I heart NY - Our journey to and across the Pond

newyorkcitybride

Well unfortunately I havent managed to make any further in-roads following an unfortunate accident involving a bread knife and my knuckle!!!!

All I can say is ouch, and A and E is not a fun place to be on a friday night...

So typing is prooving a little bit difficult... however the only good thing is that it is the index finger on my left.... hurts like hell though...

And!!!! Its all because I was cutting up a roll for OH to take into work for his lunch!
See trying to be debt free can seriously damage your health!!!

Need to do the food shopping tonight/tomorrow online...
Better get my thinking cap on!

newyorkcitybride

Now this is my food shop list which is being delivered tuesday and should last us till next friday...

QuantityProductPrice1 Kingsmill Great Everyday 6 Soft White Rolls £0.781 Golden Delicious Apples Pack £1.491 Value Bananas 1.25kg £0.811 Cucumber Portion £0.361 Tesco Finest Sweet Pointed Peppers £0.991 Tesco Fine Beans 200g £0.891 Baby Button Mushrooms 150g £0.943 Sweet Potatoes Loose Class 1 £1.561 Tesco Carrots 1 Kg Pack Class 1 £0.502 Baby New Potatoes 1kg £2.761 T No Added Waterhoney Roast Chicken 150g £1.871 T Ready 2 Roast Barbeque Whole Chicken 1.40kg £3.994 Muller Crunch Corner Banana Chocolate Flakes 150g £2.164 Muller Crunch Corner Toffee Hoops 150g £2.161 Tesco Kent Free Range Eggs Large Box Of 6 £1.651 Tesco 12 Mini Savoury Eggs 240g £1.042 Twix Funsize Bars 375g £1.982 Pataks Tikka Masala Medium Sauce540g £1.521 Tesco Steakhouse Oven Chips 2kg £1.231 Mccain Potato Winners Wedges 750g £1.002 Tesco 4 Lamb Rosemary & Mint Grill Steaks 510g £2.981 Tesco 8 Southern Fried Chicken 760g £2.291 Aunt Bessie's 12y/Shire Pudding Batters 370g £1.312 Pepsi Regular 2 Ltr Bottle £1.442 Pepsi Max 2 Ltr Bottle £1.44

Comes in at £39.13 :eek: (if I remember rightly) but doesnt include any BOGOF or special purchases so it can only go down.:A

It might not look like a lot, but theres only 2 of us. We've got quite a bit in the freezer already. Some things are to appease my OH for his pack-ups for work, such as the twixs..... :rolleyes:
pepsi is only on there as its on offer. we do also drink squash, water and juice which I've got in and that will last us probably 2 weeks if not more as I cant drink too much of it.:o
The muller corners are 4 for £1, so better value than the 6 pack at £2.
No milk as we get that for free.
I'm hoping to make the whole chicken stretch for 3 meals, so roast one night, some for rolls, chicken curry another night.:D

Now I'm just getting started with paying any real attention with the food shopping... so hopefully I wont get flamed for not making everything by hand, which when I've got meal planning down to a fine art like some people, I will be able to start doing...:p

Only think we will probs need is top up of fresh veg. But that wont be more than £5...:T

When my finger stops aching I'll write up my meal plan :rotfl:

newyorkcitybride

OK so the vague food plan is thus:

Dinners
Wednesday: Roast chicken, pots, carrots and fine beans
Thursday : Omellettes with mushroom/peppers with chips
Friday: Chicken pies, pots, broccoli
Saturday: toad in the hole, carrots,pots, fine beans
Sunday: Spag bol for me, meat sauce and pots for OH (doesnt eat pasta)
Monday: Roasted veggies and giant yorkies
Tuesday: Chicken portions and chips
Wednesday: lamb grill steaks and broccoli and wedges
Thursday : Egg and chips

Friday - likely to be a takeaway of some sort as we've got loads on with organising the party on saturday

Breakfast - only me that eats it, and I keep my cereal at work to use the free milk we get.
Lunches - likely to be cereal for me, or if i get round to it in the morning some rice/roll... if not I generally go out for a smoothie whilst at work.
OH takes in food, likely to be rolls with chicken, crisps, chocolate, an apple, banana, yoghurt and then he buys a drink.

newyorkcitybride

ok few things to remember on the debts.

I applied for and have been given an Abbey Zero card, which I have BT some balances to... just cant remember what I did from where! Until the statement comes through.
I know £700 from one CC has gone onto it.. really should have written it down!

However it will mean that quite a lot of the debts r now on 0% for at least 6 months... so that will save us quite a bit in interest.

I think when the statement comes in, I will do another snowball calculator to make sure I am completely up to date and now where I am and whats on what rate, as all my repayment amounts/order will now change...

newyorkcitybride

Just a quick update on the numbers

The only thing I haven't done is add on the BT fee to the Abbey Zero card, as I'm unsure what the amount is, 3% is what I think it is...
Plus I havent had the statement from them yet as card is in post, but I know what has been BT-ed over to it now...

So we actually managed to shave off about £500 from our total debt (according to the snowball) just by doing some swapping about, saving mostly on the interest. Should be clearing another 2 debts come the end of this month as well.

I still feel as though it's all spread out quite a bit.... I think there's 9 debtors, which feels like a lot to me... but whats important is that it's going down and getting cleared..

Abbey Loan1 14.90% £ 4,417.00

Abbey Loan 2 19.90% £2,367.00

Car Loan 12.30% £5,258.26

Mum Loan 0% £4500.00

Halifax CC 19.95% £2,397.69

Abbey MBNA CC 2.90% £1,045.50 (till march 09)

Abbey Zero CC 0% £2,400.00 (6 months)

I.F CC 14.90% £980.00

Computer Finance 21.80% £411.61

Homebase MBNA Card 29.90% £38.50

We're still set to be debt free in 25 months, so June 2010 now As opposed to August 2010, and thats just with a little bit of shuffling...

Now the decisions part. According to the snowball we need to pay £400 to the computer finance next month, but since its a finance option, they dont seem to (according to OH) take overpayments, only monthly payment and total settlement.

So do I get him to pay it off completely onto one of the low rate cards, and then whack the overpayments to the credit card as we can afford to clear the entire balance next month?
Advice on this one greatly appreciated!!!

newyorkcitybride

Cor blimey!

Been quite a while since I posted anything!

Pleased to report our debts now stand at £23.2k roughly.
Had a good month with clearing a couple of accounts.
Hubby's MBNA card is now totally clear, as is his finance on his computer.
So the totals outstanding are bigger numbers, but the number of debtors is falling, so thats fantastic for us!

Unfortunately Abbey had made a slight error with the loans. We are now paying our debt repayments into a seperate account and paying them all from there, which is fine aside from Abbey did not update the direct debit information soon enough, even though we gave them more than the requested 10 working days notice!
So they havent been paid!
However Abbey sent a letter admitting it was their fault and have just asked for a cheque to be sent for this month, but they will be taken my DD for next month. So no charges thankfully!

I havent yet really mastered the art of the food shopping, and I keep telling myself its because other things have been going on but if I'm honest it's just a lack of commitment to it on my part, so really must must must get better!
Need to take all access to credit out of my purse as I seem to have been naughty of late and spent on the credit card!
But I have noticed it, and will take them out now, and I have kept a lot of items to take back as dont really need them.

We also have our spending money together for our holiday now as well. Hubby may need a few cheap holiday clothes but dont anticipate that being a problem as we both have spends budgets per month... so will use most of that toward it.

Am enquiring at work about when my pay review is happening. I know its in July some time but I'd like to get some more information about it.
I've been a bit ill this week as well and so havent been overly motivated at work, so need to re-kindle some energy all round and get some bits and pieces organised at work, and back at home too.

So thats a brief sum up of where we are now!
Phew!

newyorkcitybride

OK, now I've got my motivation back, I'm going to try and be a lot better with thise post (even if it is to myself LOL!)

Today is my day off so I'm having a highly charged and motivated blitz of our flat, getting it tidied, cleaned and looking like 2 working professionals live here rather than student digs!
I'm then going to attempt some bakey cakey goodness this afternoon. I've been thinking I need to cut down on sugar/snack stuffs, which I partly blame on OH as its what he likes to eat, but as I'm prone to depressive episodes, I gifure a healthy body is a step toward a healthy mind.

I've been lucky and not had any episodes. I was put onto pills by the doctor but after not being able to handle the side effects, I went to try St Johns Wort, which I came off to see if I could handle the world, and I've done alright, I have a couple of days where it all seems a bit tough but I'm learning to challenge these thoughts with a different thought process, which is helping quite a bit and I find even tho I'm still having those days, they're not turning into weeks/months...

We've also had an extra £400 to throw at our debts this month which has been great! Seeing the numbers go down considerably each month has been a motivator in itself!
We're pretty much sorted with our spending money for our holiday as well, and my holiday clothes are all sorted.
Just need to refund some items bought in a panic onto my credit card, thus cutting the debts again

So all in all having a positive day, windows are open, getting some fresh air and had a lie in... today is a good day..... xx

newyorkcitybride

Have done pretty well this weekend.
Only spent on Saturday on some sun cream for our holiday and even went for cheaper brand (not to be a victim of good packaging and catchy slogans!) as they both list the same ingredients in the same order.... and surely sun cream is sun cream?

Today was a total no spender. I've also taken my lunch into work the three days this week following the day I promised myself I would try harder!

Overpayment cheque of £420 has gone to credit card... and life seems good.
I'm also re-reading a book by Alexi Hall "In the Red" which is her diary of stopping spending and overpaying her debts, fun read....

Am now off to treat myself to a luxury bath with some bath foam donated from work colleague who said it didnt agree with her skin... I've never had a problem with radox... and best of all it's free!
Soak and a read in the bath...... the good things in life are (sometimes) free!

newyorkcitybride

As I promised myself I'm being more proactive with filling this diary in. I consider it my online confessional.
Things have been going pretty well although I'm down to only have £60 left in my bank account to last till the 26th!

Hopefully by next month everything should calm down a hell of a lot more. Last month we had our do to pay out for, so that was a bit of a chunk, plus I did my last bit of holiday clothes shopping, so next month neither of those will feature so we can really throw some money at the debts again.

This month OH got a nice tidy chunk of overtime and mileage allowance back so we were able to pay off his computer finance and also £400 off his credit card.
So the numbers stand quite respectfully at 22.5k... not bad for three months of real awareness from 25.3k really.

Although as most people I'm sure will agree, we could always do better. We still seem to be in the mindset that even though we want to reduce the debt we dont want to reduce the way we've been living which is actually how we ended up in debt.... it's a vicious mental cycle! lol....

I'm off work tday and will be spending a lot of time in the flat with the windows and doors open, getting some fresh air and life into the place, a few odd jobs to sort out and then relaxation, definitely feel like I need it sometimes, noone else tells ou that paying off your debts is as much as mental and emotional rollercoaster as it is a numerical one!

skintscotslass

Hi NYCB

Why dont you join us on the Grocery Challenge? xx