Hands up if you’ve spent a small a fortune on eating out this week??!! Me, 100%. It was a sunny week so the pubs and restaurants with outdoor space were packed. And we all wore our winter coats, hats and scarves when the sun went down and it suddenly became freezing cold. But alas HOW AMAZING has it felt to return back to normality. And brilliant news I have just had my vaccine text, I booked straight away for tomorrow!
I’ve been doing some work with Tesla this past week and collected a Model S Tesla to use for a few days. I’ve got to say I’m loving it. SUCH a nice car and I love the fact that if I owned it I would never have to buy petrol again. Alas it goes back on Tuesday. I will be sharing my thoughts on social media in a few days! This has saved me money over the weekend with the 300 miles in driving to football that I’ve done (Northampton away this weekend for my eldest’s game). Not only the fuel my hybrid would have cost of £30 but also the insurance that I pay-as-you-drive, £9 saved there.
A New Debt Stories Post is Published
Another debt story post went live last week, this time it was the turn of Ruth from Mrs Hawkins House Blog. She shared her story of how divorce and a subsequent business failure landed her in 10,000 Euros of debt. She went extreme with her debt repayment and did a no spend year! An inspirational story, read it here.
New Podcast Talking Everyones Invited.
Episode 2 of Mrs Mummypenny Talks with Ridley Writes was published last week. And we went deep with the second episode talking about the recent media storm of Everyone’s Invited where thousands of people are sharing their stories of abuse at school, college and university. It all felt too familiar, having experienced many of the situations myself. We discuss some of the most unsavoury issues, upskirting, slut shaming, and the big one consent. Well worth a listen.
Back to The Spending Diary
Basically, yes, I spent a small fortune on food and drinks last week!! I went to the pub to meet my wonderful old EE friend and had drinks and dinner. My friend Neilboy came over on Friday night and we went to the local pub, Lytton Arms, with the boys for pizza and drinks. And we then doubled up on pizza and ordered dominos on Sat night.
My healthy eating has totally gone out of the window last week, as has budgeting. I spent £169 on eating out/takeaways. There I said it, and breathe!! And I loved every mouthful and don’t regret it one little bit! And I snapped this picture on the walk home on Friday night from the pub, cross country across the beautiful fields.
Other Spendings for last week
It was all about the eating out! I spent much less on groceries, just £58 this week. There was some bigger petrol expenses as I needed to replace fuel in the hire car which had to be returned and fill up my actual car that came back from the accident repair centre. These came to £57. My car had spent two weeks at the garage after the accident in late March, the repairs were itemised, £3,500 in repairs. WOW. Grateful for car insurance, and with it being not my fault, my excess was made zero and it should have no impact on my insurance costs going forward. Have to say the process has been sorted out so smoothly, both by my insurance company By Miles and AXA who actually underwrite the policy.
Other little transactions were an £11 spend on exciting worming tablets for Trev cat and £15 savings into my Plum Auto savings account, now sitting at £840!! All done automatically with no effort from me.
Nike Discounts
My youngest and I needed some new trainers. Mine has worn down on the soles after all that running;-) and my youngest feet have grown. £73 was spent on trainers but I double discounted this transaction where I got a 25% discount on the most expensive pair that was linked to my birthday recently. Plus I bought the trainers via Topcashback and got an an extra 4% knocked off my purchase. This saved me around £15 in total.
Total Spend for Last Week
My total spend for the week was £383, taking my April spend up to £3,500. I have totally blown my budget (by £500). But do you know what, going through this process means I KNOW that I have spent more than my budget and can now choose to adapt my spending behaviour, certainly for the rest of April and for May too.
Buying Shares in the PensionBee IPO
I also bought some shares last week. As a PensionBee customer I was given the opportunity to buy some shares in the PensionBee IPO, before they began trading on the stock exchange. I spent some time going through the prospectus (I was actually the front cover with my PensionBee billboard shot from last year!) and made the decision on how much to invest.
I now own a small part of the company that I have been working with for the past five years and whom I have all of my consolidated Pension money invested with. Today 26th April marks the day they start officially trading on the stock market. So far doing really well, must stop refreshing the share price every 10 minutes!
Thank you as ever for reading my Monday Money Spending Diary post. I do so love writing them, even when its an overspend week. Give it a try, record everything you spend to really understand how much you spend and more importantly why?!
This post contains links to companies that I mention, they are referral links and either I or both of us get a payment for signing up. If you do sign up, thank you!
