MeandO's money-shuffling

MeandO

Thanks DFW321 & badmemory.

It appears I made a mistake with the amount overpaid and I haven't reached the max limit for sub account 3 yet. There was £300 left to pay off that one and I've sent an OP of £130.25 this morning thanks to the refund previously mentioned, some cashback, vinted and a few other little amounts from various things which all added up. £169.75 to make/find in order to pay the 10% down fully on that account then before tackling account no.1.

OH and I had a nice couple of days away with very few spends and a £24 parking fee waived due to issues with a room at one hotel which was a bit of a win. We were so full on breakfast that we ate very little and didn't use the clubcard restaurant voucher so will use that up another time. We bought a couple of TGTG bags which contained wraps etc which fed up twice for a 'hotel room picnic' as we didn't want big meals. We walked a lot - 10 miles on day 1! - and mooched around a few charity shops we found on the way. I bought a stunning book shaped vase for £5.99 which cheers me up every time I look at it! I'll post a picture if I'm able to.
I felt really de-stressed after using the spa and relaxing for a day but unfortunately all stress and then some has returned this week as DS is being particularly obtuse, argumentative and just downright rude and hurtful to me at times. He has upset me several times already this week and doesn't seem to care. It seems his father had similar treatment at the weekend so at least I know it's not directed solely at me. I haven't handled it well this week, I shall try and put on a braver face and turn the week around from this afternoon. Wish me luck. :(

The window man came and measured up again yesterday to order the new windows, they should take about 6-8 weeks to be made then installed. I've chased the roofer again as have heard nothing from him. Scaffolding is STILL up and no work has started.

Three loads of washing have been done this morning, one (large) load is in the dryer and the rest on the airer to dry outside if the rain holds off.
This evening I shall try and keep busy, I need distractions. I'll make a cake for a birthday in OH's family and have made a list of chores to tackle. DS's tea is already planned as I cooked too much chicken last night so have made it in to chicken pittas, jacket potato and veg/salad stuff for tonight for him. I'll be having last night's leftover portion of chicken curry but with a jacket, I'm so sick of rice as that's all DS wants to eat these days.

I am almost out of both dishwasher tablets and laundry pods so looked up prices online, then I remembered my Parents gave me a big box of 'useful things' to come back with and there was a box of each in there alongside toothpaste, mouthwash, dish washing cloths and a brush and lots of other household things. My wonderful Mum and Dad have saved me again, I don't deserve them. Had a little cry about missing them too today, emotions are really high from the rows with DS for the past two days. I hope this all gets easier soon. :( xx

Newstartforme

Sending a big hug your way , dear meando , it definitely will get easier , youngsters these days face so many pressures and unfortunately most take it out on those they love the most at home , be assured it will pass and he will be your best pal again before too long . Your mum and dad know how well you do and are showing that by trying to help you , you must miss them so much . Hope you have a relaxing evening xx

badmemory

To be blunt - at least he is taking it out on the ex & not just you although I suspect the ex is somewhat less sympathetic. Could he just be jealous. You have a nice time with OH whilst he isn't there & he suspects his father is having a nice time when he isn't there. In time his life will move on & he will just be concerned if his washing is being done & these moods will be a thing of the distant past. I still wonder which is best. My DS hasn't seen his father since he almost 9 when he went to live with the younger model. It has left him with different issues, but issues none the less.

Mrs_Money_Penny

Sending hugs teenagers are hard work x

MeandO

Thank you for your kindness Newstartforme, badmemory and Mrs_Money_Penny, it was much appreciated when I read your comments last week. There has been an improvement in the mood in the house and I got to the bottom of some of what was bothering DS and have tried to help him through it. I completely understand why it is annoying him - it is to do with his father - and I have tried to discuss the subject with both him and his father as amicably as possible. I can't change it for DS but I have tried to improve things for him going forward. I am also trying to deal with the normal teen grumpiness better and have to keep reminding myself not to take it personally, although it is extremely hard at times. I had a discussion with a staff member at DS's school last week about an admin error and they had nothing but praise for DS and his attitude, behaviour and demeanour which was lovely to hear and DS had a big smile on his face when I shared that conversation and praise with him.

I am so very tired today. I haven't had the best few nights of sleep and am struggling with aches and pains across my whole body. Walking was difficult yesterday due to my painful knee and I really need to get back to concentrating on my health and fitness and losing more weight but I'm finding it very difficult to find the strength and mindset to do anything at the moment. it is difficult when everything hurts.

The finances have altered a bit in that I swept around £700 to the mortgage OP's from my ISA. It seems I don't need to part with any money for the new windows until after they're fitted, so the funds will sit in my account longer and I didn't want to breach the UC savings thresholds, so sent a chunk to paying down the mortgage.

New totals:

Mortgage at highest: £132,500, Now: £52,198

Mortgage OP’s: £25,909.36


Sub a/c 1: £507.93/£2402.79
Sub a/c 2 £1479/£1479 ✅
Sub a/c 3: £1062.15/£1062.15 ✅
Sub a/c 4: £750/£750 ✅

So, £1894.86 to find/make/save to pay the full 10% allowance this year.

Last week, two items sold which had been listed for months, one on ebay and one on vinted, both making £8 each. I also received £10 CB from our mobile switches at the start of the year. £18 has been sent to clear the CC of a few little spends I put on there and the £8 from vinted will be sent as a mortgage OP when it clears.

My lovely Mum and Dad sent me £20 in the post today for some Mother's Day treats which I also intend to pay off the mortgage instead as I really don't need anything and paying the mortgage down makes me feel better.

Two loads of washing have been done this morning and I've combined them as one load in the dryer. It's wet and drizzly here today so no chance of line drying.

I am doing quite well on the grocery budget this month and still have over £100 left on the Asda £250 gift card I purchased on pay day. There's also a small amount of cash left in the groceries pot for any shopping needed from other shops. The freezers and cupboard is also well stocked so we have more than enough in and a loose meal plan of sorts.

This week I'm going to try and focus on looking after myself a little bit more and try to keep the calmness that was joyous to feel in the house in parts at the weekend. Focusing on the little things is really helping me. My daffodils both inside and out of the house continue to bring joy, as does a nice cup of coffee enjoyed on the sofas in the 'new' space that is the front room. I have been cooking some new recipes which has been interesting and rewarding. Light-hearted laughs with DS and hugs when he is giving them out continue to be the best bringers-of-joy and I treasure those moments.

Sending everyone much love for a good week ahead. xx

Newstartforme

So glad to hear you sounding brighter , do hope you manage a good sleep tonight , it really does affect everything when sleep is poor, lovely to get compliments regarding your DS xx

MeandO

Thank you Newstartforme xx Unfortunately I had an even worse night of last night, my fitbit tells me I had about 5 hours 😐️ so I am hoping my first coffee of the day will help me through.

A trip to asda to pick up bananas, spring onions, taco seasoning, yogurts and toothpaste last night (it appears the current toothpaste we have is irritating DS's skin around his mouth). I also bought two packs of YS sausages reduced to £1.16 which I'll split and freeze today and four rolls of birthday paper which were on sale for 25p a roll which was good timing as I had practically run out of wrapping paper. I also popped to HB and picked up cling film, stir fry sauces and two sets of solar lights for my Dad's birthday which I'll wrap and take with me on our next trip home.

Lots to do today so will catch up later. Have a good day all xx

MeandO

I don’t know why sleep isn’t my friend this week but last night was pretty terrible on the zzzzz front too. 5 hours seems to be the key number this week. :( I’m just exhausted and would love to have a few days off to myself but no chance of that unfortunately.
Work has been busy and chaotic. Home life with DS has been good this week with some lovely moments and I’ve done my best to keep calm and diffuse any stressful situations, it’s hard on little sleep though. OH is being a bit ‘needy’ at the moment and I feel like I can’t move or have any time to myself. All I feel like doing at the moment is relaxing, pottering around my house with a bit of decluttering thrown in and just taking time out. OH’s idea of evenings is usually always TV focused, whereas I barely watch it and prefer to potter, do a few little jobs, rearrange things, declutter or, like last night, move furniture round! I don’t want to be sat in front of the tv, it feels like a waste of time and a little bit of resentment is building up at the moment as when I’m not with DS, it is automatically assumed I am with OH. I love seeing him but sometimes I just want a night to myself or to see my friend or to browse round the shops by myself. Last weekend I popped to home sense to look for something specific and OH insisted he wanted to come. I was having a lovely time just browsing round until OH had obviously had enough and was bugging me to hurry up as he was fed up. It really annoyed me, he has no patience yet always says it’s me who has very little patience. It feels like I have two stroppy teenagers sometimes. 😕

Sorry, moan over.

DS wanted a few more bits to take on his trip so we popped to the sports shop tonight and spent £51. 😣 I was hoping to use a voucher towards it but apparently they no longer take them. I’ll transfer the money from the school/sports pot shortly.

I need to now not spend much money as there’s two weeks until payday and this is the most difficult part of the month. There’s nearly £70 left on the Asda gift card so I need to make that last, although we are well stocked up so should only really need fruit/milk/eggs etc.

Off to try and coax DS to go to bed now so that I can get to bed before 10.30pm for a change. I’m not hopeful it’ll work. Night all x

MeandO

Morning all,

Another week has passed and I'm impatiently for payday, a week today. Grocery shopping is going ok and I have around £35 left on the Asda card and around £10 in the grocery pot in cash which I will make suffice. We need some yogurts, fruit, milk and a little bit of veg which I will pick up at the weekend. This morning I opened a carton of long life milk I bought months ago for no-milk-left-in-the-house-emergencies and have used that to make a milky coffee for myself in the pod machine/milk frother - it's fine in coffee. Annoyingly, I found another carton at the back of the cupboard which was well out of date (last year!) so that got wasted I'm afraid.

I defrosted some braising beef overnight and have prepped a Chinese 5 spice beef recipe from the Good Food website, which we'll have with some boiled rice. It's currently in the slow cooker so hopefully will be an easy and tasty meal tonight for DS and I.
Last night DS wanted a favourite previous batch-cooked meal from the freezer and asked if he could take some food to school for lunch today instead of buying from the canteen. I'd taken some marinated chicken out to cook for last night so cooked that for a lunch box meal for today for him instead.

I had a lovely couple of hours last night pottering around and tidying the utility room and kitchen, re-purposing storage and re-arranging things to be tidier. I even tackled the dreaded tupperware drawer! 😁 Four storage tins got emptied and most of the contents binned or put for charity, so there's just four small drawers to tackle in one unit and then that's as much as I'm able to do in that room. The room needs ripping out and doing properly as previous owners (badly) fitted the old kitchen units in there which are all well past their best, don't match and are falling apart in places, but that won't be happening anytime soon due to funds. There's a whole heap of things to tackle and pay on the list for before that's even considered.

I also made a start on digging out the borders around the lawn in the garden yesterday. The turf was originally laid too close to the fences and I struggled to dig it all out on my own at the time so the plants were probably planted a bit too close to the fences and the borders weren't well defined. I've cut in and removed 75% of the turf that needs to go, I just need to dig it all over and move some waste turf and then I can get on with digging out 4 or 5 plants and relocating them. One big cordyline which has grown huge has already been relocated to a large pot and is sitting in a nice position at the back of the garden, partially covering an ugly wall. I'll more or less be starting again with the borders other than the few plants that are currently in them, so I need to look out for some cheap plants or bulbs to keep the cost down.

The sunshine must have flicked a 'get stuff done' switch in me because I also painted started the mammoth task of painting the whole perimeter fences last night! It hasn't been done since it was installed 4 years ago and needed doing. I bought 4 tubs of fence paint last year in the sale at £3 a tub instead of £12 each so am thanking my past self for that saving. I managed to get around a third of the fence done with one tub and called it a night instead of opening another as my joints were screaming at me. I'll get some more done this evening and will hopefully finish the entire fence (facing sides) by the end of the weekend. I'll re-asses how much is left then and maybe tackle the back of the fence (where I can access it) with any remaining paint.

The velux windows are hopefully being replaced this weekend so the roof shouldn't leak from then on which will be a novelty after so long. I've made a list of jobs I need to do around the house with the hope of crossing as many off as possible whilst I have to be at home this weekend. Some are bigger than others and I won't get all done, but I'll give it a go.

I've stripped DS's bed and that laundry is all out on the line drying. There's another load currently in the machine which will join that outside when it's finished. It's so nice to peg the washing out without worrying about it raining.

Back to the budget, and I have £27.76 sat in the mortgage overpayment pot after winning £30 on a free spin offer. It was up to £40 after being combined with some cashback, but I had to get petrol this morning as the car was running low. There was £24 left in the fuel pot, but I filled the car up instead of just a top up and the massive jump in petrol prices meant it cost more than normal. I'm going to leave the OP pot there for now and hopefully won't need to dip into it for anything before payday then I'll send it off to the mortgage.

Best get on, lots to do! Have a lovely, sunny day all. xx

MeandO

I’ve just finished the second instalment of fence paining and have got through a second tub. There’s two left which should be enough to do the whole of one side and hopefully one length of the outside that is accessible. My knees and back are on fire but it feels good to be getting it done and it’s lovely to spend time outside.
I also put some bunting my Mum made for me last year up on our summer house/shed which has really cheered it up and looks lovely flapping in the breeze. It’s a little bit of my Mum’s handiwork in the garden too. ❤️ She made some a few years back which lasted a couple of years out there and I now have this length and another to replace when it gets too weathered.

I forgot to mention earlier that I dropped another ounce of donations to the charity shop yesterday, A small TV that was. Previously in DS’s room but no longer needed (and was originally gifted to us) and a black bag full of clothes and items that haven’t sold on fb or vented for some time. I would rather donate them and have the space now in what is turning into ‘The big Spring de-clutter mission.’ On that theme, I filled another black bag and a second bag for life full of items that DS had grown out of - some toys, tech items, bedding, clothes etc and a lamp that I don’t have a place for in this house, I tried to sell a few of the items for a while to no avail and offered them to a friend that didn’t reply, so they’re going to charity. They’re in the car, I’ll try and drop them off this week.

Tonight I may tackle the four drawers of doom whilst I’m on a roll!