How disappointing is this summer weather at the moment? August has been rubbish, lots of rain and not very warm. I am very hopeful for an Indian summer and for things to warm up in September. Just in time for my next little mini break, a weekend in Walton-on-the-Naze in Essex in a caravan. Yes my university friends and I are glamming it up for luxury break this year, in a 1970s caravan. But it a very bargain cheap holiday. Its less than £100 each.
I was interviewed for the Daily Express
My saving experiment made it into the Daily Express last week, where I shared the performance of my £1000 saved four ways after one year. You can read the article here, please do, every click and comment counts!
I have Written about my Body Image Story
I wanted to share this week about how I have really feel about my body image and weight gain this year. And also how I have shifted my mind-set to be more healthy and get back to a place where I love myself. It includes all sorts of life changes, food, exercise and mind-set. Take a read of the post, maybe you are going through the same, and I want you to see that you can break bad habits (binge eating was mine) and work towards a healthier body and mind.
Reducing My Spending
I talked last week about my weekly spending being out of control in June and July, so I have been trying hard to reduce it down in August. This week was made slightly easier as I only had the boys for 2 days of the week. I have managed a £637 week, much better than previous £1000 spend. This week did include quite a few one-off expenses that wont be repeated for a while.
My Fun Spends
As well as my one off costs, that were more essentials based I did spend a fair bit on fun money. I have been giving my nails a bit of break from gel polish to help them get back to health, but this week I decided to have them gel coloured again. I had both my toe and finger nails done in matching purple and paid £45. My nail bar offers a loyalty scheme where every three visits you save 10% so I saved a whole £5. Every little helps.
We spent a day exploring Royston last week, its a place that I would like to move to so we were checking out the high street and property market. It also has one of my favourite shops in Hertfordshire at Royston Caves. It packed to the brim with crystals, books, candles, jewels, art, everything that I love. I bought myself labradorite ring, a lotus flow candle holder, a new selenite wand and a book on the Royston Caves. I spent £67. And am extremely happy with all of me beautiful purchases.
I had an Instagram moment of weakness. How it knows these things I do now know. It showed me a t-shirt with ‘last night a DJ saved my life’ on it. One of my favourite songs and I often sing it to DJ, my son. So I bought it for £29.95, I had had a couple of glasses of wine as well, which always makes the buy now button easier to click.
Total fun spends for the week were £158.
Healthcare Spending
There was a chunk of essential healthcare spending this week, £107 in total. There was £16 on some medicine and then £91 spent at the dentist. I have a brilliant NHS dentist who charges very little money. I had two back teeth fillings and my front tooth chip was repaired. He did a perfect job, my front tooth looks as good as new. And it cost me £40! Impressive. The remaining £51 was a different trip to the hygienist also last week, who is private and hence more expensive. I hate going to the hygienist with a passion, my gums and teeth bleed and it hurts. This week was no different but I do have very clean and now perfect looking teeth.
Back to Football Spend
My eldest is now back at football so we are back and forth to Cambridge and Newmarket several times a week. This means that the fuel spend will be increasing again. £48 spent this week alone for two football trips. I have also paid £85 for his new training kit. Academy football doesn’t cost me anything in terms of training, games or coaching but it does costs the earth in fuel as we can be travelling to anywhere in the country. And there is smallish cost of a new training kit each year.
Bowling Fun
When was the last time you went bowling? Its mega expensive right! I booked two games for three of us and it was £38, and that was with a 10% discount from my Kidspass membership. The saving grace here is that bowling was a mystery shopping job for Proinsight. This meant that I had £15 towards the cost of the bowling, £8 payment for the mystery shop and £20 worth of food we could get. The bowling and food ended up costing £20 after all of the credits and mystery shopping payments. Not bad for three hours of fun I guess and the boys were fed.
Eating Out and Social Life
I did see two different friends last week, but one was dinner at my local Lytton Arms pub and the other was takeaway at my friends house where I didn’t drink. My eating this week has been extremely good, with me even making healthy choices when eating out. Saturday night takeaway was sushi and teriyaki salmon. Yum.
Total spend on eating out for the week was £111 and grocery spend a teeny £42 as I had alot of mindful chef food already in the fridge/freezer.
Other Spends
My other spends for the week to take me up to the total spend of £637 are my cleaner at £25. I paid £11 for flea and worming tablet for Trev the disappearing cat, yes he did another three day runner this week. There was also £16 to my Plum auto-saving and £13 spend on my limited company annual registration.
Thanks for reading for weekly spending diary.
