September 2015: A Month In Review

Goodbye September! Another month gone by and we creep ever close towards another year being over. September seems to have passed by quickly, with the days blurring into each other through lack of sleep and routine. However, it has been such a special time for our little family. Our son is growing every day, developing his own little personality and traits. He’s just started to smile properly, which is very cute!

 

 

Our Financial aims for September were:

 

Have 20 No Spend Days (NSDs)

– Overpay our mortgage by something

– Put £400 into savings

 

As we get settled into more of a routine and rhythm, I find I have been out more than I did in August; seeing friends and family and popping into town means that NSDs have been harder to gain this month. In fact, I close the month out at 18 NSDs, which is two short of my target. However, I’m not too disappointed as I knew that 20 NSDs a month as we approach the holiday season may get slightly trickier.

 

As I didn’t know what our finances would look like this month, I didn’t put a specific number target for our overpayment. However, I have managed to overpay our mortgage by £307.31 which I’m really pleased about. This is the biggest overpayment we’ve done all year, in a month where our income is reduced. It really does show us that spending less means we can continue to put money in savings and overpay our mortgage debt, so we’re continuing on the road to freedom.

 

Lastly, I have managed to put £813.88 into savings this month, which again I’m really pleased about. Although this is still far off what we need to save every month in terms of reaching our long term goals, we also need to be careful with transferring too much money to savings and not leaving enough for us to live off whilst I’m off work and our household income is reduced. Although it’ll make it harder to catch up to get back on track, we knew this would be the case once the baby arrived. I will need to work much harder later on the pull it back!

My Personal Aims For September were:

– lose 4lbs

– bake something

– have an outing as a family 

 

Now, I have to admit, when I’m at home all day and not doing particularly very much most of the time, I find it really hard not to snack, or eat healthily, especially when I’m having to eat with one hand whilst holding DS in the other! However, I have lost 2lbs this month which is a start. I’m going to try and start going out for a walk everyday with DS in his pushchair, so I start getting some exercise everyday. Hopefully that’ll help with the weight loss too.

 

I put in my aims that I wanted to make some brownies, but the actually aim was just to bake something. As I have apples to use up plus some plums, I’m going to make an apple and plum crumble for us to have for tea today, which needs to be baked in the oven. That counts, right? The apples are from the tree at my parents’ house and the plums are a foraged find, so an almost free pudding! Plus I love crumble, it’s one of my favourite puddings. I think I’m going to add some cinnamon to the mix to make it slightly more winter-y.

 

Finally, we have managed an outing as a family; in fact, we’ve managed to go somewhere else and stay over night! It was lovely, though the amount of stuff you need to take away with you when you’ve got a baby is insane; it took us ages to leave the house! But, now we know we can survive and even enjoy it, we’ll hopefully do it again sometime soon.

 

The top 3 posts on The Frugal Cottage during September were:

• How To Organise Your Stockpile
• How To Save Money When You Have A Baby
• Why Everyone Should Be Aiming For Early Retirement

 

I was also lucky enough to be featured in a national newspaper, twice! The articles are here:

• Meet the super savers stashing away hundreds every month
• Meet the thrifty savers retiring in their 30s and 40s

 

So, September has been good to us! I’m looking forward to seeing what October will bring.

 

How was your September? Have you hit your aims? I would love to hear about it!