MeandO's money-shuffling

Honeysucklelou2

Hope your daffodils are bringing you some joy at this time.  I often get some daffodils - the vibrant colour always seems to give a lift…

Glad you were able to enjoy the time with your friend.

MeandO

Thank you for popping by and commenting everyone, your support is always appreciated. xx

It's been a little while since I posted as DS had a birthday and he and  I went away on a mini break abroad (paid for last year) and then to see my parents for a few days, shortly followed by OH's birthday celebrations. It's been a really hectic few weeks and I don't feel like I have rested for any of that time so am hoping for a quieter week and some early nights. 
It has also been a spendy few weeks so I haven't been able to pay much more than a few £'s off the mortgage or save anything. It seems I have been in a constant battle to pay the credit card off every time I have used it. The remaining balance is around £160 which will be paid off by the end of the week when I get paid. I shouldn't need to use it again for some time now as there's no major purchases or trips planned. 

My house pot will diminish greatly at the end of the week when I have to pay for the boiler and heating repairs at a cost of £231.60. There's only £300 in the pot presently so I need to build that back up asap in time for the house insurance to be paid for in the summer and any other things that go wrong with the house.
The gifts pot is also nearly empty so that will get a minimum of £150 a month moving forward to build it up for Christmas.
DS's phone broke too this past week so I had to get another one. It wasn't insured as was a few years old. My parents have very kindly covered this for him despite him offering to pay for it himself. 

The new TD arrived but has yet to be used as it's sunny today. I'm hoping the washing will dry outside as there's two large loads on the line. The new peri-menopause vitamins also arrived and I have been taking them for a few weeks. We'll see if they have any effect. I haven't felt as low as I did a few weeks back, thankfully, but I'm taking it a day at a time.

I've had a quote and forms to write a new will - mine was done several years ago and needs scrapping and starting again. It's going to cost around £180 but may be more as I need to lock away funds from DS's father so he can't access any of DS's money if anything was to happen to me and apparently this can be a bit more complicated. I can guarantee his father would spend DS's inheritance on himself and justify it to everyone (and himself) that it was 'in DS's best interests.' I will fill in the forms, but submitting and paying for it will have to wait for a month or two until I have the money.

I've cleaned the bathroom today and sprayed some mould cleaner on the blind which had black mould spots on it. I'm glad to say it's all come off so looks much better. All DS's birthday decorations have been taken down today and the house has had a tidy up. I've offered a friend of mine some of DS's old toys for her little boy which she has jumped at, so that will be a few more bits gone to a good home shortly. I have a charity bag sorted and ready to go and a bag of items to distribute to family members. 
My student loan deferment application arrived last week which I need to fill in and send off. I had one of the last of the old mortgage-style loans and I have never earnt above the threshold to repay it. I believe it will get wiped next year or the year after.

I think that's a round up of happenings in the past couple of weeks, hopefully the next few will be a lot less spendy! 

MeandO

I had to use the new tumbler dryer for 10 minutes or so today as the clothes didn’t quite dry on the line. It’s much quieter than the last one and seems more efficient at drying so I’m pleased with it so far.

I checked the gas and electric account today and they claim my bill was £168 last month which was the highest it’s ever been, That was mainly gas so must have been from the heating as I did have it on a lot. I’m on a mission to reduce that drastically this month as they claim my minimum payment will rise to over £200 otherwise which I absolutely cannot afford, so the heating’s gone down a degree and the timer has been set 15 minutes later in the mornings so will only be on for 45 minutes each morning. It hasn’t been cold enough for the heating to come on tonight so that’s a win. I was feeling chilly but just put an extra jumper and my slippers on instead. DS said he wasn’t cold either, he’s always in shorts anyway.

MeandO

Evening all, 

Bit of a cr&ppy day today. Work was a chore and ongoing IT issues meant everything takes twice as long and was twice as difficult. Motivation and morale is not great at the best of times and it’s even more difficult when there’s no support or contact from anyone in charge.

Later, a good friend phoned me which was lovely to catch up, but she spent 3 hours moaning about her relationship issues and whilst I tried to give her the best advice I could, it kind of went round in circles and I felt totally drained by the end of the call. Three hours. 😯 I know nothing will change for her either unfortunately as she will just keep doing the same thing. I came off the call and instantly blew my diet being the emotional eater I am. I’m not doing well with the diet lately and am really beating myself up about it today. I just can’t seem to find the headspace to do it. 

Attempts to reduce the gas bill are ongoing and I’ve since turned the heating down a bit more. DS hasn’t noticed and is fine but I’m cold so am currently under a blanket on the sofa after having a hot shower. If DS is cold it’ll go back up but I’ll be fine and will just put on extra layers. I need to get that bill down. If it was just me tonight I’d have been in my bed and under the duvet an hour ago!

I spent £21.99 in Asda today on some things we’d run out of. £5 of that was for OH for which he’ll reimburse me. That should be the last of the grocery shopping before payday on Friday, hopefully. I’m trying not to spend another Penny so that I’ll have around £70 left to go towards paying the CC off. 

Tea tonight was creamy Tuscan chicken made from one of the p!nch of nom recipe books. It was really lovely and one DS enjoyed too so I’ve made a note of it on a notepad. I’m going to try and make a little go-to recipe list of dishes that are healthy, reasonably cheap and that I can make for DS and I. Sometimes it’s hard to think of new things to cook and I find myself cooking the same things. 

Today I’ve been organising cupboards a little more. My Dad managed to find some YS deals on fabric softener and cleaning products a little while ago so they very kindly sent me back with 4 bottles of softener and numerous cleaning products. I’m ever so grateful as these will save me so much money, I always seem to be running out of fabric softener. Unfortunately whilst trying to fit things in under the kitchen sink I found that the cupboard was a bit wet. Water is obviously leaking from one of the joints around the U bend, so I’m hoping it’s something I can fix myself with a bit of help from OH. I really don’t have the money to pay someone to do it. 

Aimingforthegoodlife

Glad you had a lovely time away, you work so hard you deserve it! Urgh to the boiler needing spends on it, so frustrating when you try so hard to build these pots. But at least you have them, no need for credit! The will sounds like a good idea, hopefully it will be unnecessary but your ex needs to be erased for sure!

Getting the cost of heating down is so hard, the weather is milder than normal, which helps a little but I still get chilly! Love my hot water bottle!

Elisheba

Glad you had a little break away - they do tend to lift the spirits. Regarding the heating, my nibling got me a fake Oodie for Xmas, and it's been an absolute godsend. When the weather is fairly mild like it is now, I can wear it in the evenings or when I'm WFH, and I don't need the heating on at all. It's brilliant!

MeandO

Thanks both, I do have a dryrobe (which I've had since I used to open water swim, not for doing the school run or shopping! ) so could wear that if I'm really cold, but it's been hung on the back of the door since then unused so I am considering selling it on vinted for some extra £'s. Mornings, it's warm enough in the house and I will turn the heating off timer for then, it's just late afternoons/evenings that I'm feeling chilly. I think it may be just me though!

Talking of heating, I've just waved the heating engineer off although I'm no further forward. Apparently he wasn't told by his office he was supposed to repair the radiator and the part he fitted in the boiler hasn't fixed the problem. Give me strength. I won't be using this company again.

MeandO

Payday! 
I've paid the credit card off, sent £180 to the car/house pot, £175 to the gifts pot, £25 to DS's uniform/clothing fund and just over £330 to the EF which finally brings it up to the £6k mark.  
£100 will go to the hols/fun pot by SO shortly and £25 to DS's Isa which I plan on upping to £50 from next month.
£100 OP has been sent to the mortgage and everything else has been allocated in YNAB. I've allowed for all income sources coming in in the next week or so, just the child benefit which is unaccounted for and I'll allocate that when it hits the bank account in a few weeks. I'll see what the pots look like by then and if everything is healthy, hopefully it can go towards building up the house pot as the plumbing and my new Will needs to be paid for this month, ideally. 

Mrs_Money_Penny

All sounding good. Hope your feeling better xx

foxgloves

Awww, I love that I am not the only person whose spirits are lifted by the simple pleasure of £1 spent on a bunch of early daffodils! They are usually sold in bud, so I think it is partially the joy of them starting to unfurl over the next couple of days, as well as just their.....well....yellow petally loveliness!
How very annoying that your heating repairs were not fully carried out. 
Re new wills. I do agree that this is an expense very much worth paying. We had to make a new will when it occurred to us that if anything happened to us, a third of our assets would be going to a family member from whom we are now very much irrevocably estranged. That was a wake-up call, I can tell you, & it was quite a relief to get it sorted out.
Re perimenopause.....it is surprising the range of symptoms this can cause or exacerbate. I struggled quite a lot with this, & ridiculous as it may sound, didn't really realise it was due to the perimenopause until I hit the actual menopause & found that pretty much all those troublesome symptoms disappeared. I haven't really had any of the usual menopausal symptoms at all, I clearly had them all during the run-up. I think there are probably very many women struggling with a whole range of symptoms in their 40s who don't think to attribute it to hormonal changes because they still expect these to happen much closer to the menopause. Mine started in my early 40s. Menopause at 51 & a half.
Wish I'd bought some daffodils now!
F