Live on £4000 for a year - Part 3

sophiesmum_2

Good evening frunchkins,

Managed to get everything done on my to do list today. Just have a big batch lot of pasta sauce simmering away now in kitchen and a loaf in breadmaker and it is all done once they are finished.
Visited bro in hospital and he is very comfortable at moment as he is having morphine so is not in pain, he is having great fun experimenting with the controls of the all singing and dancing electric bed that they have given him, typical male - loves remote controls and gadgets;) We are hoping to have him home by Thursday, which is good news:D.

Driving along the East Lancs road on way to hospital suddenly I saw a chicken walking along the cycle lane at the side of road all by itself. This was miles away from any houses/farms etc on a busy dual carriageway I was seriously beginning to think I was losing the plot, when DD piped up " I was holding my breath then, thought you were going to stop and get that chicken" :rotfl: :rotfl: So glad I am not going mad after all:p

Managed to get to gym for a swim tonight, which is great for unwinding. Going to try and go early morning tomorrow whilst i am not working, will be a good start for the day.

Nyk - good result with the bathroom suite :T :T You could potentially save a fortune picking up materials for the fixy up on freecycle.Nice to have a friend with space to store it:D

Janey51

It is really gratifying to realise that the little day to day traumas that beset my life afford so much hilarity to fellow frugallers

On a serious note.
Could someone please confirm that the date on MSE is correct?
It is really dark, windy and raining here so I think I must have slept in and it is actually November

DS1 is coming to paint my bedroom today. I am capable but he insisted. :beer: . I have defrosted a bargain chicken (organic) and have some frozen leftover stuffing and vegs so I can feed him.
My scones went down very well and the few remaining are in the freezer next to the squirrel
After poo picking yesterday, I moved on to scraping little furry bits off the windows. I think they are the resting place of some insect but they lodge in the gaps in the sash windows. I suppose I could have left them to act as draught excluders but they are a bit unsightly :rotfl:
It's a good thing i have skinny fingers because I tried everything to reach them. I also managed to knock off a load of paint on the windows in the process so I will have to search through DH's shed :eek: to find some primer/undercoat/sealer of some description.
If I do not post again within the next few hours, I am lost in shed land :rotfl:

whitewing

Janey, write your book. I can't wipe the smile off my face.

While you are swamped in shedland, I am swamped in weddingphotoland. DH (not OH anymore!) took nearly 100 photos - not bad considering he was the groom. Since then, we have been given 3 cds each with nearly the same amount. There are even photos of people taking photos. Sounds weird but we have the wedding from all angles, and some of the are the best as they capture the moments where everybody instantly relaxes.

We have more emails and CD's to come I think. Today DH is working but I should be working on my wedding album. It's in demand already. Luckily it's one with removable pages (I'm a scrapbooking fan), so I will be able to add to it.

I haven't caught up on the pages I missed. bails, I think you asked me to elaborate on why it feels different after marriage (bearing in mind, I virtually forced my OH to marry me, and was half-worried that he wouldn't turn up!)

DH and I had been living together for 6 years (not as partners at the start). When we bought the house last autumn, we thought that that was a huge commitment, and it certainly was a very steep learning curve, what with strict budgets and 'shared' goals. So in many ways we didn't feel that being married would make much difference, except that it would allow me to give DH step-parental resonsibility for our son. I also wasn't actually that bothered about the actual wedding day, being neither sylph-like nor pretty.

However, what we hadn't realised is how getting and being married would affect the way that other people saw us, and how it would also make us feel more respectful and considerate to each other. We take more pleasure in holding hands, in calling each other 'wife' and 'husband', in lovingly chiding each other when we do wrong.

I actually feel that I have more freedom now. I know that my main motivation in life is to make my husband happy and my son happy, but that doesn't mean being a doormat. It means that work is still very important because it provides the means for our lifestyle but family and family memories are around for longer.

My son occasionally sees his real dad, and has latterly always seen DH as a true step-dad. So marriage didn't change that for him. But he takes enormous pleasure in knowing that his step-dad is now an 'in-law' to my brothers and sister. In his eyes, it has given DH more longeviety and status in my extended family.

Similarly, DH has always been viewed as whitewing's partner. At family gatherings he is now 'son-in-law', 'brother-in-law' etc. More of a person in his own right with a definite role in the extended family. But these are very subtle differences that have crept up on us unawares, being a pleasant surprise rather than anything we felt like we are missing.

My dad apparently said to my brother on the wedding day that he had never seen me so happy, and I certainly do feel more content, and more able to enjoy the moment. Cousins mentioned how much 'softer' I seem (I have always been seen as the person who 'gets things done'). None of this has been a surprise to DH, of course.

Responsibilities that have been a bind are more of a pleasure too. We had about 50 people to the wedding, and most had travelled around 2 hours or more to get there. It was touching that so many made such an effort. And they really, really enjoyed the day. (I am now getting cards to thank us for our hand-crafted thank you cards!). We feel humbled that just a fairly simple act of getting married has provoked such goodwill among so many people. We do feel that we are moving forward into a new life together (maybe we won't admit it, but before perhaps each of us thought there was an opt-out clause). We really feel that we have been blessed as we create our new family unit. Most importantly, it felt right to get married. It felt even more right when we woke up the next morning, and we are literally enjoying being married more and more each day. (But it's not perfect, and we have to work on disagreeing respectfully).

Janey, if you have got this far, I would say that you and Tom, and my friend and her dear departed husband, are a huge inspiration to me, and I am so grateful to have the opportunity to build a marriage like yours. (My friend finds a lot of comfort on www.merrywidow.me.uk and will be meeting up for the first time soon with one of their groups. I don't know what the website's like. I haven't looked as I don't want her to feel that I may stumble across her posts. I know she has printed off a lot of comments though and finds them very helpful when she's on a downer).

We are still getting the occasional card and present so I have four more thank yous to make today. I want to spend some good time with DS. He did very well in an exam he took recently, so has been sent some money from relatives to get a treat. He's too frugal now to waste it on chocolate, so it should be interesting.

Now as this is a financial website, for anyone who is interested, most of the people who gave us money/cheque/vouchers as a wedding present gave us £20. A couple gave us £45/£50. A few gave £30 and a few £10. I have never known what is 'acceptable' and have agonised for ages sometimes when I have been giving a gift. But I can honestly say that we were delighted with everything. And we got a lot of beautiful cards. I have been guilty in the past of not bothering to send a card if I wasn't going to the wedding, but the cards made our day more than anything as they trickled in before and after the day, extending it out for at least a month. And I said before, they were just like getting our marriage blessed each time someone was thinking of us.

Rambled on too long now. See you later.

taka

Whitewing... what you wrote about your wedding is beautiful!! I feel all warm and fuzzy inside... :j :T

Janey51 wrote: »

My scones went down very well and the few remaining are in the freezer next to the squirrel

You have a squirrel in your freezer... ummmm... interesting??!! Have I missed something...

Brighton_belle

Whitewing - that was beautiful and sums up for me how I feel about marriage vs living together , but been unable to find the words, so thanks(still living together and very happy but looking for change in the future).

I am sooo excited: I have finally, after much dithering ordered a remoska. Very big financial outlay but it should pay for itself in time (thats what I keep telling myself:o ). I now need to freecycle my popcornmaker - in with one gadget, out with an unused one. I think the george forman grill might go soon too - it was great for a few years, but I no longer grill chops as I no longer buy them - use cheaper cuts of meat.
Just baked a couple of cakes for a birthday picnic on Saturday: near disaster - all in pans and just putting them in the oven when I noticed the unopened pack of butter on the counter:eek: . Had to scrape 2 cakes tins of dollop back into the mixing bowl to add butter. This of course meant I had to lick scrape the mixing bowl out twice. Shame. Ever feel early onset senility anyone?
You're right bails -yesterday was still avery good day. & bread did rise eventually and much more sucessful than first attempt:j .
Nyk - the more I read about where you live the more I am aghast that you actually have to pay rent to live there:eek: . The damp/cold/dodgy electrics are really bad. I rented out my flat for a few years and lived as a lodger elsewhere to save the pennies and I always prided myself on being a good landlord. It shocks me how shoddy some are.

Frugaldom

Whitewing, EXCELLENT POST! There's nothing more I can say about it other than thank you for sharing it with us all

Taka, please do ask about that squirrell as HS/OH2B is still astounded by the tale he heard from Janey when she came to visit :rotfl:

Sophiesmum, I just spotted a fantastic bargain opportunity that you could be interested in as you mentioned foing a photo library type project for your mum; I'm thinking of taking up the offer as a Christmas gift for my gran. It's through Aldi - make up your own photo book and then getting it published. www.aldiphotos.co.uk is site address and you download the free software. It's possibly similar to Vistaprint. My e-newsletter says it's only £10.99 at the moment. (I know we don't have an Aldi but as soon as I heard they were building one near here, I signed up for their online newsletter )

Brighton belle - this house really isn't as bad as it sounds, I don't think? It's more a fault with the LL than the house itself, as it's just very unfrugal and in need of some money spent on it to correct the faults before they cause serious longterm damage. It does have a great garden, if the rain would just stay away for long enough to enjoy it! :mad: What happened to summer this year?! OK, now that the water is running off the roof (guttering is wrecked), bouncing off the window sills and washing my plants away, I'm tending to agree... the sooner we can move, the better.

DD and DGD were here this morning and stayed for 4th birthday lunch, clearing up has been done, they've now wandered off home pushing new baby doll in new pram up the street in the rain. But I still think that her favourite birthday present was her pink Barbie bike we got from Freecycle! :rotfl:

Frugaldom

If anyone else has joined www.i-measure.org.uk then please consider joining the MoneySaving Carbon Club. Just go to join 'carbon clubs' and then type in MoneySaving Carbon Club. There are 28 MSE'ers there already and the site calculates your carbon footpront and electricity spends on a weekly basis

Janey51

DS1 came to visit under false pretences :eek:
He reneged on painting but still expected to be fed. But it was nice to have him to myself for a few hours.

Whitewing what a lovely post. You said it all really :blushing:
I have registered on the Merry Widow site already and have found a lot of help there but your post may help others who don't know of its' existence.

Should I tell you about the squirrel? Should I?
Tomorrow I may be persuaded
And maybe the mole

BB please give feedback on the Remoska as I am dithering. The money I get for some of DH's tools will more than cover the cost but it's a big outlay if it's going to end up snuggled next to the Foreman grill in the recesses of my kitchen cupboard.

Nyk's house is very nice really. But the sun was shining while I was there
I have just had to construct a second line of flood defences at the back door to stop the rain running in from the burnt out bit of the house :rotfl:

Frugaldom

Frugal-alert! I'm about to declare my grocery challenge at £67.05, which is pretty appalling, considering I had intended to attempt £40 per month until Christmas, but it's becoming impossible! DS has decided he's on a body-building 'diet', which does NOT fit in with frugal living and, at the same time, milk and fruit prices are continuing to increase! If I'm to succeed on the £1000 per year grocery budget then I need to curb spending to £158.25 (plus vouchers) from now until 31st December. I have £13 in Tesco clubcard vouchers + £20 Tesco gift voucher, then there should be around £20 of clubcard vouchers still to come from the November statement. I'm going to attempt September on £45 and see how it goes.

Sophiesmum, how are you managing with your contingency fund?

Janey51

Nyk I have a solution to your grocery crisis.

Find a long lost relative who lives in a country where you can get 1p flights to. Send DS to visit for 3 months