Countdown to Part Time…

Blackcats

Hope you feel better soon.
I'm the opposite with my personal spends pot - don't spend it until towards the end of the month and then have a bit of a splurge so I need to train myself that it's ok not to spend it if there's nothing I need to spend it on.  

Spinayarn

Blackcats said:

Hope you feel better soon.
I'm the opposite with my personal spends pot - don't spend it until towards the end of the month and then have a bit of a splurge so I need to train myself that it's ok not to spend it if there's nothing I need to spend it on.  

What would you do with anything left over at the end of the month? Would you roll it over?
I had £17.00 go out the incidentals pot for a purchase made on Saturday. This was for some wool wanted for a specific project. I can justify it partly by knowing it is for something specific and it was vintage wool from eBay at a good price. Now I do have to avoid buying any more yarn for the rest of this pay month.

I’m going to visit my daughter at uni in a couple of weeks. When I did this in October I hadn’t really budgeted for it so I think I need to put some money from the incidentals pot into another to save it until then. 

Spinayarn

Morning all. Coming back on here is definitely helping me focus. I went to the post office and the vet’s late yesterday afternoon. They’re both in a precinct and part of me was tempted to pop in another shop and buy some sweet treats. Well, neither my waistline nor my bank account need that so I managed to drive home without spending anything else. 😀

I also transferred £60 into a pot to pay for the train and some lunch for my daughter and me when I go to see her later this month.
I got an offer through yesterday from our local theatre offering me 2 free tickets for press night for a new production. (I’ve got them because of my job) So I’ve asked a colleague if she wants to come too so it will be an ice free evening out later in the month.

Car loan and loan payment for one bank loan gone out today.

Definitely feeling more in control again. 

enthusiasticsaver

That CC2 is coming down nicely then no CCs left, just the loans. 

I go through my diary for the month when I get my personal spends, take so much out in cash for odds and ends, allocate some for hair, nails and toiletries and so much for socialising/trips etc and I put some in a personal savings pot to save for walking holidays or trips with friends or my DDs. This month I paid for theatre tickets for me and 2 DDs in the summer. 

Blackcats

Good morning @Spinayarn - the Blackcats budgeting system doesn't have a "standard operating model protocol" 😉 in place  for underspends from the personal spends pots.  It's more in the realms of  "mm what shall we do with this pleasant occurrence?".
mr BC who often has leftovers diverts any spare £'s to the car pot.  This is to cover things that he likes to fiddle about with over and above the usual car tax, servicing, insurance, breakdown etc.   
I'm surprised that I no longer think that it's essential to use the money up by spending it on anything just because I can.  At the moment I'm purring my leftovers into our entertainment pot.  This covers concerts, shows, subscriptions and general fun stuff.  It gets very depleted at the start of the year as our favourite concert venue releases tickets for their summer music festival and they are very pricey.  Topping up the pot means we are in a good place if other concerts are announced (although if it was very special we would still buy tickets and then repay the cost which is probably a bit naughty)
sorry a long but not necessarily very systematic answer!

good idea to put some spending money aside for your visit to your daughter.  

Spinayarn

I managed another day without spending any money yesterday. Had a long day at work and I’m still not feeling great. 

Husband has been bringing home free sandwiches from work - he’s been getting any leftover sandwiches and biscuits that are going out of date which has helped me to have something for lunch. 

Spinayarn

A pretty good day money wise I think today. We did parkrun this morning - both my DH and I walked it. Free parking and no coffee shop visit after, so that was good. When I was in the shower afterwards I realised I was very nearly out of soap. I prefer to use a bar of nice soap rather than shower gel etc because of single use plastic so I was trying to figure out where I might be able to find something at as cheap a price as possible. A gift from my daughters for Mothers Day sprang to mind although this is still quite a while off.

Anyway, lunch was free cheese toasties brought home by DH last night and then I took some clothes to the charity shop. I had a look round whilst I was there and found a Sanctuary Spa Shower Gift Set with two full size bottles of shower gel and one of body lotion for £3.00. Bargain. 😀 They should last me until Mother’s Day.

I also bought a skirt suitable for work for £5 and a comfortable black long sleeve top (£3) for just any kind of general wear. Pretty happy with them too. Husband had been muttering something about sausage rolls earlier in the day so I bought one for him and one for DD from Greggs as a little treat.

This afternoon I was watching a knitting podcast where the designer was admitting she was struggling with finances due to issues with moving house etc. I knew I had previously wanted to buy one of her patterns and I also knew that I actually had £5 credit on a credit card from where I had slightly overpaid the final balance. Aha! I thought. I can help her a little without actually spending money and saves me trying to work out how to get that £5 back! 

Overall, a pretty good day with the finances, I feel.

Spinayarn

Well it’s nearly the end of January - it’s going quickly, isn’t it?

Last night we bought takeaway and I had the leftover pizza for breakfast this morning. Not exactly the healthiest choice… 🤦‍♀️
I got a “Too Good to Go” box from Aldi last night. It had loads of stuff in it so my lunch was mussels in white wine sauce with a slice of bread (both TGtG) followed by some vegan mango yogurt (TGtG) which was very nice mixed with a couple of spoons of muesli. Tonight I’m having a veggie green Thai curry - also from the Aldi box. Husband is making chicken pie to have with gravy and roast pots with the DD1. I’m not keen on that kind of dinner so I’m happy to have the curry. There was a bag of mixed veg in the box so we’ll both use some of those in our respective dinners.

I have some work to do this afternoon so I’m just trying to persuade myself to eat the frog and get it done.

In theory, I shouldn’t have anything to spend now until Thursday when I’ll go to my knitting group and have a coffee there. I skipped my smol delivery of dishwasher tablets for this month as we still have an unopened box, so that’s £6.30 saved from the budget. I’m really hoping I’m going to have a little extra to lay off the CC this month as I didn’t pay off as much as I wanted last month.

Spinayarn

So this morning I noticed that I’d had 91p taken out of my account as a direct debit for the credit card I had spent on over Christmas. Well, I had paid off about £190 but there was still about £30 left in the balance. I decided to just clear it this morning with some money out  incidentals pot. Well, that’s it sorted now.

a very little money came through from my side hustle. That’s in a separate account for now. I need to do some work for this over the weekend and I’m hoping I will get some cash from it in March and April but I need to put in the work in February for that to happen.

Spinayarn

Good morning. Last day of January. Not much to report here. Yesterday was a normal day at work. I was in at 7:20am as there’s so much to do. Left at 5:30. This morning I went rummaging in the back of the cupboard for some jam. I had a feeling that there was a jar of my mum’s homemade jam lurking back there. Sure enough, a jar of golden plum jam from 2019. Managed to get it open and it’s perfectly fine. Found some other rather strange looking jars and cans looking shifty back there so I feel a cupboard clear out could be needed. My husband is terrible for buying random seasonings and sauces then using them once. The top shelf of the fridge is also testament to this. It’s a chutney graveyard.