Mrs S.....life after debt

End of the week has arrived, which means another skim of the accounts. This week I've managed to put away £6.76 into savings :j From someone who couldn't save a penny, putting a different outlook on it has really helped. I've saved more during the past few weeks than I have all year!

I've had a couple of Spends today (confession time :rotfl: ). Ds1 is totally shattered, has a few mouth ulcers, and is generally feeling a little pants, and then he asked for a chippy tea. £5.20 later that was dinner for both boys sorted :rotfl: Totally unhealthy, and being run down healthy foods full of nutrients and vitamins would've probably been far better. Sometimes, life feels so much better eating dinner out of a box though. :rotfl:

I also picked up a bottle wine and some choccies, and spent £8 doing it! It adds up so fast. That's almost a week's worth of entertainment money gone is a flash!!

I am the proud owner of a new shed :rotfl: I am also the not so proud owner of an empty bank account :eek: It has been paid for in full on the Tesco card (wahey for the points) and I have the money waiting in an account to pay it in full. It will be arriving at some point in July. I can't wait :j It has pretty much cleared what I was saving, but I'm now going to start thinking of the next little project and savings goal. I need my whole back garden and a little of the front fenced!! That's not going to come cheap, but I've decided to get a quote this year so I have something to aim for. It will be next summer by the time I can save up enough for it (unless I have a win on the premium bonds, though June wasn't successful :rotfl ).

It's so easy to spend money though. I haven't spent a fortune (on top of the shed) but over £30. I bought some more seeds for planting (flowers and veg), then some pots and compost to do the planting!! I'm going to do some planting with ds1 in the morning.

I've also been working on spreadsheets today. I have actually totally impressed myself and used the 'if' function on excel (and it works!!). I'm still working on budgeting gifts correctly. I think I'm pretty much there now with it, but have totally shocked myself with how much I need to spend for gifts to cover the next 2 months. Moving on then, I'm planning on buying gifts a month in advance (for the ones I can), so if there were any birthdays in August, the gifts will be bought in July. By doing that I'm never running around last minute, realising I haven't got enough money in the pot and buying something cheap, last minute for the sake of buying something.

June/July are expensive months for birthdays, but things should quieten down then with only the odd little bit each month until the new year. I've got £157.50 in the pot for June and July's gifts (includes a Father's Day activity and an activity for my mums birthday) and after totting up everything I need to get I should come in around £10 under budget. There has been a new baby in the family so need an extra gift there, and we're heading to a wedding in a few weeks time so need a gift for that which has made things a little tougher. Definitely doable though!

Today has turned out far lazier than I thought! Ds1 wasn't well at all when he woke up this morning. Very quiet and a slight temperature. He was supposed to go to a birthday party, but I text the mother to cancel and we've just lazed about watching tv, eating and he's now playing on my ipad! Ds2 is with Mr S so we're really taking advantage of the quiet time!

We may still do a little gardening this afternoon, we'll see how he gets on. I've spent £10 today on books. I ordered the 10 for £10 from the Works. I had on my list for tomorrow a couple of children's gifts to buy, but as they're just token gifts I think I'll wrap 2 books for each. Only £2 per child spent out of the budgeted £5. I must admit that with the amount of toys my boys have, I'd be quite happy with a couple of books!!

2 more of the books will be wrapped for ds1 for his birthday in a couple of months time. He loves books (though we have billions here already :rotfl: ).

I still have quite a list of things to get tomorrow and Tuesday, but should definitely come in under budget now! :j

Day off today and I've spent most of it so far in the kitchen. I've almost finished sorting my work lunches for the rest of the week. I bought a 1.8kg pack of chicken breasts from Aldi yesterday, so I've portioned them into little bags and popped them in the freezer. I've done a couple of loads of laundry, probably got another 2 to do (and then some ironing).

I keep jumping back and forward between YNAB and my Christmas/birthday spreadsheet. I'm trying to find the balance between saving enough each month so that we don't have to find any extra money, but not going mad and spending too much, which leaves money tight every month. I think I'm about there. I'm not going to post actual amounts on here as I don't think I'd get a fab reaction, but I've totted up and included (for Christmas):

• Gifts for the boys,
• Gofts for the boys from each other,
• Mr S,
• My parents (2 sets - both divorced and remarried),
• My Grandparents,
• Nieces and nephews,
• Friends children (£5 budget each here),
• 3 x friends (again small budget - box of choccies for example),
• Gifts for work (There are only 3 of us in the office),
• Christmas days out,
• Christmas food shop,
• Christmas alcohol,
• Teacher and nursery staff gifts,
• Decorations
• Random other bits I forget about

Birthdays are for pretty much the same people, but include things like a day out for birthdays.

I've started thinking about Christmas more over the last few days, I do usually start planning and writing lists from this time onwards. Last year we bought less for the boys, but 'nicer' gifts if that makes sense. I'm hoping to do the same this year. I don't want to bulk out gifts with cheap bits they're not going to look at just to make it seem like they have more. I'd rather a couple of good quality bits instead.