feeling hopeless single parent

[123onlyme]

what do you single parents do when feeling hopeless due to not being able to provide for your kids, when you are on low wages or benefits & you have to tell your kids No when all their friends are doing it. ie. cinema, ice-skating, amusement park, holidays & basically everything else you can think of.

Many find other less expensive things to do, picnics with friends, days out in the woods building shelters and other bushcraft activities (weather permitting), being there for the dc and getting active in other creative ways. Some kids love cooking so things like making pizzas with friends for a cheep film night in. Collecting coupons for activities helps and organisations such as national trust/English heritage have free days.

Some of those things you mentioned are affordable as a once off, no?

Movie nights at home are much better than cinema if you ask me! :-)

Camping holidays or staying with friends. Daytrips walking in the woods. My only issue is that I sometimes lack motivation in the school holidays!!

playparks, museums, walks.....?

I teach my kids to not compare themselves to others and to not be jealous of what other people have. To appreciate what they have. I'll let you know how that goes...

The key is to get them together with friends to do things. This is priceless and so much fun. Also good for us to keep in touch with other parents to keep us sane

thing is a park gets boring after a while! and museums, yes theyre free but the transport to get there isn't.

I try and save what I can for an occasional day out somewhere, we take a packed lunch and stuff to save a bit.

but yes, you can make a cinema evening at home, popcorn etc,.

mine had nothing of value, no phone or anything (we were kindly given an old playstation so she has something) but she appreciates what she nhas and isn't a 'in with the in crowd' child.