Missy’s full time working mum juggling act MF adventure

Elisheba

Sorry its been so hard, Missy, with the tax bill and all.  Hope OH sorts himself and his finances out - its hard to get out of the spending habit.  

missymoo81

Sorry I’ve been quiet, I’ve been really struggling mentally. OH is Away and we’ve argued because we’re so stressed about money. The children have been at their dads so I’ve been really lonely. The heating stopped working for 3 days and kept tripping out and it’s been zero degrees. I was panicking as I obviously don’t have any money to pay someone to fix it. But I googled it and followed a video on YouTube, and upped the pressure and now it’s working. I had to pay £65 for a
new tyre. Then I Had to take the cat to the vets and it was £1100, I burst into tears and told them I couldn’t pay it. They’re going to put it through our insurance rather than pay first and claim back. But I did have to Pay £280 for the excess and fees etc. OH has paid it back but I think I’ll just have to give it back later in the month, when staff need paying. May has come Home from school crying, girls at school people horrible, it breaks my hard, as she’s such a sweet little thing.

So there’s enough to pay the mortgage and bills. I’ve just been to Lidl and spent £10 for next weeks shopping, I still have an awful lot of food left from the last shop, as the children have been at their dads so that’s good. I have £217 left for fuel and food for the rest of the month. 

Actually I need to put an invoice in for some Work I did.but it’s all accounted for. 

the_end_of_the_rainbow

I'm so sorry that you're feeling down and have had an horrendous week. Hope May feels better soon.
Without wishing to sound harsh, you seem to be struggling with day to day expenses and do not seem to have an emergency fund to cover one off emergencies - would it not be better to cancel the holiday that you booked last week and use that money to create an emergency fund / add some wriggle room to your monthly budget?

jwil

Well done on fixing the boiler and hope May is ok.

fionaandphil

What would we do without YouTube! I've learned so many fixes from it.

Hope May feels better soon, make sure school are aware too. Sounds like you both need a relaxing pamper weekend.

missymoo81

the_end_of_the_rainbow said:

I'm so sorry that you're feeling down and have had an horrendous week.
Without wishing to sound harsh, you seem to be struggling with day to day expenses and do not seem to have an emergency fund to cover one off emergencies - would it not be better to cancel the holiday that you booked last week and use that money to create an emergency fund / add some leeway to your monthly budget?

Thank you I appreciate your thoughts. We did have an emergency fund but we had to use every penny we had to pay the unforeseen tax last week. And we just have no extra money until pay day on the 28th Feb, then I can put money straight into an emergency fund. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. And obv the cat needing the vets was completely Sod’s Law. I can’t cancel the holiday it is nonrefundable and I booked it not thinking anything would go wrong in the 4 weeks until I got paid. But of course Sod’s Law is a thing. I am planning to be better at planning my money etc in future, I have learned a valuable lesson.

Thanks for your kind thoughts @jwil and @f@fionaandphil I appreciate it. I just need to get through these next few weeks. 

So for my money to go further I need to bake bread this week, and cakes and banana bread. I made a big batch of chilli the other day for my dinners, and I think if I do some rice too I can make it last until Monday night.

i sat and watched @mandaland on bbc Iplayer and omg it’s just so funny and true to life! Can anyone recommend  other box sets type things to watch? 

Thanks again all for being there when I need you. I confided in a friend today about my day and she just text back with ‘sounds awful, I don’t know what to say’.

so thank you. 

LadyWithAPlan

Wow you have a v busy life and so much going on. Well done on fixing boiler and all your baking.

I agree you need to build a  decent (3 month min ) EF before holidays etc - I would never dare personally to spend money reliant  on a future paycheck, I am self employed and never know when I am being paid. Things happen always when one pushes the budget out a bit I find..

My life is a lot less stressful  since I  have plenty  cash in my EF, you are so busy I would build a comfort ef to make life that little bit less stressy.

jwil

I got loads of good recommendations for tv series on my diary a couple of weeks ago.

I agree with the others about the EF.  It brings so much peace of mind and reduces stress so much.  My savings have been depleted recently and I can feel the stress creeping back in, so it's my focus building them up again.

missymoo81

Ok, so I have been the laziest moo bag and done nothing all weekend, apart from 4 loads of washing and mended Roos coat. 

I have meal planned and looked at my finances though. Lots of numbers in my head, I will see if I can write them all down. 

So from all of my workings out, as long as I can stay on budget for food and fuel. Which I think I can. Then I need £377 from small business, it is the last pay check I will get from it as will be sold at the end of the month. Not sure if it would be that much. 

jwil

Lazy weekends are the best and good for the soul.