Mooloo's Joining up the dots in 2017

Savvy_sewing · 19 April 2017 at 7:41AM

Morning.
I felt exhausted all day yesterday and only tackled easy jobs and fittings. I did walk to and from work. Got twin2 to drop DGDs stuff at home and bring her down to the shop.
We bought a few yellow stickers bits and pieces in the co-op on the way home, and saved £14.40 on full price. Good start to the budget busting I need to do for a while until my bank balance is back on track.
I have my eye test today as concerned about them deteriorating. Have to have an AMD test because both Mum and my brother has it. Worrying.
A quick trip to help mum and then back home to sort out my clutter!

Savvy_sewing · 19 April 2017 at 6:47PM

Thankfully no sign of AMD in my eye test.
No longer going to have bifocals as I just take them off most of the time in close work etc.
I am going to get wraparound sunglasses that will cover my glasses instead of tinted as well.
I went to see Mum, then my daughter as I picked up a boys bike in the charity shop for £10. That can go away for dgs4 when he is ready.
I did manage a little housework but then it was time to get dgd from school and apart from cooking tea etc I have to confess that I got absorbed in watching old runs of Money for Nothing etc.
It does make me want to learn more about other mediums than sewing. It's times like this when I wish I could retire early and just be creative. Instead I seem to get very little for my work. Around here people don't want to pay anything for handmade or one off items at all.
I would like to think that my skills have some value that's for sure.
I am going to have to get my diary out and bash it for a while and find my optimistic side as I am currently not feeling it.
Bills, and debts seem to have me in a grip the last few days.
The house insurance and my glasses have cost me two weeks wages today and as I desperately try to rebuild my bank balances I am fearful of the changes I am expecting with post adoption team, housing benefits and tax credits as well as DS has been getting paid cash and therefore he has not been sending money toward the rent to me, and the DD is due out on 28th for the full rent since they lost housing benefits with his new job.
I can't feel optimistic anymore

Savvy_sewing · 20 April 2017 at 7:31AM

Woken up a grumpy granny!
Had to have the windows open as too hot, and the noise levels woke me a lot. Next doors business associates start turning up from 6am! Van after van coming and going meant I might well have not bothered trying to sleep after 6.
Dgd is supposed to be going on a school trip and is complaining she doesn't feel well. Somehow she has got access to Amazon digital downloads on the kindle and has been buying films. My email was full of instant payments that I had not expected and my account obviously has been depleted about 10 times in the last month. I am not a happy bunny.
Money is very tight and I am worried that I will not have enough to pay the bills, especially the business ones, it's very tight.
I have taken my eye off the ball a bit with holidays and family issues etc.
Today I am going to have to get a grip and sort it out, or at least start to.
Back to the drawing board and try and find out what else I have let slip.
I am going to be overdrawn unless I move money from the emergency funds etc and that's not what I was planning to do. I usually am well prepared in advance of things.
My house contents insurance was paid yesterday just short of £97, and my glasses were about £100 -a few pennies less.
I need to get a grip. Stop feeling defeated and find something to reinvigorate and rejuvenate me and my world.
I cannot let fear of lack start attracting more lack!!
But I don't feel very optimistic at the moment.

Eager_Elephant · 20 April 2017 at 8:11AM

Surely DS needs to step up again - it doesn't matter whether he is paid cash or not. He knows that rent has to be paid. Do not get into debt for DS and his GF.
Could Biggest collect the money from him when she calls round?
Could he not pay it into his bank and then transfer it? Even if he does not have a branch near him some banks let you pay in at Post offices.
Can you drive over there on his payday to get the money?

I know it seems a lot has left your account recently but it is all normal things that in an ideal world would have been saved up for.

Can you consider today a whole new day and start afresh - so the bank of mum is shut and you only buy essentials. I think you have said before your cupboards and freezers are bursting - can you start eating some of that down?
It's a nightmare with kids when they get hold of screens and manage to spend money but we live and learn and I know it won't happen again.

Savvy_sewing · 20 April 2017 at 8:24AM

Thanks EE
I just need to get a grip again!
I have mentioned the rent to DS but still haven't seen any money coming my way. I will message him again today and remind him yet again that he needs to pay me before the rent is due not after.

dktreesea · 20 April 2017 at 6:50PM

I do agree with EE but I also have children trying to survive and run a household on very little money, who don't want to move back home even though it's pretty obvious to me, even though they don't smoke, drink or gamble, they don't earn quite enough to manage a household over the longer term. It just too hard, on them and me, to say no sometimes.

Eager_Elephant · 20 April 2017 at 7:50PM

I am not that harsh that I wouldn't support my own adult children but surely Mooloo should not be getting into debt by helping her kids.

Its one thing to have the spare income to give freely to your adult children but quite another when a credit card is used as outgoings exceed income.

I know Mooloo wants to help her kids and I am fully supportive of her but her income is not stable at present - there is the chance that the guardianship money will stop, if it doesn't this year then it could next year or the year after and she needs to think about her and DGD before anyone else.

If Mooloo wants to help then surely food parcels are the way to go as then she knows they are at least eating and she can control the cost of this. Paying DS' rent won't be helping him understand that rent must come before everything else and should Mooloo keep a roof over her son's head while struggling to manage on her own income plus of course the rent will be a lot higher than the food shop!!

Savvy_sewing · 20 April 2017 at 8:59PM

I got a message returned from DS saying he now has his card, and gets paid tomorrow. I am not sure which card he means, but I will try and speak to him tomorrow and see if he can start paying me some money. As he gets paid on a Friday I may have to take a drive after work and collect the rent from him.
I did start to write in my diary but got stopped in my tracks with Biggest calling. Dgd2 is off school ill, and so not much was going on, we chatted for a while then my next fitting arrived early so the chat was cut short, but Biggest has had a reasonable lump sum paid back to her after claiming a miss sold bank account so I won't need to help them with the church, now paid, the disco or the photographer, so that is a help. Technically I am not going to be paying for anything more, as they will be making the card payment for anything that they do have on my card. Any costs involved etc will be down to them. So far it is only the last payment for the rings that has gone on my card.
I interviewed a woman about the sewing job however although she is a neat and fairly competent sewer if the sample she brought are anything to go by, she is not capable of doing the wedding alterations etc. She is also seeing her back surgeon next week with the possibility of needing surgery and 6 weeks out of action! So I have told her that she will need to see her surgeon first and that I would not be able to employ her then have to pay sick pay etc. That possibly she might be able to help with some of the mundane things like shortening trousers and skirts etc, but only if the surgeon gave her the all clear. She did mention being able to help in the shop if staff does retire later this summer.
But I am not sure that she would be suitable really even though she was a pleasant enough woman.
On the way home from work I picked up some dolmio sauce to do dinner and a couple of whiopsie TV dinners to chuck in the freezer for emergency meals or the CBA days.
I spent £3.36
This evening I did dinner, then went for a bath, and watched some find it flog it program recorded earlier in the week.
Staff went an hour early today as there was nothing left to do for her by 1.30 and I was sewing the last job we had, but just before I finished it more work started to trickle in, and I have about half a dozen jobs in again for the morning.
I am going to take the laptop to work and see if I can do something of the accounts, correspondence and even maybe access the website and see if I can fathom it out. I noticed a few extra £ signs in the price list when I was showing Biggest the site yesterday and I would love to try and upload more up to date pictures and sewing courses etc.
But for now I may do a little reading before sleeping ( hopefully), an early night and a decent sleep will help me to refocus and rebuild my NO energy!
As staff is not coming in it will be Sod's law the shop gets busy. (I hope so).

Savvy_sewing · 21 April 2017 at 7:26AM

My little travel kettle has started to leak, and while mopping up the water after I had poured my tea ( thankfully) I knocked the kettle over and spilt the boiling water ( luckily only a small amount, over my left foot! I have dashed down stairs and thrust my foot under the cold water tap to try and ease the burn! I think I have got away with two very small marks on the top of my foot!
The news about Paris Attacks again is very worrying. The man on the TV has suggested that attacks may start anywhere and not just in big cities! What a terrible world it is turning into, with trigger happy rulers and massive bombs etc

I am not sleeping too well and know that I need to find my positive mojo again. I will be on my own at work today so an ideal time to think about my future and my plans to drag myself back up again.
I must not panic the work will come in, the sales will build, and I will manage.
Time to wake dgd and get moving on with my day.
Have a good one. We are after all lucky.
We have a roof over our heads, clothes on our backs and food aplenty.

dktreesea · 21 April 2017 at 12:49PM

Eager_Elephant wrote: »

I am not that harsh that I wouldn't support my own adult children but surely Mooloo should not be getting into debt by helping her kids.

Its one thing to have the spare income to give freely to your adult children but quite another when a credit card is used as outgoings exceed income.

I know Mooloo wants to help her kids and I am fully supportive of her but her income is not stable at present - there is the chance that the guardianship money will stop, if it doesn't this year then it could next year or the year after and she needs to think about her and DGD before anyone else.

If Mooloo wants to help then surely food parcels are the way to go as then she knows they are at least eating and she can control the cost of this. Paying DS' rent won't be helping him understand that rent must come before everything else and should Mooloo keep a roof over her son's head while struggling to manage on her own income plus of course the rent will be a lot higher than the food shop!!

I agree with you, but sadly debt is the way of small businesses up and down the land. Not necessarily credit card debt. It could be the rent of the shop that is outstanding, or suppliers' invoices for stock that need to be paid.

It is strange about the rent though. For my generation, rent was always the first thing paid, even if it meant being a bit short on food. The priority was to keep a roof over yours and your children's heads and not end up on the street. I'm in my fifties now and I can remember a fear of homelessness that persists in my generation even today. Even bills - they got paid as soon as our pay came into our accounts. That, for me, meant banking a cheque so the pay wasn't cleared funds for (back then) 5 working days.

Nowadays if you are in your 20s and trying to run a household, paying the rent is a far greater burden than it was when I was in my 20s on low wages.

Yes, paying some or all of our children's rent once in a while won't impress on them the need to pay the rent first out of their own funds, but becoming homeless isn't going to help them or their parents either.

Mooloo's Joining up the dots in 2017

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