New family commitment that's potentially going to affect my Mortgage Free Challenge!!

Hiya All

How things can change on the space of a week (well, since my last, more optimistic post :-) As finances have started to become more stable and thoughts of making mortgage overpayments have become more of a reality, what do we end up doing? We go and buy our boys some pets!!

To be fair, I think the boys have been brilliant and although it's not been great whist we were having to watch the pennies, they've not been as demanding as maybe they could have been. My boys have wanted a pet ("any pet, it doesn't matter mum, we just want something to look after") for such a long time but my eldest recognised that whilst the financial situation was as it was, this wasn't going to be an option.

By "giving in" to their desire of having "something to look after", it was also our way of saying not to worry about money (kids are more clued up and tuned in than we realise - a fact I feel I'm learning more and more about by the minute).

Soooo, what have we treated our buys to? Two Guinea Pigs!!! And they've cost us a fortune already (oh, imagine how much I could have saved on the mortgage - stop it, stop it - you did it for the boys, don't forget!!) They're brilliant little animals (though I found out this w/e that they grow much bigger than I'd anticipated - wish I'd invested in a larger cage now!) We've only had them a week and although it's put my Mortgage Free Challenge to one side (again!), they've given us so much pleasure, they're worth every penny I've not saved off the mortgage :-)

Px