Frugaleers dripping their way through a wet January...

[SneakyGremlins]

Hang on, that makes us sound like alcoholics

Just a hop skip and a jump from each other tatyto.

I'm glad everyone is loving Edinburgh, you've convinced me, will definitely look into booking it. We were thinking end of July. We thought 3 nights, one day do the zoo and the others just exploring the area. north I wish our train was £60, we looked and would cost £260+ for 4 of us, 3 changes and over 6 hours on the train. Thats with a railcard! Would rather pay an extra £60 and fly!!

tayto I too hate hormones I turn into a constantly hungry, short tempered bitch when I'm due on. Dh and the girls have learnt not to argue with me or wind me up at that time of the month 🤣 I too want to read more instead of reading random threads on here!

Very fed up have put on 3lbs this week so I need to actually stick to my meal plan and stop eating crap in the evenings.

In happy news we've started game if thrones from the beginning again in preparation for the new series 😁 does anyone else watch it?

£9.95 on 2 packs of party pop teenies reduced in Argos to put by for DD2 birthday. One pack for her and a pack to split and give as favours with a book. (Thinking of doing a small crafty/pamper party with nail painting, glitter crafting, cake making)
£4.95 slimming world, if I lose my 5lbs I will be back at target and no more paying!!!

If anyone wants to use booking.com I can send you a referral code and we both get £15 I assume you don't need to be a first time customer 🤷🏽‍♀️

Oh where have you got game of thrones from. I watch it. When does the new series start. It's about April isn't it?

Life it’s on now tv at the moment (presume also on sky on demand but I don’t have sky)

I love GOT it is tempting to watch it all again ready for April

Today and yesterday I’ve been crocheting my fortune’s Shawlette. It’s helping with the boredom.

Picking ds up in a few minutes and then will need a couple of trips into the city to drop him off and pick him up as I don’t want him getting the bus after 5pm.

I hate hormones as well, I get terrible PMT, really teary for no reason and then get the rage as well I've stopped taking evening primrose and noticed its got worse again, need to restart. I also find my skin is worse, IBS is worse and headaches/migraines are worse depending on the time of the month.

Dd had a good riding lesson, they did lots of work with legs out of stirrups and she says her legs are aching now

Went to the flooring place and was completely depressed by the quote which is loads more than I thought they said for everything including fitting it would be £450. There is no way I can afford that so back to the drawing board, will ask about and see if there is someone local who can fit, the laminate itself isn't that expensive its just all the extras like underlay and door trims.

Bought a soap dish for £1.99, am going to use soap instead of hand wash as i have about 10 years worth of soap to get through!!

Absolutely freezing today. At work and have bought lunch £3.98. Also swapped some of my clothes order for a new dress. £6.
Made a batch of chilli yesterday, made dinner plus 5 containers so that's in the freezer for easy meals. Asked DP to put the slow cooker on with chicken breasts, peppered, carrots, chopped tomatoes, herbs and spices. That will be ready for home time and will hopefully make another couple of containers too. No more planned spends today. Too cold to go shopping.

Going to the theatre tomorrow but have put money aside for lunch at the hard rock cafe and ice cream in the interval. Just train tickets into London to get.

@girlie bad news about the flooring, hope you find a cheaper way to do it.
@north and @tayto what a great way to make decision having the whole family involved. I'm sure everyone is happy their voices are heard and it can be better to understand the reasoning behind decisions.

Well, we had our family meeting no cakes though. We discussed all of the things we would like to do this year, if money was no object and agreed that it wouldn't be feasible to do them all. Then we took turns to say what our priority is (and made a case for it). To cut a long story short, we agreed that our priorities are:- (1) DD's school tour because this is the last year she can do it (it's only offered to 1st and 2nd years) and (2) furnishing the teenage hangout room because we've been talking about it for years. We'll furnish it cheaply from IKEA. I'm a little bit disappointed that we won't get to go on a foreign holiday but there's always next year for that. Mostly I'm relieved that we're not over-extending ourselves or putting big expenses on a credit card. And we're all on the same page and working towards the same goals.

north I like the sound of your monthly treat if you manage your finances well during the month.

I forgot to say that I got a nice lavender bath set and also a fancy shampoo and conditioner set for Christmas, so hoping to make a small saving on these items.

life we have the dvd box set, but I think it's on nowtv, they usually put it on before the new series. I'm excited to see how they wrap it all up as this will be the last series. There is a trailer but I'm waiting to watch until we have watched through again.

Also waiting for the walking dead to come back on too not sure when that's back.

That's great Tayto. Everyone needs to be on board. One of our problems has been top up shops which we've stopped and so it means everyone has to a bit more flexible, there's plenty of food but it just might not be your first choice.
Enjoy your theatre trip mo

£30 riding. £6 dinosaurs. £4.35 sausages and rolls from the farm shop.

Took ds to see the cows.

He’s being a bloody pest this afternoon. Will not nap. Will not shhh. Will just not. Dh has taken him out for a walk. I have a headache and feel exhausted. Dh also feels exhausted and moaned about me resting. I may have used the “I’m pregnant, but if you really want me to over exert myself so you can have a nap” line. So now feeing guilty. Shouldn’t but do.

Baked rissotto for dinner. And salad. I’d love garlic bread with it but we have none and I cba to start bread making.

north top up shops was a problem here too. Started doing £100 a WK for groceries in envelope and that's helped so far.
tayto family meeting sounds great.
em take care hope tiredness lifts a bit soon

£33 M&S. Motorway was blocked so I took a detour and thought I’d look for some yellow sticker bargains. There weren’t any but I did get two jars of half price almond butter, and some soup, bread, apples etc for lunches next week

£2.50 parking
£16.50 mcdonalds

North we are really bad at making do with what we have for fruit /snacks (better at meals though). Must try harder.

Family meeting sounds good Tayto

It’s exhausting when they’re like that Em, can you have s nap and then DH have half an hour of peace when he gets back?

£52 for hair incl tip. And then £30 in Waitrose for stuff I couldn’t get from Ocado/forgot plus soft fruit etc. And two pairs of very thin naice tights for the wedding next week. I don’t normally shop in Waitrose but had to get a click n collect.

I had bought a possible frock for next week’s wedding as the one I planned to wear is quite thin and kimono sleeves, so I’ll freeze in a draughty room (bride has warned us) ... but this one was no better, in spite of longer sleeves, and not as nice anyway, so it’s going back. Winter weddings are tricky, nice dresses are never warm! In desperation I also bought a little fake fur cropped jacket thing to wear over either dress (it’s black, but the dress I am wearing is bright green so I won’t look funereal!). I quite like it though it makes my waist disappear... I need to decide how cold I am prepared to be before I decide whether to keep that or not!

Might take the kids for a day out tomorrow so probably entrance fees to the place we are going as it’s not NT. We’ll take snacks and try to come back here for lunch as it’s too cold to picnic. But it will make a change. It’s hard to get excited about a day out when it’s this cold but at least it’s dry and if we don’t make an effort we end up not going anywhere. This time of year is hard as DS doesn’t cope with the noise of indoor attractions like museums at all. So it’s outdoors or nothing!

Naice prawns for dinner - a treat dinner, which we often do on a Saturday as we don’t go out a lot or do takeaways. I might try to make tomorrow’s cottage pie filling this evening too so I don’t have to cook much tomorrow.

We’ve been decluttering the book cases in the family room so we can fit more of the kids’ books on, as the room is generally carpeted in picture books . Two Ikea bags full for the chazza. I feel quite liberated by getting stuff out of the house and can feel the urge to purge rising within me! I have my sights on the bathroom cupboards next. We have 3 big ‘kitchen’ Cupboards in the bathroom (our bathroom is huge) which should be loads of storage and yet when you open them things just fall out

Well today was shite! All of us have a horrible cold and we've all been irritable and cross with each other all day. The weather didn't help. Fresh start tomorrow.

I don't think I get particularly emotional or irritable when I'm on my period but I do generally feel a bit run down and poorly. I bleed really heavily and I really struggle with the sensory aspects of it all too, and I often get migraines, and IBS, acne flare-ups etc like Girlie when I'm on my period. Bleh, hate it. The first few after DD weren't so bad but they've gone back to being very heavy again so I will probs ask GP next week to go back on my combined contraceptive pill as that makes them much lighter and I also run pill packs back-to-back so I only end up having a bleed every 3 months or so which is sound.

Girlie We have used soap in the bathroom instead of handwash for about 2 years now, works out cheaper for us. We have a cheap soap dish from Asda. We just handwash in the kitchen as more practical there.

Em Don't feel guilty, it's his son too and there are extra demands on your body right now that will make you feel more tired. I know you know this, but just saying it again.

Snuggly Oh no, hope you all feel better soon

Seacow I'm loving imaging all your house! Remember when everyone posted pictures of their kitchen ages ago? Well, I didn't, cos it takes me ages to figure out how to get a photo from my phone onto my laptop but that was fun. I loved looking at everyone's kitchens, it was a bit like looking at a photo of the person, iyswim.

Managed a 30 minute nap. Then made dinner and begged dh to keep ds out of the kitchen which he did. Then I gave ds a bath while dh chilled.

We did the most splashes ever. At one point I honestly thought ds was going to bellyflop into the water he stood up, arms up and had this wicked grin on his face....I thought it was time for bathroom tsunami for sure! Luckily not.

I think it’s because he’s only having one nap at nursery, is so busy exploring and learning and so just doesn’t want to miss out.

In bed now. We moved the dresser in here to the side of the bed and moved clothes rails to the foot of the bed. Makes the room look a bit bigger. Dh has moaned about my clutter (ie plastic box of handbags and shoes). Suggested I throw it in the spare room. With all the rest of the crap....Must sort that out.

I keep saying that but have no real motivation to do so. Will see how far along I am on Monday at the scan and then work backwards from the due date. As long as we have everything ready to go 2 months before (extreme but I know how panicked we were last time and did a lot last minute...)

Thank you for kind words. meadow you’re right, I know I need to chil/rest etc. But sometimes you never listen to yourself right?! Needed someone to tell me

Em I hope you get a decent sleep tonight

4.99 ordering stitch markers on amazon. I reckon I’ll be on the edging of my shawl tomorrow and it needs a stitch marker in every block apparently

We started ' ed time' at 7.15pm. It is 20:50 and DD is still here with us downstairs, intermittently sleeping on DH for 10 minutes and then suddenly waking up crying hard for a few minutes and repeat. She's been doing this since 20:10...we are both sitting in the near darkness feeling very fed up! Have just given her 5ml Calpol as she was doing this at her last nap before tea as well so wondering whether it's pain or not feeling well of some sort. Feel sorry for her but also really annoying for us too. Getting her to sleep for a nap or for bed is just such an ORDEAL, takes soooo long and is so frustrating.

Meadow how old is she - I know you have said before but I have a shocking memory.

Sea faux fur cropped jackets are ideal for cold weddings. I had one for mine :) and so did a few of the guests.

Today has been a long expensive day - the snow had melted so we drove to Bletchley. I may have bought snacks, McY D's , wine for puffer watching and a couple of books for the girly mite (she has now thawed). We also had to go to the Computer museum next door. The poor volunteer had a do not compute face on when dd was explaining why she had to get loads of photos of the punch tape ... (primary research for a porcelain sculpture.). I learnt loads, but have never felt so stupid when going to a museum. I need to learn about codes & code breaking.

7 months today Unescorted! It's not always as bad as this evening tbf but does tend to be a bit of an ordeal. She is clearly exhausted but she just finds it sooo difficult to get to sleep and 90% of the time needs motion to sleep, which is getting increasingly unsustainable now that she is over 7kg. My whole body is aching from rocking her so I tend to use the pushchair for almost all her naps but this doesn't solve the problem of getting to sleep for bedtime, and in two months time she will be in nursery, God help them !! How do you teach them to go to sleep themselves without motion without hysterical screaming for hours?

DH took her up to bed about 9.15pm finally but she was then a bit unsettled in her cotbed so he lay in bed patting her and fell asleep. And we already agreed he could sleep in til 8.30am tomorrow morning. But I'm just not tired enough for bed yet. I have just discovered the AMA subforum, just read the one by someone who lives in KSA, that was interesting.

Today has been spendy, in frugal news. I did a huge Asda online shop which is coming tomorrow night that was about £100 but about £20 of that was baby food/snacks, some of which will be going to DM's ready for when she starts looking after DD when I go back to work, as she is too anxious about choking to do BLW with her. And some more of it was spices and things that I won't need to buy again for ages, and some more was loads of wipes and nappies. Babies are expensive! And I've heard they get even more expensive as they get older, don't they?! Also spent about £10 total in our local Asda and Home Bargains on a few bits for tea tonight and lunch tomorrow and chocolate. I can't wait until my PIP money comes through gahh..

£2.50 on a card, £2. Lottery ticket.

Does it seem worse when she goes to bed with a full tummy? DD went through a patch where she had an upset stomach when she drank milk before bed - but needed the bottle to sleep. She was mixed breast & bottle. We fiddled with teats, moving from bottles to breast and vice versa for the night feeds. Stinky t- shirts seemed to work in that if she woke up during the night she would go back to sleep if she wasn't hungry. The other thing we did which will get me lynched by the sleep police was leave a bottle in the cot - she had self service bottles in effect. She got too disturbed by us coming into the room but she wanted food. Even if it was only one feed a night it meant we could all get some sleep.

I wish some sort of magic fairy would come and sort out all the sleep issues! Quite a few of us not getting enough sleep at the moment!
Actually last night wasn't too bad by our standards but I've been awake since 5.15 trying to ignore the little cherubs. Eventually caved and got up at 5.40 when the cute gurgling turned into crying. Now they are all playing with Duplo while I try to stay awake.
Should be NSD today. Made some amazing naan breads last night. Think I might get the dcs rolling some more out for lunch. They'd enjoy that.