Settling in for the long haul

Dakota_Rose

It’s been a nice day today, putting the children’s incessant squabbling aside, as we’ve visited mum and taken her out shopping at a nearby enormous Home Bargains store. My mum is happiest in amongst house bargains but struggles with her mobility these days so she enjoyed it and happily filled her half of the trolley up.

The children spent £5 of their own savings each on treats and bits for going back to school. I love to see them managing their own pots and taking their time to choose carefully. Often, they’ll buy different multipacks and split them to get maximum benefit (when they’re getting on that is - today was not one of those days).

Dog food and toiletries have been purchased along with a couple of gifts for Mother’s Day and Christmas(!). We stopped off at Lidl on the way back to pick a heated cushion up that I’d seen in the middle aisle yesterday. I wasn’t sure if my mum would like or use it, but with her upcoming spinal surgery we both thought this would be a useful gift for Mother’s Day. I think it will certainly be safer than her trying to manage hot water bottles afterwards.

Other than one more main food shop tomorrow, my spends are done for the month. I have plenty of petrol to last the week, so I have sent £20 to the car pot and the few remaining pounds and pennies to the emergency fund which is now at £805/£1000.

I also had a small Vinted sale overnight and have posted that today so that’ll be an extra £4.50 over to the EF next week all being well.

Yesterday’s pizza takeaway leftovers will be served with homemade potato wedges and dips for tonight’s dinner. Tonight’s plans are to enjoy dinner with a glass of wine and then will settle down to my watercolours for my last proper evening off before going back to work.

Wishing everyone a lovely Saturday night whatever you are doing 😊

Dakota_Rose

…somebody chuck a halo my way - we’ve just had roast chicken sandwiches for dinner, moving the takeaway leftovers to tomorrow. Feel like a food-stretching angel 😂 😇

It may have been Mr D’s idea but he is too far gone in other ways to wear the halo 🤣

Dakota_Rose

We have had a fairly productive Sunday so far. We divided and conquered so the children have been fully laid back while Mr D did the food shop (on budget) and I sorted the kitchen out, ironed uniforms and clothes for starting back school and work tomorrow. The £9 survey came through as promised, and it was quite interesting and only 20-mins long. Hopefully that will clear before the end of the week.

It feels like I’ve accomplished a nice amount this holiday as well as resting lots. The only thing on my list that didn’t get done were my watercolour cards. I really enjoy painting but have to be in the mood for it. I didn’t feel great with my IBS last night and opted for a New Lives in the Wild and an early night instead.

The lighter mornings and birdsong this weekend have really lifted my spirits. Spring is definitely on its way. I feel like I’m returning to work refreshed and more hopeful - we’ll give it a day! 🤣

Dakota_Rose

It’s been a busy day back at work and it’s nice to be home for dinner.

Some survey money cleared so I have sent £11 over to the emergency fund. £816/£1000. That’ll be it until payday on Friday now, unless Vinted money clears, but I have budgeted to fill it to £1000 then ready to move on to our home improvement pot - shower and shower unit replacement is the first thing on the list.

Have been keeping an eye on our mobile contracts as one was due for early upgrade today (a month early). This is good news as I was able to ‘upgrade’ to a much cheaper SIM only deal. £16.68 saved a month moving forward 😊

FootyFanDan

Absolutely amazing effort with that emergency fund

Dakota_Rose

Thank you @FootyFanDan I’m not sure where the motivation came from but the diary has definitely helped! The challenge now will be to get enough in the sinking funds to stop it being needed for something that isn’t a true emergency.

Made myself do a yoga practice tonight which as always didn’t feel like doing but am glad of afterwards. Feeling suitably stretched and de-stressed so will hopefully sleep well tonight.

joedenise

Have you decided what you are going to do with the £16.68 a month you'll be saving on your phone? I would suggest you add this to your shower and shower unit replacement pot in addition to anything you're planning on adding to it each month. It's amazing how much all the little extras add up to.

Have you heard of Tilly Tidies? This is where you round down your accounts to the nearest £10, £5 or £1 depending on how much you have to spare and add those bits to a particular thing like your shower replacement pot or to overpay a CC bill. It's well worth doing - I used to do this whenever anything came out of the account be it shopping, a DD or a SO. Other people will do it weekly or monthly. Worth a try.

Dakota_Rose

Thanks for commenting @joedenise. That £16.68 has now been allocated to the shower fund as you suggested. I’m hoping to gain some momentum with that as soon as possible so we’ll see how I go.

I did try tilly tidying but settled on a zero-based budget in the end. I rarely have anything left over what I need in each account but do enjoy keeping an eye out for any little bits of interest going in and moving that over.

£4.50 Vinted money has come through so I’ve sent £4 of it over to the EF to make it a nice round amount of money £820/£1000 to end the month with.

It was another long day at work today but I’m hoping to catch up with some work from home tomorrow afternoon. This is one of my busiest periods at work so the next 5 weeks are going to be incredibly full on. Still, I like to be busy so I just need to keep on top of the workload enough to ensure it’s manageable.

Humpday tomorrow again!

Dakota_Rose

It’s been another busy but productive day and I am loving the warmer, brighter weather. I have noticed over the past few years how tough I find the winter months of January and February but it really has impacted my wellbeing this year. Need to think of how I might counteract this next year as I already feel like a different person with just a week of spring-like days.

Nothing much to report on the financial front. I have seen the last payment go out of my current account for the month and swept the remaining pound and pennies into my birthdays/gifts pot. Mr D has had a portion of that this month for a Mother’s Day gift for me. I know he has bought me new Birkenstocks for the summer, which I’m delighted about as I literally live in them and my last pair died at the end of last summer. I have Birkenstocks and Fly boots and nothing in between 😂

I am very impatiently waiting for TCB to process a payment for life insurance we took out. It’s a big payout we’re expecting (circa £160) so I’d love to see it come through. There was also a £100 gift card promised at the same time through the company we purchased with. I expect one reward may cancel out the other but I’d love either if not both. Must be patient. For now, it’s waiting for Friday’s payday so that I can do the money shuffle and top-up the emergency fund but we have everything we need in for between now and then so no stress.

Dakota_Rose

We did one money-sensible thing today by picking up our free baguette and cookie from Lidl. That was too good to let go to waste. The signal is non-existent at our store so we use a screenshot of the card while in there. Unfortunately this means we can’t see any new rewards until we get home. We now have a free filled muffin to collect 🙈

In other money-sensible news, we have finally been able to get some bedding out to dry on the line. My car battery is lasting the full journey to and from work again rather than struggling to run as economically with the cold weather. And, it was a use-it-up dinner with a huge stack of French toast to share.

Tonight, we’ll get two baths for the price of one. Then as it’s Mr D’s turn to do littlest one’s bedtime, I intend to relax with a YouTube yoga and my next book swap book. It’s one of Sara Cox’s and it’ll be an easy read judging from the first few pages. I’ve been very gentle on the picks so far this year but they are just about all my tired brain can cope with after a demanding day at work.

I hope everyone has a suitable relaxing Wednesday evening planned. We’ll be at the end of the week before we know it.