Countdown to Christmas 2022: it's s bit warm to be considering Christmas, but I'm doing it anyway! (Thread 3.)

[NoWordForFluffy]

Evening!

Here we go...unless we talk more, this will do us til the big day! 🎅🏻 🎄

Timberland we're having their final reductions as I went back to work from physio yesterday and it was quiet so I took 10 minutes extra and found a nice jumper and nice polo shirt for Dh. I actually looked through full price racks first but the ones to suit him were in the reduced racks so even better!

Dd is safely back at school (and the attitude for school is also safely returned! ). Need sleep - DDog decided she didn't like Dh being away so barked both nights in the middle of the night...oh well, the joys of a new Minister today...!

Neros what a bargain!

Yay for September! I’m on a mission to get Harry styles tickets again this morning. I said no, not again as they’re expensive but dh volunteered to pay. Then we’re out for lunch with mil. I didn’t sleep well again, I keep waking up for about 2-3 hours in the middle of the night.

We’ve had a nice day. Lunch was good. Ds had crab and lobster ravioli. There’s another house available we could afford so have applied again, not the one in the photo though as no way we can afford that! There’s about 9 of those available.

I waited in the queue for an hour for the tickets then I got to the front of the queue and it kicked me off, so stressful, only for my mum to message me and say she got some for us! Obvs will pay her back as that’ll be dds birthday present and treat for next year. Great seats again too.

We’re going to London tomorrow to the dungeons (dd and dh) and shrek adventure (ds and me). I’m going to try to go to the adidas store to get ds the football shirt he would like for his birthday.

Holy crap...is that deemed affordable rent?!

There's a shared ownership property which has come up here which looks like a good deal. I've just spent the last half hour getting a mortgage in principle (no way will they lend the amount it claims, hence going for shared ownership!) and signing up for the shared ownership scheme, as well as contacting the agent to arrange a viewing.

I'd prefer to buy this house, but don't know if it's feasible or not (or if the landlord will sell), so I might as well explore this option.

Oh that’s good, that’ll be the way we go I think except with the mortgage and rent the shared ownerships come to about £1200 a month I think but it’s a few years down the line. Let us know how you get on, my current thoughts are that owning some of a house is better than none and we can always increase over the years/downsize eventually but I don’t know loads about it.

The rent is insane isn’t it? The frustrating thing is that if we received universal credits it would increase to cover the rent but as we earn just on the cusp it’s way more hassle than it’s worth to apply plus if we want to save for a deposit we wouldn’t be eligible for UC with the savings we will hopefully have in a few years.

Rent is crazy around your way Wreck!
I know a few people in a similar position to you too and it's so frustrating to be just on the cusp.

Fluffy Shared ownership can be a great way to buy a house so hopefully that works out for you.
We looked into it but there was nothing in the area where we were looking at all.

Long day here as I worked on for an extra 2 hours to get some tasks done before new project lands on Monday.
Am now sat on the sofa with a notepad writing a giant to do list to get things out of my brain (so far it includes random things such as researching how to look after my lemon tree, book car MOT, look into best way to preserve herbs, send a complaint letter, sort cabinet on the landing 🙄

114

Ina couple of weeks we'll be over the 100s and on the way to double figures

Rent round our way is stupidly high , I was looking on Rightmove , there was a 1 bed flat (Maisonette ) about a mile from the town centre at £1005 per calendar month , not sure if that included some bills .

The DC are living at home so we don't need to pay accomodation , just travel and their food /laundry .

TKMaxx had a few Christmas things in and a huuuuge amount of Hallowe'en !

Out of interest I looked on Rightmove at rental prices around here. Between £950 - £1200 for a small 3 bed house, and there were only 5 of them on there.
It was always cheap around here so they've increased a lot. We paid under market rate when we were rented (landlady was a friend of my dads) but even so, market rate was only £650 for a large house 2 years ago!

70 funnily enough my dm called me yesterday to ask if I want her to keep an eye out for anything specific in their Christmas stock as some came in on a delivery on Wednesday night.
I've said if any of the Spode Christmas tree glassware comes in I'd like some so 🤞🏼 as they've had none at all for the last 2 years.

Also Wreck I'm jealous of your Harry Styles tickets. His music has grown on me over the last year or so and he looks like he'd put in a fun show.

I went on to have a look at rent here. One was charging £95 per week for a shared double room. Not including utilities. Maybe I'm too old but I'd at least want my own room.

Shared room?! No, ta! Not even when I was younger!

3 beds are about £850 here. We pay less, but more expensive ones are nicer, so it's a trade off.

Rent seems to have gone utterly bonkers almost everywhere. The cost of housing in general has got out of control.

feel a bit sniffly this morning, hope I am not coming down with a cold!

113

Two weeks today we're at 99!

We just had about 60 starlings come down for worms. They're insane birdies! I've never seen that many before as I'm not normally by a window and don't move to look as I don't want to scare them. They must get one worm each! 🙈

We went to bed early as I felt most odd yesterday after very little sleep. I feel better today as I had about 8.5 hours...unheard of most of the time for me!

Hair cuts and blood-giving today. Exciting times!

Woo hoo! Feeling autumnal here this morning.

Crazy I was indifferent to him before we went and saw him in June, it was honestly the best concert I’ve ever been to, the atmosphere was amazing and everyone was so friendly and happy, no drunk idiots or rude people at all.

I just looked on right move and private rents for a three bedroom house here start around £1350 for a tiny ex council with an old kitchen and bathroom which isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. The nicer ones are around £1600.

We had a good day yesterday, took the dc to wagamamas for the first time and ds especially loved it, he generally loves all food though. I also managed to get him the football shirt! It wasn’t on the rack so I asked a member of staff and he didn’t think they had it (computer said they didn’t) but he spent ages looking for me and found one then I was able to use my adidas rewards 20% off on top of that so I got the shirt, printed with his favourite player, all for £45 instead of £65. Pretty pleased with that. Shame he has to wait until the end of November

Today is just housework and sorting ready for back to school I think.

Morning

We had flash floods again last night. I don't think it was as bad as it was in early summer though.

Torrential rain here and I am under a blanket reading a book. Bliss!

@WreckTangled I too got Harry styles tickets, level 1 wembley for £108 each so I'm very chuffed. Make an excellent present for my sis

I'd like this please!

I'm back from giving blood and will sit on the sofa for the foreseeable. No rain, however.

That’s what we got, had the same last time and they’re great seats.

When I was driving us back from London last night we hit heavy rain, it was so bad no one could go over 40 on the usually very fast dual carriage way. We had rain here overnight too I think.

We haven’t got any food but I’ve found some left over Bolognese in the freezer and some puff pastry so I’m going to make some kind of parcels, will add some grated cheese.

Sainsbury had a small-ish stand up of Cadbury chocolate Christmas treats like tree decorations and robin sweets , also a shelf of Sainsbury mince pies , some cakes .
Too early to buy these but I did think "Yay , it's on it's way "

It's very exciting!

I'll keep an eye out in the cheap shops for chocolate tree decorations as they're a dear do. The kids can manage that much dairy in one go. I'll still be getting dairy free selection boxes though, and probably advent calendars.

Still not liking the new MN version, it's like being back in 1999 😵‍💫

It'll be dairy free all around here. We keep saying we're going to wean DD and then chickening out and hoping she weans herself. Going to try again tonight - wish us luck... I've still got the Florentines I bought for myself last Christmas waiting for me on top of the kitchen cupboard!! (No idea if they survived the heatwave)

Our extension is finally finished, hurrah. Only took twice as long as the longest estimate! Just need flooring down, blinds up and to decorate!

Ooh exciting fire!

crazy stormy here last night, but scared to look out the window.

woke up to £50 won on premium bonds though :)

So, I posted on the new bargain thread and it worked really quickly. It would appear the site runs more slowly when I try to post on a longer thread, possibly because I have it set to load all the messages in a thread rather than in pages.

Ooh, that's exciting Dreaming.

What are you planning to spend your winnings on?

We just had a bit of rain, but it hasn't broken the mugginess. Yesterday was soooo icky sticky.