Keeping our Fru Year Resolutions! Frugal January thread two (already) - all welcome!

[Cagliostro]

Eeek so the other thread filled up fast. January 10th must be some kind of record!

It's this wreck I'm planning to get a set for DS too. She just can't cut food no matter how much we show her the right way but these sort of force your hand into the right shape. I thought she'd feel a bit patronised TBH but she is so excited about them, I feel bad for not thinking of this before!

That is rubbish Love, moan away!

Intrigued by the death cleaning. I used to absolutely dread being left with my childhood home as it was in such an awful state. My mum eventually said she couldn't live there anymore so they sold up and now they have separate flats, mum has totally turned it around and loves keeping it nice, dad was always the worse hoarder though and is only sorting through all his stuff under duress! But I was so grateful a few years ago when mum actually said "I don't want this all to be left for you to deal with".

I sometimes wonder if anyone will out me, well Norbert (hello if you're reading! :o) recognised me but I haven't said anything I wouldn't say to her and other good friends anyway. There is one person I wouldn't want to find online but meh, she is the mum of the girl who bullied my DD and she spends her online time on Twitter bitching about us anyway 😂😂😂

Oops sorry wreck link would help I suppose :o

Childrens Caring Cutlery Set www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00J7QW8B2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_-97vAbNF7HH9P?tag=mumsnetforum-21

Have a moan love, that sounds like an utterly shit day. You're entitled.

Oh girlie I do feel for your poor DD. Think the slight decline in hearing has had anything to do with recent events? She's a lot to contend with, you want to protect them and wrap them up with a fluffy blanket and hope nothing bloody hurts them ever don't you?

Black bean and chipotle chilli tonight. I added a carrot and a pepper and a red onion. We had it with jacket spuds and salad. Healthy and cheap.

meadow the Meerkat offer is great isn't it? How did I not know I wonder?

My mortgage is due to finish its fixed interest period next month, I don't know how I missed that, better get on it.

Duchess We all slip, you just get back on it.

Welcome Brioche

Love Bad day indeed. I'm so sorry.

Girlie Poor little thing. Heck of a blow at that age

£10 fuel.

Well AF came today

£110 on contact lenses (will last 6 months)
£8 on a dress and £1.99 on a skirt in the charity shop
£3 on a cake to bring to a work tea party
£36 weekly cleaner

Spendy day ....
v tempted to have a glass of wine

Hi, can I join please? I was going to jump in on the last thread but it moved so fast it was full before I had the courage.

I have always let DH take the lead with our finances and never bothered to understand them But it’s led us into some debt (nothing major) and a realisation that we spend a lot of money on having a good time, but actually we need to be saving and reign it all in a little. I’ve crunched the figures and we can still pay everything, pay off the debts, save some money and have a decent living standard, we just need to stop wasting money (lunches bought at work, going out for food too often - leading to wasting the food shopping, lots of going away and just general waste).

So I’m on a bit of a mission. I have a bullet journal and have put in all birthdays, insurance renewal dates etc and have a page for monthly bills / payments and one to record debts and hopefully show them reducing throughout the year.

So all week we have taken lunches to work and had a home cooked tea 😇 I've had 2 NSDs and today the only spend was £40 fuel. The struggle will be tomorrow as I have to go shopping for 2 birthday presents in my lunch break and I’d underestimated how much DH eats so there is no bread, soup or jacket potatoes left (which were bought for this weeks lunches).

So I’m hoping I can drop in and out every so often and use the thread to encourage me to stay on track - it’s a whole new way of doing things for me so I’m hoping it sticks!

Well switching to a new deal proved much easier than I anticipated. 10 minutes process and a whopping £300 pcm saved. Which I'll continue to pay off anyway. When we bought this house 6 years ago we took the mortgage up by £100k. We've overpaid monthly and also chucked additional monies at it when we could, which took a bit of discipline at times. It's vastly reduced now and the value of the house has gone up significantly in that time. Keep at it frugal folk, it felt never ending when we moved but I can see us mortgage free in the foreseeable. Hard work but worth it.

Hi money, good steps you are taking there already. You are most welcome here.

Oh bad news MissA. Have a wine

love hope things aren't as bad as they seem.

Girlie my ds2 is 12 and is quite a sensitive soul. I just keep my fingers crossed that he flies below the radar and gets through High School relatively unscathed. Luckily he has a big brother who is very self assured and for all they fight like cat and dog would never let anyone pick on his little brother. Hopefully your dd will settle. I was wondering if her stomach pains could be hormonal, as I seem to remember my niece having regular pains in the lead up to her period starting.

Spends today:-
£23 on lunch with friend (my turn to pay)
£35 on birthday present but used a voucher for that
£4.50 in The Works on pens
£10 in body shop but used my points to pay

Thank you for all the frugaleer sympathy

I’m sorry missA , it is truly gutting. Was this the first month or has it been a while? Don’t answer if too personal a question.

Welcome all the newbies. Lovely supportive people here

I haven’t worked out who the recent NC person is yet

Thanks love and so sorry to hear of your terrible day hope I don’t seem like a selfish twat moaning about AF.
It’s now been 6 months, we also had a MC at 7 weeks ish in august which was unplanned and was what convinced my very reluctant DH he did actually want a baby.

missA do you know long your cycle is, and when you ovulate? I had no idea so used the clear blue things for dd2 (dd1 not planned).

love what a horribly shitty day tomorrow will be better, just by default.

I have started my journal! First page after 'january' page, daily spends! Priorities first. I'm going to do each credit card as a jar to fill, each £10 paid off will fill it a bit more.

I think I know who the name changer is

I’m probably due a name change. But cba.

Dh has annoyed me. (Again). He’s done something to our tv. So I can only get bbc NI. It’s been this way for weeks and he’s said he’ll fix it at the weekend. That mythical weekend which never seems to arrive because he never does anything!!!!

I’ve scheduled half hourly reminders on our calendar. So he’ll have to do something.

He’s also booked his London trip. I thought he’d just be away for the day but it’s an overnighter for him. I’m nervous about being alone with ds overnight. But apparently have to put my big girl pants on and deal with it.

Aw I’m sorry missA :(

Just got invited for one of those amazon offers where you buy a gift card and get extra gift credit free.

love that is a truly shit day

Sorry to hear that missa

Thanks for all the support re dd, it helps. I def think hormones are coming into play as her body shape is changing (hips!!) and she is getting a few spots etc, will have a chat with her over the wend about the hearing aids...

cag dd struggled with finding bras/tops (spd) and in the end we found sports type ones caused her the least problems. Primark do some which have been fine.

Thanks girlie I think I know the ones you mean, she had some but outgrew them (or else suddenly found them uncomfortable anyway, it’s hard to tell with her!). I’ll definitely look in there.

I did my first survey in months today as I had an email warning me my account would expire again! But that’s a good start and I’ll carry on now.

I’ve spoken to some friends to book lessons for their DCs. I’m nervous about teaching with baby but they are very good friends so will understand I think. Should be an extra £30+ a week so far. Author is sending first part of manuscript over soon too.

I've just been woken up by my next spend our house alarm battery was fried by the lightning last week but we hadn't got around to replacing it. Alarm going off at 2.30 and no way of stopping it definitely has prompted that quick google says they're about €30-€50. Neither of the dc woke up

What age do you give dc a knife to use at mealtimes? I've never given dd 8 in April one & hearing of difficulty makes me not want to as she has hypermobility & gross motor issues.

Loveabaconsandwich, sorry to hear about your Dad. We have been in the same situation with our Dad. Horribly scary. Surgery, radiotherapy etc has kept it at bay though. 💐

Thank you Fluffy, back on board now. These threads help a lot.

Sorry MissA ttc is hard.

Em I remember my first night alone with DD when she was a baby. I was terrified but all was fine my mum came to help

Thanks all already on train to oxford for a training day... had to get up at 5am hoping for an early night tonight.
£36 on train and £2 on coffee (didn’t want to carry an empty re-usable cup around with me all day)
Not sure if I will get £36 back from work or not as I organised the training myself and had to get permission to go...
Didn’t succumb to the last night so feeling very virtuous. This dry Jan thing is flying by!

Morning all, hope your course is good Peonies. I’m very glad it’s friday, it feels like it’s been a tough first week back and I’m feeling a bit sad and sorry for myself. Finally persuaded dh to both eat and cook the omlette he’s been avoiding all week for tea tonight so we will see how that goes. Need to submit my expenses claim today so that it can hopefully be paid next week as the bAnk balance is looking a little sad and sorry for itself too

We all over slept this morning but the dc are on the bus and I don't work today so I'm going to blitz the house then later I'm going for a facial. Have a £20 voucher but I think it's £45. Need to use the voucher though.

Made the call to the bank this morning to remove one of my two overdraft facilities - managed to clear it and don't want the temptation! As I've got a small savings account (earmarked for holiday) I figure that if something awful happens I can use that. Seem to have been paying for the overdraft even when not using it so that's a saving too :)