Buying a little piece of Middle England; Manifesting my way to mortgage free.

debtfreewannabe321

Good morning all, so much cooler here today thankfully. I feel almost back to normal (yay!) 

DD swimsuit arrived and fits. Today's job is to cut her hair before she goes off to camp and to help both of them pack their bits up. DD has already done it but she's somehow squeezed a week's worth of kit and civvies into a school bag and a carrier bag 🤨 so I will find a suitable case and help her to REpack. DS hasn't started yet so will help him too. 

I will then REpack the boxes from DD room 🤣 she's brought them down quite pleased with herself but she's basically thrown everything into a banana box not wrapped- books with antique jugs with random bits of crystals etc. So I will re do it and use some of the masses of packing paper and bubble wrap I have. 

We need to call solicitors as we had an email quite late on after 7pm with what I thought was the contract but my phone wouldn't open it properly....once I got onto the laptop I could see it wasn't contracts but the house info forms from the seller whatever they're called. But we think this was the last thing to be done before contracts were ready. We ideally would like them to be ready today for us to sign and then to be sent to our seller for latest tomorrow for him to sign so exchange can go ahead next week. He's panicking a little about going on holiday right before the move. And told us he's not even packed yet, hmmmm. 😬

I did a tarot reading for a friend last night - I was glad I'd left one deck out when I got asked to do it yesterday afternoon 🤣

I am wanting a NSD today and tomorrow really to catch up on all the money spent this week... If I have to pay solicitors anything or removals I'm not counting this as it's already budgeted for. My NSD will simply be earned by staying away from daily random spends and groceries 🤣. 

It seems the kids camp is over an hour's drive away so I will need to factor in most of my afternoon at the weekend doing that. I may leave DP behind to do some bits for moving- like taking out the water filter from under the sink and replacing with the cheaper one we bought.

Nearly another week done though...I can't believe it and I've barely done any packing this week thanks to being ill. Cuppa and time to crack back on I think ☺️

debtfreewannabe321

Oh and £5 cashed out quickly on a survey site yesterday. It takes almost a week to hit the PP though but should be in as the money starts to dwindle to nothing which is good.
Still waiting on the ££ from PO.
And I have some more on Prolific ready to cash out today.

debtfreewannabe321

We've had our contracts sent through! 

We are in for signing tomorrow and they have been sent off to our seller for him to sign so he can go off and enjoy his holiday without worries. We are going to enquire about a will too. 

I've had 2 car loads of boxes and packing materials dropped off to me over the last week or so by a lady moving from the same town as us to the same city. She's just brought a load more and we have chatted each time, she seems really nice and similar age to me. She has just moved to my sister's street! Small world huh? She's told me about jobs going at the college I might be interested in, part time mostly but flexibility needed which I can do now kids are older, and term time which is great. I will get DP to help me finish off that CV I started and never finished (yes I know naughty). She has promised to send the link when the job description is live.

So I have a whole load of boxes in my hallway now, I supposed I ought to move them but was just reconciling my bank with ynab. And cashing out some survey money.

The current account for daily spends/ grocery is now at £75.08 with some more due in over the next 15 days.  

This is very low compared to usual as we have spent on other categories we don't usually. This is totally a challenge to me now though I am going to stretch the money due in and what is in there as long as possible before touching any other pots. (thankfully I do have other pots with some money in)

I need to transfer £95 out of one pot today for the prime subscription due tomorrow. 
Going to do stir fry for dinner. I found a fantastic way of getting your kids to appreciate your wholesome home cooked from scratch food. Feed them burgers and sausages and greasy rubbish food for a week straight and they will be begging you to stop  

Right okay a job list for today as I am kind of two days behind now:

1. Put all packing materials in the garage aside from what I am using this morning
2. Bring in the wardrobe box I collected the other day
3. Hang clothes that are left out and get 2 outfits from kids and put in there so they have clothes after camp
4. find an awesome CD to wake kids up with and motivate me
5. Cut DD hair when she finally gets up
6. Pack DS2 bag for camp
7. Re-pack DD bag for camp
8. Marinate tofu, soak rice
9. Finish packaging up all mirrors and paintings and glass pictures now I have some suitable packing things.
10. have a quick tidy round

I feel like I have been very frugal this move compared to last. I am more mindful about everything and because I have been mindful it means I have been more organised and therefore calmer. 
Frugal MSE ways this last month have included 

• sourcing most packing materials free (ALL boxes, 95% of the bubble wrap, ALL packing paper)
• sourcing the bits I had to pay for from fb cheaply (packing tape and bubble wrap)
• Pursuing a refund for the item I was sent in the post that wasn't up to standard (and getting to keep it woo)
• pursuing a new duvet when the one sent was also not up to standard- AND keeping the one that wasn't stitched and sitting there stitching it together by hand last night so we now have two
• Free food even if it has made us all fed up of it I am grateful it has saved me a lot of money on the grocery spends.
• Fighting our corner with the asked for reduction in house sale price- saved us £7200 
• still trying to do surveys in amongst a tip of a house and stuff everywhere to bolster income a little.
• Getting lots of quotes on removal companies & surveyors before choosing.
• I have also been looking out more for YS items when shopping and trying to coincide small shops with when they put it out (i've noticed they do it in the morning and the afternoon here)

I am sure there are more ways but I didn't do half of this last time and it ended up costing us so much to move here. 
I need to do a tip run and a CS run this week sometime too. 
Okay cracking on with those jobs now!

debtfreewannabe321

1. Put all packing materials in the garage aside from what I am using this morning
2. Bring in the wardrobe box I collected the other day
3. Hang clothes that are left out and get 2 outfits from kids and put in there so they have clothes after camp
4. find an awesome CD to wake kids up with and motivate me
5. Cut DD hair when she finally gets up
6. Pack DS2 bag for camp
7. Re-pack DD bag for camp
8. Marinate tofu, soak rice
9. Finish packaging up all mirrors and paintings and glass pictures now I have some suitable packing things.
10. have a quick tidy round
11. Re-packed all the boxes the kids tried to do themselves - thank goodness I did because there was some pretty glass ornaments in with big books on top of them  
12. sent door knocker away for a charity. Told him I am the charity this month.

About to tackle number 9 & 8. Tired already, I feel better but my energy is not 100% still so I am glad I started early. I intend to have all the pictures / mirrors packed up by the end of today though before I stop.

HotDog2020

debtfreewannabe321 said:

1. Put all packing materials in the garage aside from what I am using this morning
2. Bring in the wardrobe box I collected the other day
3. Hang clothes that are left out and get 2 outfits from kids and put in there so they have clothes after camp
4. find an awesome CD to wake kids up with and motivate me
5. Cut DD hair when she finally gets up
6. Pack DS2 bag for camp
7. Re-pack DD bag for camp
8. Marinate tofu, soak rice
9. Finish packaging up all mirrors and paintings and glass pictures now I have some suitable packing things.
10. have a quick tidy round
11. Re-packed all the boxes the kids tried to do themselves - thank goodness I did because there was some pretty glass ornaments in with big books on top of them  
12. sent door knocker away for a charity. Told him I am the charity this month.

About to tackle number 9 & 8. Tired already, I feel better but my energy is not 100% still so I am glad I started early. I intend to have all the pictures / mirrors packed up by the end of today though before I stop.

I need to do this with my list...well done..I am the queen of procrastination...Come on hotdog, get to it!!

debtfreewannabe321

Oh I procrastinate too 🤣
I've had a total meltdown over packaging up a mirror. I ended up stubbing my toe, banging my elbow and then bursting into tears over it all 😳
I think we have too much packing stuff now and it's hard to see what I need and don't need. Overwhelming...

DD is being very helpful after clearly hearing me turning the air blue after the toe stubbing and is packing her room up herself 🙈🤣

I've cut her hair so that's another job done.
DP came in and finished the mirror and the other paintings. So that's another job done too.
I'm going to get DS clothes for after camp then I've got both theirs in my room. And I know I can pack all else when they've gone. 
I will soak rice and do tofu and I think I'm nearly done for the day really!
I also need to pack DS bag but he's adamant he has done it. I said do you have shoes and he was like, well no. 🤨 So I think it's best I go check it at least.

HotDog2020

Ahhh you poor thing, I hope you feel better soon toe and energy levels, good to get others involved and take the pressure off...you sound like you are doing well...could you put anything else in the garage to get it out of the way, it should be okay for a shortwhile?

beanielou

If DA doesn’t have what he needs this time then he will remember next time. Resiliency! 

debtfreewannabe321

HotDog2020 said:

Ahhh you poor thing, I hope you feel better soon toe and energy levels, good to get others involved and take the pressure off...you sound like you are doing well...could you put anything else in the garage to get it out of the way, it should be okay for a shortwhile?

As we're packing most boxes they are being moved out to the garage. We have a large double garage and DP office probably takes just under a quarter of it. We already don't have a lot of space left ... there are boxes everywhere I turn 🤨🤣

We've also got them piled in the dining room and conservatory and we've tried to keep the living room and our bedroom clear of boxes so it's at least a stress free evening each day. When I do the kids rooms I will keep the boxes in their rooms as we don't have enough space now in the garage for two more rooms 😲

HotDog2020

You could see if there is any potential storage places near you on Stashbee, it might aleviate some of the struggles you are having and I beleive it is cheaper then official storage place...get a feel for the place don't do it if you don't think you can trust.