I made my last planned payment of £53.37 to debt for the November challenge. If you missed this, the challenge was to try and pay £835 off debt in one month.
I also managed to make an extra payment of £73.37 by using the money from some compensation I received and a small payment in from the CMS, making the total amount paid toward debt in November £908.37.
This amount I’m really proud of and I plan to use the same strategy in December. This is where I look at all my income and expenses coming in and out of my account for the whole month and see where I could make any debt over payments. Effectively, I would zero out my months budget. This enables me to see clearly where all my money is going.
Unfortunately, due to huge car repairs this month of £531.57 which I put onto the credit card, I won’t see the full decrease of £908.37. However, I have decided to withdraw £300 from my Help to Save account to pay towards the car repairs, so this will help.
What I have left in my Help to Save is £500 and this is effectively my Emergency Fund. I still pay into this every month with a regular standing order of £50 so it will start to slowly grow again.
I was back delivering at the weekend and my car was driving like an absolute dream. It’s a bloomin good job after having all that money spent on it! I delivered 115 parcels on Sunday and not going to lie it very nearly broke me lol!! Some of the parcels were so heavy, it was a work out in itself!
It made me feel so Christmassy being out delivering and I always feel like Santa as a courier, but less hairy lol! 😊. It was really cold though and at times, all I could think about was being indoors all snug and warm. Like a trooper, I kept on going and kept thinking how happy I’ll be when I pick up my earnings in December and pay it all off debt. Thoughts like these keep me going.
I’m still waiting for my references to come back from my new main job after being made permanent last week. Today I found out they sometimes do overtime on a Saturday and it’s double time! I know working 7 days a week isn’t great every week, but with me being such an opportunist, if overtime comes available, I’ll definitely be up for it. It will get me out of cleaning the house anyway lol and I love my secret job so much, it wouldn’t feel like work at all!
A little update on the savings challenge. I have managed to colour in 3 lines out of 20, so still along way to go but I’m still going at it. I may not complete the challenge in full before the interest free period ends at the end of December but as it’s such a small amount anyway I don’t think the interest will be very much. I do plan to use my courier money in December to pay a chunk off it though.
What I Spent This Week
£7.98 Garden Centre for a couple of special Christmas decorations
£30.00 Tesco Food
£27.00 Tesco petrol
£5.70 Greggs – pop and vegan sausage rolls for Sunday delivering
£41.41 Dog food – this comes out of the pet food sinking fund
£10.66 Macdonalds
I haven’t spent very much this week. I have started Christmas planning and have made a gorgeous new Christmas Present Planner which you can download for free.
I have started Christmas shopping too but I’m not including that in what I’ve spent this week as it’s all coming out of the Christmas sinking fund. What I will report is I am within budget – This is where I want to stay aswell but I realise it is very early days. So far, I have resisted any impulse purchases so fingers crossed this continues lol!
Elf on the Shelf on a budget activities have been planned for each day – Dec 1st to Dec 24th for Elf on the Shelf in order to keep costs low and within budget. I didn’t do this last year and ended up spending so much, well actually I just went mental. You can read about the disaster with my spending at Christmas last year here ‘Why I Put Christmas On A Credit Card This Year‘. I have shared my Elf on the shelf ideas on a previous post, with a shopping list and cards you can print – all downloadable for free of course! Hopefully it will help someone else out there in frazzled parent land 😊
Finally, I have started to put together a list of all the books I would recommend. As you may have seen on Instagram, I have been reading to increase my finance knowledge. I do have lots of knowledge of finance having spent over ten years in banking but things change and I think learning is the best way to improve your position in any regard. For me, although I don’t have the money right now for huge investments into property or the stock market, it doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t be finding out as much as possible for when I am ready. And I’d urge to you as well. If your not in a position to buy books new, try buying them second hand or even better join a library and read for free (just don’t forget to to take the books back else you’ll have loads of fines – I speak from experience here lol).
Some links in the books I would recommend post are affiliate links. This means that, at zero cost to you, I will earn an affiliate commission if you click through the link and finalise a purchase. I will only recommend products I have used and think are great though and if there is any you recommend me to read, please leave the titles in the comments below.
Have a great week
H
TMWM 