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When we came to High Street seven weeks ago, we wanted to help residents feel more in control of their finances. And street residents Natalie and Gareth Williams were really struggling.

Gareth works full-time as a loft insulator and Natalie is a trainee driving instructor. With three young children and a low combined income, they told us making ends meet was a battle every month.

Gareth said, it'd just be nice to think, "yeah, we're safe with money - everything's good, all the bills are covered in the house".

Earlier this year the couple relied on credit cards to make ends meet while Gareth was on sick leave. They'd built up a debt of £2,500 by the time our financial expert Sue Clay came to advise them.

A few months ago Welsh legend Margaret John told us how annoying she found junk mails and cold calls.

At the time, the only way to cut down the number of calls and letters was by subscribing to two different services - the Mail Preference Service and the Telephone Preference service. But now, there's been a new development.

Consumer Focus Labs, the online arm of watchdog Consumer Focus, has launched a new site to help consumers reduce unwanted junk mail and cold calling.

allows you to opt out of receiving junk mail and sales calls by registering with the Direct Marketing Association's (DMA) various preference services. This means that consumers can simultaneously sign up to the Mailing Preference Service (MPS) and the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) at the same time.

Now that it's mid-summer, many of us are digging out those walking boots and picnic blankets and heading out to enjoy the great outdoors.

But there are always those pesky little bugs around. And although most of them are harmless, there's one which is spreading a nasty disease - and you need to know about it if you're spending time in the countryside.

The bug in question is the tick. It's related to the spider, it feeds on blood and it can transmit an illness called Lyme disease.

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A tick

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For most of us, applying for a passport is one of those fiddly things which takes a bit of planning, but at the end of the day is pretty straightforward. But not for Wanda Montana-Jones from Pontypridd. For her, getting a passport has turned out to be an uphill battle although she's lived here for more than 60 years.

Wanda came over here with her parents when she was a year old. Her parents were Polish, but they fled their homeland during the war. Wanda was born in Germany in 1946, and a year later the family moved to Wales, first living in Abercynon and then moving to Ynysboeth. Her father bought a house there and worked in the mines like many Polish people of the time.

The peace and quiet of the West Wales coastline brings thousands of visitors flocking here every year. With its beautiful beach and stunning scenery, New Quay is one of the most popular areas. So it's little wonder that so many people have invested in holiday homes here.

John and Vicky Butler love this part of the world. Four years ago they signed up for a holiday chalet at the Woodlands Holiday Village in New Quay. They paid £13,000 for a ten year lease, plus around £2,500 a year for ground rent. But they felt it was worth it.

But the peace and quiet was shattered when, without warning, the Woodland Village began to look more like a building site than a holiday park.

John complained, 'we've got dumper trucks, tractors, diggers, lawnmowers, tractors flying around the site!'. And in recent months the building work around John and Vicky's chalet has increased. Hardly the relaxing holiday home they'd paid for!

Last year, there were more than 60,000 incidents of rubbish being dumped illegally in Wales and it cost a massive three million pounds to clear up. But there's an army of dedicated workers battling to stop our countryside turning into an illegal rubbish tip.

Rachel Treadaway-Williams visited the Environmental Crime Team in Flintshire to find out how they're trying to fight the fly tippers. Part of Paul Corbett's job is to search through the rubbish for evidence to lead him to whoever is responsible.

For many of us, juggling the cash to pay the bills is a constant challenge. And if there are children or teenagers living in your house, you may be tired of reminding them that money doesn't grow on trees! But soon, the young people of Heol y Cyw will have to make financial decisions of their own.

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Teenagers from Heol y Cyw are put to the test on household finances

Debt diva Melanie Giles believes it's never too early to teach young people about money. With the average household debt running at about £9,000, excluding mortgages, she wants to tryÌýand make sure that young people don't make the same mistakes as their parents. Rhodri and debt diva Melanie tested two sporting teams of teenagers on money matters to find out how much they really know about the cost of living.Ìý

If you want to give your offspring a head start in understanding the real costs of living, why not download our household budget planner ( or ) and talk through where your money goes each month?

And we want to know how you teach your children the value of money. Do they have toÌýwork their pocket money or do you think they'll learn as soon as they earn? Let us know by posting your comments below.

For the discerning collector, a fine china dinner service could seem a wise investment. But if you're thinking of buying one you need to watch out.

There's a company currently operating in Wales, taking advantage of vulnerable consumers with a taste for the finer things in life.

The company is called Regent China. They target elderly victims and persuade them to spend thousands of pounds on dinner services which experts say are actually worth a fraction of that.

If you're always losing important things but can't find them, don't despair. There's a team of specialist detectives just a phone call away.

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Man with a metal detector

Alun Jenkins and Ray Coburn might not look like your normal detectives but they're part of a UK network called the Federation of Independent Detectorists which offers a free service to track down your lost treasure. Items they are called to find include car keys, farm machinery and personal jewellery.

The hub of the detective network is in Swansea in the front room of Secretary Colin Hanson's house.

For the last 25 years, Colin has been coordinating the free scheme and he's now got over 5,000 metal detectorists across the UK to call on when he gets a report of a lost item. The success rate at finding lost items is about 98%!

The detectorists are also out to find real treasure and once in a while they do strike gold. Last year, Terry Herbert discovered the biggest hoard of Anglo-Saxon gold ever found in a Staffordshire field - worth £3 million pounds. And in Wales, in the last five months metal detectors have unearthed 2,500 objects of archaeological interest.

Find out more about the , including how to contact them if you lose something, via their website.