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And now we go again...
Comments
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Good news that your tax code is sorted. I don’t think it’s fair to tax on savings interest when you’ve already been taxed on the income that’s funded the savings 😖
I’ve got £1.25 on my C0 0p app so thinking about getting the dine in for £10 deal.
I get knocked down but I get up again (Chumbawamba, Tubthumping)4 -
When my grandparents died and we were sorting the house, the first thing I took was an orange plastic handled fish slice from the 70s. I use it regularly and it always makes me smile. So many memories of it living next to my Nans cooker, and her using it for all sorts of things. I have quite a bit of kitchen stuff but that's one of my most treasured (and used) possessions. I also later had her sunburst clock that I had been looking as since I was born, often having my nappy changed in front of the fire that it lived over. It's up in my living room now, above my fire. I no longer need my nappy changed in front of it though, you'll be glad to hear!
Debts 04/01/25 02/03/26
Natwest2 £6,509.97 £4,940
NatWest CC £7,612.74 £6,465
Lloyds CC £6,112.60 £4,335
1st Direct CC £176.03 £33.94
CC total £20,411.34 £15,773.94
TSB OD £500 £0
1st Direct OD £600 £0
Car loan £4,000 £3,800
1st Direct Loan £10,684.44 £7,425
Total £36,195.78 £26,998.94
EF £1,500.38
HF £175.547 -
My iron is almost 30 years old, but then it's only been used a handful of times 😂
"Good financial planning is about not spending money on things that add no value to your life in order to have more money for the things that do". Eoin McGee6 -
Ah that's good to know Paspatur - thank you. That said, I know if I go in and look at the range I'll be tempted to buy something I don't actually need!
MSE Stuff:
- S&S Isa is still doing nicely - that will likely last as long as the 🍊🤡 doesn't do anything silly!
- One Pr1nc1p@l1ty 6 month reg saver (issue 3) matured today - I've combined the money into another maturity account while I decide what to do with it, but rumour has it that they are about to release an Issue 5 so I might just end up going that route instead.
- Spare Maturity account has had a request to close sent on it just to tidy things up
- Washing was done last night at a vaguely decent electricity price, and has got popped onto the airer this morning before we left
- Free exercise via walking to the office from the car and back later and I'm intending to do my yoga tonight too - nearly at the end of the Flow challenge now so will have to work out what to move on to!
- Tonights food will be the remaining two pasties I made on sunday - I'll probably do a pile of assorted veg with them I think (including runner beans as the freezer still contains a wholly unreasonable amount of them!)
- Need to check the meal plan to see what it says for tomorrow as well - hopefully something from the freezer!
- New toaster is ordered - much as I would like to have got it from a physical store or at second best one of the "normal" online retailers, it was substantially cheaper from the Big River site so from there it is coming!
- Finally managed to redeem the big river voucher from my TeeEssBee bank switch - £25 now sitting on the account - I was tempted to do it before buying the new toaster but in the end I've decided to keep it for something I want/need personally. The switch incentive and ongoing cashback are both going back into central funds, but I don't see why I shouldn't get SOME personal benefit!
The weekend is shaping up to be quite a sociable one - we've got friends staying over on Friday night on their way down to Kent, then I'm meeting a pal in London on Saturday for beers too - we've both agreed that day-drinking is the way forwards there and I'm sorting out a few decent pubs to amble our way between! Depending on the weather I might see if a local friend fancies a litter-picking session and a cuppa on Friday - she asked if I was up for it and I initially said no as I thought I'd be busy, but I'm rethinking a bit now.
🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25
Balance as at 31/08/25 = £ 95,450.00. Balance as at 31/12/25 = £ 91,100.00
SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her9 -
Weekend plans sound very good. Hope you find something nice to use the voucher on.
LTotal Debt Dec 07 £59875.83 Overdrafts £2900,New Debt Figure ZERO !!!!!!:j 08/06/2013
Lucielle's Daring Debt Free Journey
DFD Before we Die!!!! Long Haul Supporter #1244 -
The voucher has so far been used to buy a new pair of insoles (a bit dull, but needed) and a diffuser which should fit my hairdryer and enable me to dry my hair curly - although we'll see how that goes, my hairstyling prowess is far from legendary! Still got £11.xx of it left too - which might yet go to restocking my salted licorice supplies!
🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25
Balance as at 31/08/25 = £ 95,450.00. Balance as at 31/12/25 = £ 91,100.00
SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her6 -
Well the new toaster is shockingly bad, and will be going back. It's a Breville one - a double long-slot, and I've no idea whether they are just trying to get it to cover too wide an area or what, but first go through it toasts the break on one side not the other, then when you turn the slices round and set it going again it burns right round the edges. It was passable for toasting crumpet, but I far more often toast bread, so it's unfit for purpose as far as I'm concerned. MrEH attempted to to the return this morning but failed as our post office reckoned the box was too big for their big river returns counter - I smell BS as I've returned bigger stuff there in the past, but "whatever" as the kids say! We'll lug it to the other PO on Friday morning and hope they'll be more obliging! (And I will try and find a way of reporting the failure at the other one to big river, too).
So annoyingly it's now back to the drawing board and see what else I can find - I think this time we'll just go for a standard one albeit a 4-slice, ideally I wanted to avoid the bulk of one of those on the worktop, but so be it.
Spendiness:
- takeaway with our pals - but planned and ended up with leftovers that fed MrEH and me on Saturday evening as well, which was most useful!
- Beers and food for me out with another pal on Saturday in London - plus the travel - £10 on my Oyster was from the joint account, and the rest of the spending via my personal spends of course, and it ended up cheaper than I might have expected as we did the well known cutlery chain pub for lunch, and only had a couple of pints elsewhere - lots of chatting and a brilliant catch-up though!
- shopping this week has been around £28 I think - which is fine.
MSE Stuff:
- return for the toaster sorted promptly - I'm not letting them keep our money for that for longer than needed!
- Freebies from Olio - a pot of coriander, a couple of stalks of lemongrass and two packs of Lebanese flatbreads which was an utter win as I love those! Collected those on the way home last night to avoid extra travel.
- Lots of washing this week (spare bed bedding, MrEH's rugby kit etc) but all being done overnight when the prices are at least a bit lower.
🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25
Balance as at 31/08/25 = £ 95,450.00. Balance as at 31/12/25 = £ 91,100.00
SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her7 -
I'm happy with our toaster. It's a 4 slot one but very compact so doesn't take up much room - Tefal Loft.
I get knocked down but I get up again (Chumbawamba, Tubthumping)6 -
Eek - that was a lengthy break from my diary! The last couple of weeks have been mostly about trying to fend off the nasty bronchitis type lurgy that is doing the round, and failing miserably. Although mostly feeling human again, I do still have the most delightful rattly cough. I had to put off my planed trip to Lincoln at the end of last week - although the Reds didn't fly anyway (weather) so not too much of a blow.
MSE Stuff:
- New toaster was acquired - a D3 L0ngh1 one which seems to be mostly OK, although once again it has an unevenness to the browning which is irritating. The reviews across the board seem to suggest that most modern ones have this issue though - and that includes the really pricey ones too. This one was at least just £50 so slightly cheaper than the one that got returned.
- Feb grocery spending ended up at just fractionally over £200 - but that included a quite high farmers market spend and the stocking up I did earlier in the month, so I'm happy enough with that.
- My car needed two tyres - as usual I shopped around and I'm happy I got the best price. Cheerfully that also turned out to be from our locally local independent place - I'd always rather use them if I can. Because my car has no spare my tyres are always painfully pricey though - £165 from the car account to cover this.
- Surplus at the end of the month got split between a chunk towards the planned final bits of the electrical work - now happening this week- and £100 each to the mortgage and PBs.
- Nabbed some bread from Olio yesterday and the lady offered a pack of rolls as well which I gratefully accepted. We're now well stocked for weekend breakfasts and some lunches as well.
- Two OP's made to the mortgage this morning - £100 standard start of the month plus £197 for the Council Tax not needing paid this month. That sees us into the £88ks.
- Remembered to check and the upcoming L T museum depot open weekend is the one we get to attend free as friends of the Museum so I've booked that for us.
- Batch cooked some curry on Friday afternoon - three portions for the freezer so that helps with Friday fakeaways!
- Needed to replace our wok - we bought a non stick one with a well known Chinese chef's face on the packaging when we moved in as our old carbon steel wasn't flat bottomed enough to work on the electric hob, but it's not lasted well. £14.99 on a new basic carbon steel flat bottomed one in H0m3s3nse so hopefully that will be OK. Also spotted a S@bati3r all purpose knife reduced to £4 and although it wasn't strictly speaking a "need" I wasn't leaving it behind at that price!
Another spend over the weekend will come from our personal spends - I managed to nab 2 tickets to see the Manic Street Preachers at the Royal Albert Hall in a few weeks time. SO glad I thought to check for them doing any live dates as they're a real favourite and great live. The tickets are the lowest priced at the venue (Choir seats up beside the organ which is a location I personally really enjoy) and so we've only paid £81. This also ticks the box of trying to say yes to spontaneous nice things!
🎉 MORTGAGE FREE (First time!) 30/09/2016 🎉 And now we go again…New mortgage taken 01/09/23 🏡
Balance as at 01/09/23 = £115,000.00 Balance as at 31/12/23 = £112,000.00
Balance as at 31/08/24 = £105,400.00 Balance as at 31/12/24 = £102,500.00
£100k barrier broken 1/4/25
Balance as at 31/08/25 = £ 95,450.00. Balance as at 31/12/25 = £ 91,100.00
SOA CALCULATOR (for DFW newbies): SOA Calculatorshe/her8 -
Sounds like you nabbed lots of bargains! Hope the cough disappears quickly.
LTotal Debt Dec 07 £59875.83 Overdrafts £2900,New Debt Figure ZERO !!!!!!:j 08/06/2013
Lucielle's Daring Debt Free Journey
DFD Before we Die!!!! Long Haul Supporter #1244
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