I've been a bit lax in the challenge department lately. What with the FH's death and the aftermath of that, getting the EFG off to uni and then finding a job, the summer and autumn flew past without me doing much more than getting by finance-wise. January had a promising start, but three weeks of being sidetracked by the rogue appendix kind of put the kybosh on any great plans for frugality there.
But February has arrived now.
The YFG is back at school, and normality is on the horizon! I am so chuffed to be able to say that I put £500 into the ISA at the end of January - and I don't really know how I managed it, apart from saying that being at a hospital bedside and then trapped at home with a recuperating invalid don't give many opportunities for trivial spending......I lie. I did buy some magazines in the hospital when I got fed up with knitting and I had read both of the Jack Reacher books which I took along. That wasn't too bad. Because my patient was a child, I also got reduced parking - £2.60 a day for however long I was there, so that was a help to the expense account too.
(image from guardian.co.uk)
In 2012 I managed to save £5000.....so with the best part of 11 months to go of 2015, I'm going to have another shot at that again. It amounts to about £455 a month. I think that it is very do-able, and I am going to have a jolly good go at it. I shall be throwing all that I can in that direction, and starting from today.
I have lots of "stuff" to sell, including the FH's beekeeping gear, and lots of books from my bookselling days, so I think that I need to organise myself into some kind of strategy for moving this stuff onward. Reducing our possessions has to continue, and this seems like a good enough reason to motivate me into action. I shall be making use of ebay and other local selling sites to bless other people with things that they need at realistic prices, I hope.
[When I work out how to do it, I'll start some kind of box in the sidebar to keep track of how I am getting on with this.]
7 comments:
hat do you mean you've been lax in the challenge department?! Your life has been a challenge for several months!!
Really impressed with all that you have achieved, in a year packed FULL of challenges- losing FH, EFG off to UNI, YFG not in good health. Not to mention your local preacher study course. God give you grace and strength for this new year!
Sounds like a very challenging time to me! Well done on the savings. I've been selling a few books on Amazon, but now according to EU regulations they need proof of identity & other things that I can't quite understand, seems to be the same for individuals selling a few books as for people running a business, as far as I can fathom from the masses of small print. Not sure whether to carry on or not. Good that parking charges were reduced for visits to a child patient, here people have racked up charges of £11 a day. Yes, really! Vee X
I agree with the others you have done remarkably well after what you have had to go through. Well done,
Gill in Canada
You are doing fabulously and it so easy to lose control of life and finances when something like a serious illness hits. You did very well in January and will do even better in February if things quiet down :)
Thanks for your support, everyone!
You've been challenged so much in the past few months!!
Far from being lax in the Challenge department I think you've done magnificently.
Good luck with saving £5,000 this year, you've already got off to a brilliant start and having things to sell should give you a good head start.
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