The Lockdown Saving and Spending Continues! May Frugaleers continued

[LaneBoy]

New thread!

My delivery of wine arrived. Yahoooo!

And this has happened to my garden table. This is an earlier picture but I’ve done the whole thing now. Love love love it!!!!

I’m struggling today. We are on day 15 I think with me not getting a proper break. Dh is still exhausted. And is grouchy because he’s exhausted. What he hasn’t seen is that I’m doing everything. And I’m about ready to crumble.

He keeps saying that it’ll be ok when dparents can have the kids. But no idea when that will be.

Spoke to dm earlier and almost cried. She’s seeing dsis this afternoon. They’re in the garden drinking wine. Bastards.

She said she’d love to help but I’ll just have to put up with it. And that I shouldn’t have had kids if I didn’t want to look after them. Which wasn’t what I was saying.

Sigh.

On the plus side. My wine arrived. And I’ve ordered Thai food. Yay!!!! So nice noodles and a glass of wine for me.

Popped to a garden center this morning, spent £10 on a few plants and then had an enjoyable couple of hours this afternoon putting them in.

I picked up an garden archway in the aisle of doom in Aldi last week, am really pleased with it!

Em will your parents have the kids for a bit if you asked them? It's understandable you need a break, dd is 14yo and I've still needed my mum to have her a couple of times over lockdown.

Work was rubbish Ystd, I cried after a meeting with my boss, just so much to do it's overwhelming. In the end I did what I could and then left it, I'm off next week so it will all have to wait.

Pic of the archway!

Nice archway.

Ofgs em. It's not about you having kids or not it's about solo parenting without a break when they are at the most handful age. Is DH so exhausted he can't sit in a chair and watch them even for a short while.

Anyway. First world problem in struggling to spend £30 on Amazon from mil for my birthday. Might get the bosh book but I really don't need anymore cook books. Is it worth it?

Or I was going to get a pandora bracelet from my old team as they sent me a voucher. I could get a charm.

girlie under normal circumstances they would. But they’re “not allowed” Dm is sticking to the guidelines. Which is now actually really starting to piss me off. She won’t see the dc. Won’t see us. Because virus. Will happily see my sister (whose been in and out of school) and her friends (nurses....)

life in theory dh could. But in reality he’s just being a bit useless. Seems like the longer we’re home the less he does.

He won’t even take the dc out while I’m working. I know he doesn’t have to. But they need out. He gets angry with ds when he wants to play and all he (dh wants to do is sit and look at his phone).

I know he wasn’t well. And know it absolutely knocked the stuffing out of him. But I managed with two of them.

I said during his week of illness that I wanted a day to myself. Has that materialised? Nope. Did I really think it would? No.

I’m still doing all the chores. Still making sure ds and Dd bave nappies etc. Still doing all the laundry. Whilst wearing my work hat and my mum hat simultaneously. And getting little to no downtime.

I have just told him that I’m close to breaking point.

Afternoon / evening.

I have been missing a couple of days - no real reason, just life.

Wolf glad you got a decent night's sleep. Take time for you this weekend - park the interview prep to a specific time so you don't feel guilty about not doing it. Good luck with the interview.

em lock all 3 of them in the house and sit outside with the wine in the sunshine at your very fine pink picnic table. Put ear plugs in and put your back to the house. Enjoy!

I managed to spend £192 in ALDI yesterday. I have no idea how I did that. Hopefully I am not going to have to make a return journey there for a while.... somehow I don't think that is going to happen. So don't feel bad about your overspend Happier

Today has been one of those not sure where the day has gone days.... I may have coincidently gone to buy cake from the takeaway window of the local café at the same time as 2 friends. It was lovely to see them in person. I have a feeling it will become a habit until we can meet up properly.

Evening everyone
Guernsey & Jersey are doing so well all power to them
Em love the pink table it's gorgeous so pretty!
Popped to Tesco this morning for Mum , NDN & us , 28 for us but l had a lot of meat with yellow stickers on which has now gone in the freezer . So l did well. It is very well organised there fair dos . I felt quite calm there , they clean the trollies, they have a one in one out policy, a one way system and they have hand gel , what's not to like
I bought suncream from Aldi online free delivery over £20 in case anyone can't face the queue like Snuggly l don't blame you it's galling isn't it especially in this gusty wet weather
www.aldi.co.uk/lacura-spf30-moisturising-sun-spray/p/074402214100101

Am loving the Arch Girlie

Thanks mrs it’s going to look ace with the grey fence and black decking. And new green grass.

Love the table

Good evening everybody. I love the pictures of the gardens and the pink picnic table, that’s inspired!

Something so nice happened today. I received a text from my Mums next door neighbour asking if my sister and I would like to FaceTime with Mum if they set up an IPad in her sun lounge. This is a lady who is a teacher and does that remotely at present, has two little ones of her own and who supports her own parents and in-laws and shops for them as well as picking up things for my Mum. We did that this morning and although I can phone Mum whenever I like it was wonderful to see her face. We had a rare chat, it was like a visit.
I have had a look on the Ringtons Tea website. Anybody living in the North East will know who they are, they deliver tea and coffee and other dainties to the door. At the moment they only operate online so I will order a gift box of tea, coffee, biscuits and toffee for Mum’s neighbour.

I have made a double batch of fruit scones today and frozen them for packed lunches. Used up a tin of evaporated milk from my Brexit cupboard which made them very brown but nice. If I can find the energy I will make banana muffins also as I have two dead bananas.

Baking aside, I am resolved that tomorow must be a clean eating day. On Thursday we had breaded fish with chips done in the fryer. Yesterday DP had a Cornish pasty with oven chips and beans and I had a M&S ping lasagne. Tonight Chicken and chips are in the oven. I tried to argue for new potatoes but DP said chips went better with the chicken. Our fridge is full of fruit and salad. We will eat it tomorow...

I hope everyone has a nice dinner, some downtime and a peaceful night.x

Em your parents are being highly unsympathetic, you must be exhausted. I will guarantee if it were you that were poorly you'd still be doing most of the heavy lifting, dh needs to pull his finger out even if it's just supervising some tv time.

Baked a cake, did a bit of sorting and shuffling things around. Did a Pilates class. Cleaned the vacuum filters. Four loads of washing. Finished one book and started another

I saw a ringtons van today dutchess as I was walking home. They are definitely out and about.

I'm feeling weirdly down atm and anxious. Dunno why. DH is doing his family's weekly quiz and I just don't feel up to it. Which may be awkward for him and it's the second time I haven't joined either and the other time he was hosting. But they do know I have a history of mental illness so they can probably guess so hopefully won't ask questions of him. Sigh.

Thanks for the present ideas for DD earlier. I actually think she'd love blowing a candle out over and over again aha! She loves to sing happy birthday and pretends things are birthday cakes with candles and blows them out. It's sweet.

Ringtons have started their monthly visits again in our area, DM's guy came round last week I think it was. I do my order to her from him too so we are both happy. We did an online order a few weeks ago but will need peppermint tea next month and probably biscuits too .

Em, Girlie hope you're both ok. I won't say what I think about your DHs behaviour Em!

DD been quite challenging today. She's just so intense. As she's our first we don't have a real comparison as obviously I dont really know what my friend's kids are like behind closed doors. But from what they tell me, they are not like my girl! In the sense that they don't kick off screeching every 15 minutes or have 45 minute tantrums because I asked her to say please. I love her so much but she is Hard. Work. And I am constantly stressed second-guessing every parenting decision that I make.

Frugal wise, today was an NSD, resisted the urge to pop across the road for a takeout coffee after DD's said tantrum. Also checked the latest at AirBNB and saw you can cancel for full refund if your holiday is in June so sorted that and got the refund, about £160 phew. So it's just flights, easyJet say they're cancelling around one week in advance so just got to sit tight for that one. Also reviewed our plans for buying a house, it will take us another 4 yrs ish to save the max we can get the bonus on in the Help to Buy ISAs. So we should be able to buy after that, hopefully be home owners around the 30 mark if everything goes to plan.

I feel exhausted with the dcs today too. We've had a nice day, it's just the constantness of it all at the moment. I know that going out to work isn't a rest but it is a change and it makes such a difference. I was getting quite irritable by bedtime!
Love the garden pics. We have done a lot of housework today so the house is nice (for now!), going to do some work in the garden tomorrow. The cornflowers are taking over!!

I left the dinner table today. Ds was being a brat. Dh swore at him. And I just had enough. Fork down. Came upstairs with my wine.

I’ve told dh I think he’s being unfair. I get he’s been ill. But I need a break. He asked me what I wanted. I said some time on my own. A break. Some help.

I told dh I’m not doing family dinner every night now. I haven’t enjoyed a dinner for a long time. Because we’re always wrangling the kids. I just want to eat a peaceful meal. For once.

I’m in bed. Reading my book. It’s so nice.

Time alone is more important than ever atm I think. I normally have a few things each week that make sure I carve out the time but everything sort of rolls into one now doesn’t it?! Even therapy doesn’t feel so helpful at the moment as I’m straight off zoom and back to home edding and don’t get the “debrief” time of grabbing a drink/sit down and the bus ride home.

I buggered off too the other day - was that or have a massive falling out with DD1 over school work! I ended up sitting in the park at dusk, sketching a bit of the lake - was absolute bliss TBH. I’m going to try and do that more often as it’ll also be an incentive to make sure I get some fresh air, especially if I walk round the park first.

Anyone with young DCs - Apple Books currently have loads of “jolly reader” phonics books of various levels free to download. I’ve downloaded them all as they’ll be useful when it’s time to teach Cagletini to read :) frugal win!

Oh that’s good to know, Lifelong and Meadow. Mum has relied on them for years , it’s great to know they’re out and about again. I love their tea.

NSD today. My food shopping is out of control. I think I’m spending close to £200 per week. I do think everything has gone up slightly in price and there are not so many special offers, but still it’s ridiculous.

It must be very difficult for those of you with small dc right now. There’s just no respite from it all. Or even those who are solo parenting with older dc - it must be hard. It’s a very intense time.

It's odd really, it is relentless with the little ones but at the same time we are always on the go and the days pass quickly which is a good thing I think! I am shattered though!

Born food has gone up so much it's unbelievable how much. I used to pay a pound a box for Dd1 vegan Linda Mcartney sausages on offer and 8 weeks later there are no offers and they have gone up to 2.20. This is just the one item l regularly buy, couple this with a dearth of offers and the inability to get the cheaper brands it is no surprise the grocery bill has gone through the roof. I think it may be a case of us having to make strict meal plans and sticking to them but of course this climate doesn't lead itself to us doing anything of the sort being so Meh over the lockdown. I feel like to hell with it and am scoffing like a pig to comfort myself . God knows how much weight l have put on

I noticed that a six pack of crisps in Home Bargains that were always £1 are now £1.25. We are not in the position to shop around as much so they don’t need to entice us in. Mrs I’m the same using food as a pick me up when I’m down - which is pretty much all the time 🙈

Snuggly it must be hectic in your house but it sounds like you have lots of fun too.

Morning,

Wolf I am glad you had a pottering day.

I too would be climbing the walls if I had little ones. The lack of space - both physical and mental is really challenging even when the mob are in their rooms / sleeping most of the day. Snuggly I am being really strict with my going to work time, even though my "office" is in the kitchen - all domestic things can be discussed after work, just as if I was out of the home. Then at the end of the day I do something like go for a walk, sit in the garden or go to the foodbank so I have a space between work me and domestic me.

Food is so expensive atm. Fruit and vege seems to have crept up in price. Also the gannets are eating huge amounts. I am going to start making the snack things again (like when we were really skint) to keep costs down. Any suggestions of things that can go in the freezer and be spread on a tray to finish cooking or pinged in the microwave would be really helpful.

Trust me meadow they do luck off and screech. I can hear next doors almost 2 twins have a rare old tantrum. Multiple times a day when they don't want to do something.
You are doing great as a parent. Also don't forget matches or a lighter of you get a candle