Arrietty's Acorns

[Deleted User]

I may being over sensitive here but just not comfortable with the label ‘idiot animal’ Just my point of view.

Arrietty

Hello Baron Dale,
thank you for popping by. I often read your posts with interest.

[Deleted User] said:

I may being over sensitive here but just not comfortable with the label ‘idiot animal’ Just my point of view.

I only used the term in my original post specifically in relation to his antics last year but I agree; it doesn't sit right with me either. He's usually referred to online as HRH ( His Royal Horseyness - I'm really not sure of the correct spelling of my made up word ) but I held back from using that here in case it offended any passing monarchists. I shall reinstate his right and proper title immediately 

Arrietty

Hello,

I'm going to have another bash at being succinct - having been nothing of the sort so far! 

Yesterday I bought lunch at work so that was £4.40 spent rather than saved. I'm allowing myself one meal a week and   as Wednesday is the mid week day it works nicely for me so I only ever have to make my lunches 2 days in a row

I always make lunch the night before as I leave for work before 7 each day. I make myself a coffee to drink while I'm getting ready in the morning, a flask of coffee to take to work, a water bottle with citrus slices in and this week I've been filling another flask with hot water to take to the yard to mix HRH's feed with after work.  The taps have been frozen a  and although there's always water available there in containers or the water troughs, I wouldn't want to eat my food mixed with icy water so I don't see why HRH should either.  I also carry a 5 litre bottle of water in the car to mix with the hot water so it's the perfect temperature for him - 

I did Not Buy Lunch today  so scooped £4.40 over into the OSA
OSA Balance £747.35

I filled the car up today which cost £60.32 but that was the first time since 16th December so nearly 5 weeks on one tank! I tend to hibernate in deep winter and once I've been to the yard after work, I'm happy to scurry home, get clean and warm, make some food, light some candles and stay there until the next morning.

Recent spending has meant that 76p has been scooped over from Current to Savings 
LSA Balance £1686.18

Streaming and Broadband are the last 2 direct debits to come out of my account each month - today - and I'm now down to just over £100 in my current account with another week to go until payday.  Having filled the car up and being unlikely to need much more than some milk, carrots and maybe chocolate, I'll be happy to reach payday with just £50 left in my account. Quite an achievement for a 5 week month over winter festive season. 

daintydaisy

Sounds like you're doing great, Arrietty. HRH sounds like he is well loved, too  we do the same for our cat, he gets a fresh glass of water each night and we make sure it is a nice temp for him to drink. What are we like! x

Arrietty

Hello again,

I'm loving that its not quite dark by 5pm and even better, for the first time this year, this morning the birds were tweeting away as I left for work which is very cheerful 

Oh dainty daisy, I'm not sure whether I'm more delighted by your cat having fresh water at the perfect temperature each night or the fact that it drinks from a glass - that's brilliant  . 
My cat (no longer with us) hated drinking bowls so I bought him an old glass dessert dish from a charity shop and he deemed that acceptable.

Fortunate to have escaped unscathed from storm Isha  - although, I haven't actually been out to check the garden but I don't have trampolines or anything so I'm sure its fine - and HRH and all the ponies and trees have remained upright which is excellent. Whilst there was a fair bit of galloping around excitedly on Saturday and Sunday they pre-storm, they soon calmed down again once it was over. 

I guess I should talk about money now so I'll start with the spending:

I went to get my bread and milk and then decided I may as well buy some more fruit and veg while I was there and other items which were on offer with nectar points.  Had a bit of panic when I realised I'd actually spent £53.16 and didn't want to run our of money in my current account so popped that on my CC - to be paid off as soon as I get the next statement.
SCC balance -£53.16

Managed to shrink a HRH item having not noticed the DO NOT TUMBLE DRY label so had to replace that at a cost of £32.99
HRH balance £417.78

And now the savings:

A few pennies have been scooped over to the linked savings account following purchase of some fuel and a new coffee flask for work and I also made my weekly £10 payment yesterday.
LSA balance £1697.49

I scooped £10 over to my fun savings account and have also Not Bought Lunch for 2 days running   The last few days I've been emptying my flask and lunch box as soon as I get home and then immediately prepping the next day's lunch and putting it in the fridge so it's all ready for the morning, I find I'm less inclined to make lunch after I've had a shower or bath and then made dinner so if I can keep to that routine it'll be great.
OSA balance = £769.45

Not exactly a saving but definitely a plus rather than a minus ...I get reminders to read my meters on the 20th of each month and whereas I used to be a bit slack and sometime not do it for a week ... I realised that means I then get a secondary bill for that week which is annoying and makes it hard to see what I'm using.
So on Saturday I jumped to it straight away and today I got the statements showing that despite having reduced my monthly payment from £120 to £90 in December, I have been charged £83.55 and I am still in credit to the tune of  £362.33.
I purposely didn't reduce my payments all last summer as I wanted to ensure I had credit to see me through the winter as I don't like to be cold.  I won't put the heating on just before I go to bed I'd rather use a hot water bottle and blanket and it's not on during the day when I'm at work because that's just wasteful - and there's only one planet we can live on - but at the weekend I'll give it a boost if I'm feeling cold. 

No other money things to report but I'm ridiculously excited for Friday as not only has it been a loooooong 5 weeks since the last payday but for the next 2 months there are no water or council tax bills to pay 

Arrietty

Hello, 
its a sunny-ish Sunday here and I'm having a slow-paced morning after a very busy week at work and a day of chores and yard time yesterday.
One of us worked very hard in our lesson and it wasn't the one with 4 legs 🙄  He didn't even break into a sweat whereas I have legs which will feel like they're on fire tomorrow!  He has a special trot which he reserves just for lessons in the school and rather than get cross, it just makes me and anyone else watching laugh.  His determination to mimic all the motions of a trot without actually going forwards any faster is just brilliant 😂

Moving on to money news; it was payday on Friday 🙌 so I spent a happy half hour scooping and shuffling pounds and pennies to my pots:

Sent £200 to HRH account for livery & bills  and spent £7.50 cash on a bale of hay - I think the previous one lasted 3 weeks which is pretty good as the bales seem a lot smaller but the horses are loving it and HRH is quite fussy.
HRH balance £607.78 + £35 cash ( after paying for the hay I found another 2 x £5 notes in the car 😁)

Transferred the first payment of the year to the account I use for saving towards car costs. I did briefly consider sending HRH money to that account as well for the sake of gaining some interest... but worked out that it would only amount to about £10 a year and that's not worth the hassle of having to keep shuffling it back and forth whenever livery or bills are due. 
SSA balance £80.00

No scoops or penny round ups since Monday to my Linked Savings Account 
LSA Balance £1697.49

And now for my favourite pot:
I didn't buy lunch at work for 4 days so scooped £16.50 across in total. As there's no water rates or council tax to be paid this month I also scooped across another £182.35  I debated scooping across the extra £20 odd I've gained from the NI cut... but then decided against it as I've been so disciplined with the Not Buying Lunch payments as well as the weekly £10 payment and I don't have a huge disposable income after horsery is paid for. 
OSA balance £960.05

Should also mention that I used the CC again (£26) when going out for dinner with my Pa during the week - I got scared at using my current account just before payday in case there was payment I had forgotten 😦. This will be cleared when i get the next statement.
CC balance -£79.16

Other spends were -£10 for a birthday gift for a friend at work and I treated myself on payday to a new lipstick and some eye cream -£47.30.  As I'm doing my absolute damnedest to NOT BUY clothes, shoes, accessories or bags this year I've chosen to allow myself £50 a month to spend on some other kind of treat on payday. I know HRH is my disposable income 'hobby' and a fairly expensive one at that but I do need to feel that I'm having a little reward just for me in return for my hours spent at work.

I don't consider drinks or meals with family or friends as a treat, nor a local trip to cinema, gallery or museum. They should be a regular part of life and therefore have to come out of my regular disposable income each month.
I would, however, consider a holiday, festival or gig ticket & travel/ accommodation more of an 'event' and these would be paid for from the money in the OSA.

I appreciate there are many for whom having heating as well as food is a luxury these days and it appalls me that people are having to live like this.

I spent a few years living on a very tight budget and going without a lot when I was clearing my debts.  Whilst I did fritter away far too much money for a while afterwards, I think I've found my balance now and I make no apologies for enjoying not being in that situation now. 

Total spending during the week £91.60
Total saving during the week £298.85

Have a lovely day 😊

Skint_yet_Again

Well done on the lunch savings. Lol to the special trot 😆

OnlyJealousOfBirds

Have really enjoyed reading your posts! HRH is such a good nickname for a horse. And it's lovely to have inspiration from someone whose dealt with their debts and is flying high 😀 

I get what you mean about the difficulty of deciding what category to put things in, I have a long term holidays/trips fund and short term ones for solo entertainment and entertainment with friends. Still trying to work out if this is the right set up for me, but we'll see!

Arrietty

Hello again,

I meant to do a mid-week update but had the most intensely busy week at work and was only fit for soaking in the bath and then sitting semi-comatose on the sofa staring at the TV after work and yard.  


Hi Skint_yet_Again,
lovely to see you - HRH is quite special in a lot of ways 😄, I'm not sure if I can post pics here but I could do quite a series on his 'moments'.

Hello OnlyJealousOfBirds,
thank you for popping and for your lovely comment 😊 The debt clearing was quite the journey for me and although I quickly learned a lot of things and still implement them to this day, other habits have been a lot harder to break (I'm talking about YOU - clothes, shoes and bags) and have only come about with time and a growing interest in minimalism . I think we all have to find what works for us and our particular lifestyle and circumstance and not be afraid to change things that aren't working or do things differently from other people.

A busy work week was followed by a busy day yesterday getting up to date with some household chores and then a lovely hack with a couple of other girls and their boys in the afternoon. We revisited the field where HRH had a bit of meltdown a few weeks ago and I admit I was a bit nervous as we went with our regular companion and another horse he doesn't really know who is a lot bigger than him, but I thought HRH might be more relaxed and let the big boy take charge...
Silly me,  HRH is indeed Himself and despite being smaller and scared of falling leaves was determined to lead.  Cue lots of side eye between them and a fair degree of ear twitching and occasional increases in pace to make it very clear who was in charge 😂  After tidying up our space and refilling the feed bins from the spares I keep in the garage I came home home relieved and reinvigorated so made a huge pot of leek and potato soup - some in the freezer and some to eat during the week - before sinking in the bath.
Apparently today is National Soup Day so that was very timely!

Onwards to business:

Work/contract situation still in flux but Manager doing absolute best to keep me in the position which I really appreciate and I'm hoping the fact I've been covering another role as well as my own this last week helps push the case.

I've been looking for a savings account for my funds with a better interest rate but which also allows some withdrawals without penalties. I applied for one this morning with the bank where I already hold 3 accounts.
It's not brilliant at 3.25% but better than the 1.8% I'm currently getting in car fund 😏 and I can make 4 withdrawals a year before the rate drops which should work perfectly.  It's been accepted so as soon as I have the details I will switch to putting the Car Funds in there each month and also the New Wardrobe Fund as I wont be accessing that for a year 😐

LSA:
On Monday I sent the regular weekly £10 to the linked savings account and also the £4.94 I received in cashback for December spending. A couple of £ in change scooped over as well.
LSA Balance: £1714.04


SSA (Car Fund):
No change to this account this week but I am looking forward to moving the regular £10 a week payment to this  once new account opened as I do need to see 'movement' in my accounts to keep me motivated.
SSA Balance: £80


OSA (Holidays, Trips & Treats):
As well as the regular  £10 weekly payment I also did Not Buy Lunch at work four times 😇 and would have chosen the £4.40 optioneach time so that's another £17.60. Need to remember this balance looks good right now BUT it will reduce significantly once I get the solicitor bill - they've now gone awfully quiet but I'm ok with that!
OSA Balance: £978.85.


HRH (farrier/vet/dentist/rugs & cleaning/hay/feed/supplements/treats etc...)
CoOwner paid her share in and the livery bill hasn't yet come out so it's looking quite good at the moment!
We have the vet coming tomorrow morning (day off work for me 😁) to give him his annual vaccination, float his teeth and give him a once-over.  I'm not sure if this visit is covered by the Health Programme we joined when I switched vets last summer but will soon find out as they're very prompt with their bills!  
HRH Balance: £552.78 (once livery has debited)

During the week I went out for dinner with friends (£29.90)  bought a lunch at work (£4.40) and went grocery shopping adding a couple of household bits in as well (£89.91) I don't count my regular bills and direct debits as spending because it's not like they're a choice! 

Total weekly spending: £124.21
Total weekly saving: £42.64

I'm finding it useful to tot up my general spending and saving each week and I record these in my paper diary each day which makes it easier to find the figures when I do an update here! Back when I was debt clearing I did take part in recording NSD's and although I don't actively do that now the habit is ingrained and prevents me from popping to the on-site shop if I'm feeling snackish! 

Have a lovely day 😊

Skint_yet_Again

Love hearing about HRH and his exploits 😆 what is “float his teeth”?

Your pots are all looking good. Hope the extra work doesn’t become a regular thing unless they are going to pay you for both!