May the frugaleering be with you - frugal chat and support for frugalers old and new.

[babsmam]

I took the liberty as we were nearly at the end of the last one.

Great result Ipsos!

Back from a lovely dinner with two other home ed mums. Literally the first 'mum friends' type night out I've EVER had (DD is nearly 9!). I have found my people. :o

That's great that you felt so at home with your home ed Mums Cag. That's very encouraging indeed.

Need hope dd is on the mend, and pony hasn't been too cheeky with you. I assume you do pony duties for her when she is poorly.
Ipsos result with the ewo. Hope you are feeling less stressed now.
Collie welcome back. Hope you had a good time.
Cag, check you out and your new friends. Well done you exactly the boost you need.

Going to have grumpy dc today as they went to bed late and never sleep in, joy

I was meant to work today, but I am not now, so a free day to enjoy the sun and time with my DD.
It's homemade pizza tonight, I need to get some icecream, I'll have them all out on the lawn.
Going for a run later on and a walk in the afternoon.

i am getting my summer clothes out. And realising just how depressingly fat I am. Oh well.

lilac weve just been through a period of almost zero time together. So feel we need to make up for it. I promise it's not all romantic sea watching here -sometimes we go days without really seeing/talking to each other were so busy.

Today's spends £25 riding. And I'm off out later for a friend's birthday. So probably about £40 will be spent.

Morning.

Thanks, DD is still asleep but stopped being sick yesterday evening. I've left her asleep, as she almost never gets a lie in. She's remarkably resilient to be fair, given how busy her life is, bless her. Suppose that's called being a kid

Girlie, house purchases, even the most straight forward ones, seem endless at times. Like you suggest, it's the communications between all the parties that slows stuff down I think. Fennel tea is something to try, I love fennel.

Babs You are so right, I am on pony duty while DD is ill. Which is fine, I tell him about my day, he tells me about his. We bond

8 I bet that you are NOT fat!

Hope you had a lovely time Collie

Rare day at home today, after I have been to feed the pony. I am going to garden all day. Wondering whether to get sausages and burgers out and BBQ.

I love being at home for the day, I love my home. Ironic I am away so much!

Oh, and now I have the Santander account up and running, I have realised I can access their high interest account too, as well as M&S, so I'll stick some money in there, I'm not utilising ISA's this year, I think I can do better with general savings.

8 no-one is fat, people have fat on their bodies but no one is fat.

I run two slimming classes a week, have lots of people who are overweight or have fat but no one is fat, it is not what defines a person. Excess lodgers is what I call the extra 23lbs I'm carrying at the moment and I'm working every day on getting rid of them

need and how have the pony's day been? Is he missing your dd?
em I was admiring your closeness not criticising hope you know that

Cag glad you had a fab night! I was out with some old colleagues (one of whom is definitely a frugaleer - she brought a voucher!) £15 for dinner and drinks, £2 parking. I feel rotten today. Think it's cos I had two huge lemonades and a pudding - too much sugar and a late night - I feel hungover!

£22 yesterday for our cleaner. Having a cleaner has worked out well for us but it's something me and dh are disagreeing on for when the babies are here. I think it's an expense we can do without whereas he thinks it will be more essential than ever! Annoyingly she changed all of the beds last night and DD has woken up soaked through!! More washing today.

£51.98 in Aldi. Expensive for me too there this week - have they secretly put their prices up?!

Morning all.

need kids ability to recover is amazing. It never ceases to amaze me.

girlie to keep the pressure on get your EA to contact all the other EAs in your chain and get them to agree a moving date - suggest the one most convenient for you. It is cheaper and less stressful to move mid week as everyody think it must be done on a Friday. Then call your solicitor and tell them what date it needs to be completed on. Get the vendor and buyer one up and down the chain to do the same to their solicitor. A lot of the stress and delay comes from people not knowing what they are supposed to do.

ipsos the plastering was very messy at first but once I got going it was suprisingly straightforward - think icing a cake level of skill. I was out on site yesterday - looking around a big rehabilitation / conversion job we are doing (Lancaster Moor Hospital for those of you that want to google) which puts my patch plastering to shame. The trades people are so skilled. I am so lucky to have my job - I get to see some truly amazing things.

I have to do a meal plan for the week - and I am totally without ideas. Oh well I am sure inspiration will come.

Ursula I think they are getting a wider more tempting range. They seem to have more things that just jump into my trolley.

Right I've got my head around everything.

8 & Fluffy my settlement fee at the moment is 12448 if I wanted to do it now. The garage could only offer me about 10000 so I'd definitely lose money.

It's not that I can't afford the repayments. It's when other people get their views in my head and I start to think about it and get confused.

I currently pay 204.98 a month for 47 months and end settlement is about 5500 (give or take). I like my car to be honest and I think realistically I need to keep on paying and go with it.

I don't do too badly in petrol (dependent on how much driving I do and how I drive).

Insurance is about 450 a year and car tax 180.

lilac I know sometimes I admire it too. Like this morning. Dh woke me up (he was still asleep) by slapping and pinching my bum and shouting "yeah!!!" At 6am. Didn't feel so close then. Felt like smothering him. Haha!

Have just made eggs for breakfast. Haven't had scrambled eggs for ages! Yum.

8 I bet you're not fat. Stop saying that.

I know that feeling 8. I doubt you are fat.
need pony bonding.
£7 skate park, swimming this afternoon £15. Also nothing for tea and need a fresh stuff shop. £32 build a bear for DS to balance out DD spend earlier in the week.

Ursula I definitely agree with your husband. We got our cleaner while I was on Mat leave with dc2.

Aldi definitely have new & tempting things

need get the BBQ out. If it's over 16 degrees it's time for shorts flip flops and bbqs.

Im just getting ready to go for my riding lesson. Ponys are probably going to go nuts today. It is so sunny. Apparently it's going to hit 26 degrees!! ☀️☀️☀️☀️☀️

I was going to get my hair blow dried later this afternoon in preparation for going out. But have cancelled. May hit the beach instead. beach hair is still a "look" right

And when I say blow dried I mean go to my sisters and get her to blow dry for me. Not a professional blow dry.

lila The pony says he is fine thank you for asking, he had a very chilled out day in his field yesterday, basking in the sunshine. He's views on Brexit are worth a listen

Kids are incredible aren't they ursuala at bouncing back from illness and injury? Love it. I wish we appreciated it though when we were that little.

Re the cleaner, I am afraid I think the cleaner will be a godsend when the babies arrive, I am firmly in the camp of lila and your DH. It will be one less thing to stress about, and you can focus on the DC. There's plenty enough cleaning up after newborns. My MIL had twins as her 3/4th babies, it will be work enough.

Enjoy your lesson Em, you might find the pony 'blows' a bit in the heat, as it's come on pretty quickly and they haven't got used to it yet. Then enjoy the beach

Hi everyone , I hope you all have a fab weekend. I'm still in bed , which is a highly effective way of having a no spend morning. I'm just about to get up honest, then I'm going to make some bread.

I bought DS some new school uniform last night - his trousers are somewhat tight . They'll be fine for him next year as well though. I so ordered school shorts, which I think he'll really like having. And plain socks to go with them because otherwise he'd be wearing bright / patterned ones with the shorts . I usually stock up on bigger clothes for him in sales, so I've only spent £15 on clothes for him so far this year ! I should get back on the sales thing though - it means that he usually has really nice trousers etc that I've totally forgotten about when he goes up a size.

My eBaying has gone well too, I've made ~£50, and spent ~£20 on a pair of new Fat Face jeans for me. I hadn't bought anything on eBay for ages.

Yay . Okay, I'm going to get up now.

I've spent €1.40 on the newspaper a weekly treat for me

€20 petrol au pair car
€55 nct for same, it failed not surprisingly so it'll be €27.50 retest plus whatever garage costs
€16 onion sets
€26 butchers
I'm home now so off to walk dogs & no more spends today tomorrow

£8.99 for bin bags. Resent paying so much for them but the bin has lasted six years and the simple human bags never split.

I've had a cleaner for four or five years, wilf is 3 and Gabriel about to turn 8 months and it is hard losing the cleaner. I don't even remember how to do it well!

Spent loads but was needed.

£58 sports direct
£58 h&m
£20 new look
£6 boots

£87 tesco only to find when we got home they'd forgotten a whole tray of fucking food. They've refunded it but now dh has had to go out and get it which is a bloody waste of time and petrol so I'm complaining.

My top tip for the day. Do not head out to the supermarket without a plan..... £113 in Aldi for a weeks shop. I didn't even get the air chisel or the screw storer thing.. I can't even blame it on having dh or kids there to put stray things in.

Lovely day here...