Frugal Friends, planning, saving and considerate spending through July and August

[Wolfcubisthefemalenominal]

New Fred frugal friends

£2.45 on coffee after car park stint.

Not managed to check in this week till yesterday. I’ve had a terrible work week - serious hours Monday - Wednesday and something going very wrong at the end of Wednesday. I’ve had a crushing headache all week from lack of sleep and stress but Thursday onwards had been better and my ‘work hangover’ is finally easing. Dh was out at his work summer party last night so after I got the kids to bed I treated myself to an oven pizza (no cooking! No mess! No diet!) and 2 beers. Deeeeelicuous.

It hasn’t been a frugal few days at all. I was FINALLY paid yesterday for May and June so bought /paid for some stuff that I needed. Bought DS’s uniform last night - just the logo stuff - £90. I think that may last him next year too as some things like the sweatshirts are sized across 2 years. We’ll see. Still need some plain polo shirts and PE shorts but I think I have plain trousers stashed from the Tu sale last year. So nearly done.

Paid the balance of our holiday, £985

I also spent £500 on clothes for myself in the JL sale. I won’t keep them all as I bought a couple of things in 2 sizes, and also won’t like them all. Mostly work clothes. I also spent c £100 on Turtle Doves website buying a poncho for MIL (Christmas or birthday, not sure) and some of their excellent fingerless gloves as Christmas gifts. Gloves are normally £26 but lots are currently £18 - I think they reduce the price in the summer to keep stock moving, but it’s quite a saving. I might go back for gloves for my sisters too.

I also bought some really lovely picnic blankets - one for a couple’s 40th birthday, who we are seeing this weekend, and one for BIL/SIL’s Christmas present (had 10% off first order so worth getting both). And one for us. It’s very lightweight and compact and lovely, I can’t wait to use it, and to give the other one tomorrow! We picnic a lot... have quite a few blankets but nothing lightweight so it’ll be great for days out when we are laden down.

I still need to buy shoes for DD - it’s been raining here and I realised her leather shoes no longer fit and canvas shoes and sandals aren’t ready suitable! £££ again 😬.

So overall horrifically spendy, but I’ve not bought much for a while due to not being paid, and I’m also quite ahead with the Christmas shopping, so feeling okay about that!

Ocado is coming today and that is £150 . Not including fruit top ups. My last few shops have been much more expensive - lots of cooking for other people, and for bake sales, and family staying a lot so more mouths. But I need to get a grip on that, it’s defo getting too much. We’ve 2 weeks till we go on holiday and I need to try and run the freezer down a bit next week so might manage a much smaller shop next week using stuff up.

A quiet day at home today and then lunch at a friend’s house tomorrow. So nice to see people but not be the cook for once. I’m planning to do some baking and decluttering and garden tidying and generally have a lovely weekend!

Glad you had a lovely holiday Happier, you deserve it. Girlie I didn’t realise you’d kept the puppy a secret! DD is going to be thrilled!

Sorry Tayto, it was you on holiday! I got confused about multiple DC... . You definitely deserved a good break too .

Car packed. House vaguely clean. Fair old drive ahead but will picnic near(ish) Life’s haunting ground on the way. Hopefully a walk on the beach later if it’s not chucking it down

@Girliefriendlikescake me too if I’m honest but he’ll have to cope.

We’ve just got home from breakfast with dparents. It’s dads 70th today so we treated him to breakfast out at his fave restaurant £111 in total - 5 breakfasts plus 5 glasses of Buck’s Fizz plus two coffees (dh and I as we arrived early). The breakfasts at said restaurant are divine. I had American breakfast (2 pancakes, two sausages, 3 bacons 2 fried eggs with maple syrup) dsis and Dm had the same. Dh had a full breakfast ddad eggs royale. Each dish was between £9-12 but came with toast, delicious pastries, bottomless tea/coffee and juice.... so although expensive actually good value for money. Plus it overlooks the castle and the harbour so lovely views and all ingredients are locally sourced etc. And they were amazing with ds. 😊 he was also so good. Said fankooooo to the waiter every time he came to the table bringing food or coffee. They set him his own setting with mini knives and forks and gave him a small plastic wine glass for his “Buck’s Fizz” (orange juice with a smidge of sparkling water)

Sounds lovely @ememem84, and good to do lovely things like that when it might very well be the last thing you ever do as a family of 3. I have very special memories of our last day as 3, it was actually the day DD was born too as she ended up arriving in a great hurry just before midnight

Spends today £35 in supermarket, I'm trying to cut down on overbuying by not taking a trolley so I only buy what I can carry (I generally do the big shops online anyway, it's just when I walk into a supermarket, I seem to get completely carried away).

We passed by your way wolf.
£20 at bolsover.
£73 for dinner which was our start of holiday treat.
Down Sherwood way now.

We are back home Tuesday night though

Calm afternoon here. Ds slept until 330!!! 😱

So I pottered about, put some things away, washed all of the baby things, had a rest, filled in my mat leave pay form.

Dh went to b&q and bought a few bits we needed.

Made enchiladas for dinner (veggie ones).

Ds has had a bath - he stood in front of the mirror and I told him what a clean boy he was. “Ohh noooooo” he said. 😂

Watched some netball. Dh has just come in from painting a wardrobe and fitting an extra rail.

He lost his phone earlier. Did I know where it was? Nope. Probably the last place he had it.

Could I do a find my friend for it. Nope - because he deleted the app and I can’t connect my phone with his now. Turns out it was in the car. Where he left it.

Oooh and frugal win. Dsis gave me a couple of end of term presents she was given but won’t use. A sanctuary beach set (beach bag towel and 5 toiletries - shower gel moisturiser scrub foot cream and something else) a Shea butter body shop set, and a travel mug with coffee. So win win.

So we survived the first day of our holiday. My parents must both have bladders like walnuts though. I swear they were up every half hour in the night. Cottage is an odd layout but perfectly nice. Had a couple of nice walks with the dog yesterday and will probably take in a castle today £5 for pudding stuff yesterday, £21 diesel

Morning Lovely people.

Wolf get your dad to have a prostate check if he hasn't already. Yes it is embarrassing (but no worse than a smear) but it could save his life. I am very evangelical about this since my Dad left it too late.
I am glad you are having a good start to your holiday & evidently didn't melt when in London the other day. Hope all the other shit is copeable

Em your Dh behaved exactly the same for your first. It was all look at me look at me , I am sooooo helpless I need all your attention. I wanted to rattle his teeth through the keyboard.

Tayto Glad you had a fab holiday. Your family sound like stars. I get the changing of the house to your space rather than a shared place.

I have finally grow a spine with the food situation here - I cook what I want. They let me know if they want to try it and if not they can make their own. We have had more chilli in the last week than the previous year. Pad Thai, Chilli Sweet and Sour, Enchiladas, Soups, salads and omelettes are all back on the menu. I am now looking forward to meals with vegetables. Out of laziness they have been eating a much more varied diet.

NSD yesterday & Friday, needed after holiday week

em your dh needs to grow up & quick! Sounds like you're dealing with it well, but you could justifiably be much less tolerant, given his history of similar.
life have a good break.
tayto glad you had a good holiday, I've only been once, but I loved Portugal.
Seacow glad you've had some payment, but sorry you're having such a hard time with work, do you have a holiday coming up?
The past few days with sil & family here have been spendy I fear. It's been a really good time & they pay their way but we've lived more extravagantly than we usually would. I've abandoned my usual recording of spends , but will start again today. On the plus side we have a very full freezer so my aim is to buy as little as possible from now until we go on holiday in 12 days and manage with what we have apart from salad, fruit & veg.
Tonight I'm going to sit down & plan what needs to be done from now until the holiday. I'm exhausted at the moment as there is just too much going on. When we get back from holiday, I have a week until my mum's 80th (2 days of events, all good, but I'm organising), 5 days later their Golden wedding, 2 days after that, the quilt show & im racing against the clock with my quilt, pil arrive that day to stay for the weekend as its ds' 18th. Come September 3rd I may be found in a corner somewhere fast asleep or gently rocking!
Ds has the private appointment tomorrow, so crossing fingers for that. Just looked at the consultant's bio again & she was the NW lead for adolescent endocrinology & chronic fatigue with an interest in vit D deficiency & immune problems so sounds perfect. If we are going to get answers then she sounds like a good bet. This week his eye settled down again & he felt better, yesterday played cricket, did well, but his eye had flared up badly by the end of the day & he said he could feel the energy drain from him .
Have a lovely Sunday everyone.

Im tolerating Dhs behaviour at present because I cant be arsed to argue and go ape at him anymore. Its exhausting this last week or so of pregnancy. 😴

He knows he needs a good kick up the arse. Which in a way is good because he’s recognised he needs to be less self and more team us. But it’s now actually getting him to do it.

I can see maybe he thinks mat leave is just a big holiday at present. I’ve met friends napped etc. But am doing these things while I can.

He Skyped mil this morning (I was still in bed pretending to sleep in...). She asked him how he was and he said I’d been giving him a hard time. She asked why. He explained and she then gave him a bit of a virtual kick. She suggested he read “she divorced me because I left a glass in the sink” to him and told him he was just like Fil. Which was in my opinion a step too far.

Anyway. This morning I’ve had a shower and breakfast with ds. We shared my toast and apple. Despite him already having his.

Ds helped me do laundry (tipped pegs all over the floor then told me off for not saying thank you and good boy when he handed them to me every time...)

He helped me sort the clean washing - most of it baby stuff. I asked him who it was for. He said “beebee” and I asked him where beebee was and he slapped my tummy. 😱😂

We tried to play a sock matching game but he just enjoyed putting two socks together. So maybe we’re not at matching stage yet.

Dh took him to the shop and bought almond croissants. He’s now mowing the lawn. I’m putting my laundry away. Have put his away and accidentally saw a small box in his undies drawer. About the size jewellery comes in. So that’s interesting.

Have also half arsed packed my bag for hospital.

Your poor son @northender, I hope your appointment is the start of answers and a proper solution.

I have migraine today and DH is away so we're out and about visiting, and have friends coming over later, anything to get the day over quickly and keep DC entertained.

Will be NSD I expect.

Hope it’s ok for new people to join in?

I have 3 DCs, inc 2 at school and a preschooler.

Today the eldest has gone to the cinema with DH using free cinema tickets from the sweet packet codes (prefer not to think how much money we spent on the sweets to get them though lol). DS has gone out with my DSis to keep nephew company so I gave her £5 towards the entry to farm park.

Littlest DD is having a nap so I’m about to go into the shed and continue chalk painting the Welsh dresser I bought for a bargain £20. I’m painting it grey and will add new handles. The paint plus brushes has probably cost about £80 but £100 total for a large piece of furniture is still cheap and I’ve always dreamed of having a lovely dresser in the kitchen.

I printed off blank calendar sheets on A4 to plan out the school holiday weeks. There are quite a lot of free events going on plus the local council if offering free swimming and sports sessions for school age kids which helps. No doubt out grocery will will quadruple though!!

@Summergarden welcome. I'm not at the school holiday stage yet but I'm sure you'll get lots of good tips from others here.
Need to do a quick tidy up before friends arrive.

Ohhhh - North sorry to hear he is so poorly. I hope you get some answers so they can start fixing.

That's hope you migraine goes away. I get them when I come into contact with organic solvents, which given how many newly painted houses I get to see can be problematic.

Summer of course you are allowed to join in. If you are in the Manchester area they have an amazing number of things that are aimed at families and are free. You will find details on the library / Manchester council website or their twitter feed.

Welcome summer :)

Poor DS north :(

Em I’m pleasantly surprised MIL gave DH a talking to!

I have no updates really, nothing going on just slowly trying to sort my head out

But here’s something that made me laugh the other day. We had to get DD’s phone exchanged at Cex which meant we had to use their WiFi. I love what they called it

Laputa Ha!

🤣 Laputa

Spendy day, £5 coffee with DH then £13 on lunch with DD2 when she finished work 🤦‍♀️ I’m juggling orders for work suitable tops, will log that spend once I’ve some that fit.

Frugal win, box full of home grown spuds 🥔👍 first year I’ve tried to grow them.

€10.40 totally unavoidable spends but it's our return journey home after 8 nights away & we didn't do this kind of stops all week. 2litres of water, 3 drinks, 3 ice creams & bar of praline choc for me (anyone had peanut m&m ice cream? 197 kcal well spent imho )
Also €58 on fuel whole holiday was done on one tank of fuel

Welcome summergarden the more the merrier please post photos of dresser, I hope to furnish my next home like this. Have a dresser made from recycled pallets in my dining room which has wine racks underneath instead of presses so I hope to get a carpenter to remodel this for storage.

Em wow your mil on your side that's a turn up for the books. Hopefully your dh hasn't bought something to buy his way out his poor behaviour, but for birth of baby

Laputa I love it

Next week is unpaid leave for au pair I'm going to be sensible & use the money to pay more than 50% of local property tax