Austere April continues with the Friendly Frugaleers! Join us as we discuss our direct debits, prattle about penny pinching and possibly babble about Brexit...

[Cagliostro]

All welcome!

Agreed. wolf you have done and achieved so much in the last year

Two very overtired DC yesterday who went to bed early. Got up at 6.10am 😴 Having a lovely time away though.

A year Wolf? I can't believe it. You have been amazing and you have done/are doing so well.

MOrning all. Currently away on business so enjoying a very luxurious hotel suite. Children are with my sister in Cornwall, DH is home alone.

Enjoy audit

Morning catching up from my bed!

Happier new chap sounds lovely, I wouldn't worry too much atm. The last bf I had def paid for more stuff than I did but he was very generous and could afford it so I didn't worry!

Sea hope your dm feels better soon, are there any holiday clubs that are more inclusive or autism friendly?

We're off to Lyme today, taking a picnic so hopefully not too sure spendy....

Sounds like heaven @auditangel, enjoy!

Yesterday was NSD.
Today's spend was £3 on lunch, sandwich ingredients so the rest will be used at home.

Made it to Lyme, have got a horrible headache so am feeling a bit crap, glad dd has her friend so they can go off by themselves for a bit!

Ystds spends were £7.50 on a subway tea for dd and me, I'd forgotten she had a riding lesson after her holiday club so needed a quick tea on the go.

Today have spent £5 parking, £3 to the kids for the arcades and £1.70 on a latte. Will get chips and maybe ice creams later. It's lovely here...

Found a nice sunny spot to watch the DC in the play area 😎 It's chilly in the shade though. Our legs are worn out from swimming and walking.

Going to Las Iguanas for dinner. Yum

Hello! Can I join? I have 48 years worth of spenthrithery to unlearn... is it possible?

Looks lovely Girlie, hope you are feeling a bit better.

Love sounds like you are having a good time

Welcome Molly

Welcome @MollysLips, I think you can always learn new habits if you really want to.

Got some online banking/budgeting done today.

Ahoyhoy!!

Eyedrops for ds bought.

Katsu curry for dinner. Have been home for an hour and have bathed ds, washed his eye, applied eye drops, milky, cuddles and bed. He is knackered after a busy busy day at nursery. They took them to the beach for a run. Nursery overlooks the marina and is v close to the beach.

Catface has had a run in the garden. Ds also chased off a different cat.

Also cancelled all paper statements from banks. Phew. Trying to limit amount of paper waste.

Hi all, and welcome to the newbies!

Meal plan for this week (slightly belated):
Tomato spinach soup and grilled 'cheese' (Violife)
Ratatouille lentil pasta
Leftover chilli with rice from DH
Bean rice bell pepper casserole
Leftover tomato pasta from DH
Butternut squash and chickpea mac and 'cheese'
Refried beans and Spanish rice

Sea I've been meaning to ask, would you like a '2' cake tin (from Unescorted) for the upcoming birthday in your family?

I love it there Girlie, have fun!

Welcome Molly! Yes you absolutely can unlearn it!

Nsd. Also made a frugal banana cake to use up overripe bananas. Just realised I've got to meal plan for lunches over the holidays as well as dinners. Any quick and cheap ideas welcome!

Soup or dippy eggs here for lunches Snuggly! Kids also love a bagel and cream cheese with a bit of salad on the side. Cheese scones are good too.

Moi that’s really kind of you to remember but I think I’ll pass because it’s probably going to be a Peppa-shaped cake here 😬. DD just loves her vast collection of Peppa books.

Girlie. Love Lyme. And the seaside in general.

Busy busy day at work. Dh survived (even enjoyed?) the day with the DC, who were pretty good, but says he wouldn’t want to do it all the time.

I am having that ‘time’ when everything needs attention and there just aren’t enough hours. The shower is only half working, I am still stuck with Adobe customer support trying to access my photo software that I’m paying for (11 hours on live chat with tech support over 3 nights this week, and counting), I need to apply for my fixed term contract this week and I have paperwork to sort for DS. And I need to catch up on some actual work as there’s a few urgent things to support. I feel spread very thin at the moment. I hope DM can come back next week, she feels marginally better now the antibiotics are kicking in, just depends how quickly she bounces back.

Early night for me, off to sleep now!

And Welcome Molly! I haven’t fully unlearn my speedy ways but I’m much more conscious than I was and still trying

Welcome Molly. I think there are always lessons to be learned but it's not easy. I still struggle tbh.
Yesterday
£46 Sainsbury's, £35 pony, £10 birthday, £20 duvet wash, £23 ultras sun. The 100m is £11.99 on fragrance direct so I got 2 for free delivery - wreck

I managed a very rare nsd yesterday.

Sea can dh do the paperwork for ds and take one thing off your plate?

FFS. DS rejected by CAMHS again. 🙄

Who referred him cag? Did you know that CAMHS reject more GP referrals than from anyone else because they're so shit at filling in the referral forms? If there is something as simple as a bmi missing they won't even read the referral. One of our school nurses went in and sat with them recently and this is the information that they gave us.

Oh wow that’s interesting, thank you. BMI?! GP didn’t ask for that. He did get loads of information about behaviour etc, he’s very determined to get him seen (DS was textbook ADHD in the appt) but we didn’t talk about much else. The letter has suggested asking for an early help plan instead... a load of hoops to jump through I guess. But I’ve emailed those people to get the ball rolling. TBH we were even discussing self referring to SS recently so it wouldn’t be the worst idea.

I’m in a proper shit mood so I am going to the gym. To work out some stress. Never thought I’d say that!

Meh. Lots of people have EHP's. CAMHS get about 50 referrals a week to go through so it's more surprising for a referral to get accepted rather than rejected. I think an EHP would be a good idea even if it's just a stepping stone to being seen by CAMHS.

NSD so far, need to pick up a few groceries before I collect children though. Not doing a full shop is helping me run down my stocks a bit so I'm going to do it again this week I think.
Sounds like you have a lot on @ChristmasSeacow. If your DH's work are ok with him taking a little unpaid leave when necessary, would it be possible to build that into your budget so that it's not as stressful when it happens? It seems like anything that can make it possible for you to keep working is worth considering.

Afternoon all, tired here as work was busy and needed to pop to a garden centre after work to pick up a card and gift. Spent £13 on a nice pot, plant and card for dds riding teacher as it's the last lesson tomorrow ☹️ will miss going there.

Need to have a look at my account and work out how much money I've got left. Off to Devon next week for a few days, April is flying by.

Ah Cag that’s really shit. I know ours gets over 360 referrals per month and can take 320 new cases per month. We got lucky I suppose in that we had ss and school refer at the same time