Financial faux pas and other disasterous decisions

moo2moo

Morning all and Hallo Patchwork Cabbage. You have a PM.

I wish habbits were really made in 21 days as thats the longest OH has managed to be fag free since sometime in the early 1990s. Still the electronic fag is back on charge after a fun game of hunt the charger. Clearly its been quite some time since that was last used.

Forgot to say the 20K challenge is going to be made a tad more challenging with my being the only contestant in the house. Will be far easier if I don't tell OH we're being uber frugal as the word budget is like waving a red rag at a bull and will transform him into a plastic wielding lunatic whilst just allowing him to amble along at his own pace saying no to everything expensive that he suggests generally works. Hopefully my masterplan has been calculated such that there will be no noticable changes where the DDs are concerned providing I never ever take them to a supermarket. fat chance of that.

Continued the mega kitchen clean yesterday by transforming three drawers. Managed to fill a carrier bag with unnecessary carp only another five drawers to go. Have saved the worst cupboards for last too.

Did have lots of things I needed to do today but they are all on hold as my car battery is deader than a dodo. This happens a lot, so much so that we installed an outdoor socket on the drive level with the bonnet of my car so thhat I can precariuosly balance the charger in the car and recharge it without removing the battery although I've gotten rather good at doing that too. I did buy a new battery last winter but it turnsout that only driving 4 mile journeys to work four times a day and then leaving it to sit for weeks on end is a bit of a killer. If I was intelligent I'd simply disconnect the battery at the start of the school hols but I never remember that until I go to start it and it impersonates a pancake.

Last nights dinner was most excellent although when we left at 9:30 the DDs and their 9 year old friend were exhausted but had battled their way through mussels, kudu, springbok, crocodile, ostrich and chicken nuggets (theres always one) followed up with malteser cake, carrot cake and chocolate cheesecake. Unfortunately at that stage they were pogged and so I helped out by eating the remainder of their deserts as well as my own. I am a pig. The restaurant staff sang happy birthday in Africaans and again in English and then the kids taught them it in Welsh. Traditionally theres a birthday challenge involving alcohol and a forfit. OH had the alcohol, the kids the forfit and much tot he astonishment of the other diners the offspring lined up at a vacant table inthe centre of the restaurant with 3 tiny covered platters and a spot light. Each contestant stepped up to the table, chose their platter and the contents were simultaneously revealed. Mealy worm, cricket and some wizzened green and brown crunchy looking segmented thing. They ate them to a round of applause. DD2 really does like mealy worms and always persuades them to hand over a few extra to crunch on the way home.

Have started the countdown to the return to school. Only six days remaining, activities and visitors are planned for three of them so far leaving me three days in which to cram everything that needs doing. Still I'll be happy if the kitchen is still tidy at the end of the holiday. If I do manage to achieve any of the other things on the list that will be an added bonus. Its still too cold to do much. Minus 3 outdoors means the chicken poo is frozen to the sheds so cleaning them out is almost impossible unless you can break giant chuks off. But at least its too cold for maggots to appear in the poo and whilst its below the level of the perch bars its not detrimental to the hens as its too cold for it to go mouldy or do nany of the myriad of other things that result in sudden chicken death syndrome.

Keep thinking of things I should have included in the 20K challenge but haven't. Odd random things like haircuts (entertainment - cos I'll look funny if I don't), swimming lessons which I never quite got round to paying for, DD1s pocket money (£3 a week or £156 a year) and lots and lots of other things. I guess its all the other little things that you never really think about that add up to rather a lot of the course of a year.

Need to restart on DooYoo. I haven't done any since Christmas so my account stands at 186 reviews and a smidgen over £30. 2 a day every day is a killer whilst 1 a day would be 350 in a year or £230ish. Vaguely thinking 10 a week would be achievable equating to 500 reviews in a year or £400ish which would be a rather nice wodge to cover Christmas 2010.Sounds easy when you put it like that, question is can I really come up with another 500 items to review without losing the will to live?

moo2moo

Yesterday was such an exciting day. Invented a brand new game named retrieve the pencil from the U-bend of the sink using a pair of chopsticks. Such fun. Kept the four of us entertained for half an hour. The alternative being the dismantling of the sink to remove the U-bend and extract the pencil that way. Have since reminded the DDs that a pencil is not an essential requirement when cleaning teeth.

Made a whistle stop tour of the civilised world paying in cheques and liberating cash from the cash point to pay for todays riding lessons. Avoided the shops as everywhere was packed with mad sales shoppers although mostly empty handed ones.

Have too much time to think at the mo and keep coming up with ridiculous masterplans to transform my life from Slummy Mummy to Domestic Goddess with minimal effort and even less time. I am clearly delusional once again. Still some things clearly do make a difference although I usualy run out of steam before I get around to them. Keeping on top of the ironing by doing a bit every other day is rather tedious but means its usually over and done with in 10 minutes rather than the hour plus long marathon that happens when I ignore it until it cascades off the armchair.

With that in mind I'm going to aim to do one thing each day that I've been putting off because its out of sight and therefore incredibly easy to forget about. Yesterday I washed out 24 plant pots and two plastic trays which were formerly home to 24 lettuce plants consumed dutring the summer. Will be returning them from whence they came later today along with a box of eggs as a thank you. Only minor but its another small pile of stuff out of the way.

Got OHs car insurance sorted for less than his renewal and obtained with it 20,000 Clubcard points. Abandoned all hope of getting proof of NCD over the phone from his last lot of insurers after the complaints department stuck me on hold too. Have written to them instead.

Cleared my inbox of e-mails earning £2 from Lightspeed and a £5 voucher from another company assuming I remember to log in every day next week. Nothing else exciting to report.

moo2moo

Plans for today:

• 2 DooYoos (cos I haven't done any in ages)
• Find a book in which to keep track of my expenditure throughout 2010
• Visit work for a bit to make sure the place is still standing
• Threaten the DDs with the loss of their DSs if Thank You letter writing does not commence today.
• Remember to take the DDs to their riding lesson having first remembered to refit the battery to my car.
• Handwashing. Must have been barking when I bought DD1 handwash only thermal underwear.
• The continued assault on the kitchen
• Mini cupboard inventory in anticipation of my next visit to a supermarket
• 30 minutes decluttering of the rooms downstairs in the hopes that the DDs x-mas games can be persuaded to fit in the toy cupboard or that using stealth tatics some of the games at the bottom of the pile can be disposed of.

moo2moo

DooYoos done.

Whilst surfing I came across an ingeneous and inspired idea of Hypnos whereby instead of paying a cleaner you pay yourself £5 for every completed day of FlyLady you achieve. Sounds great on paper but then I found the flylady thread:

Wednesday ~ Master Bedroom and Landing
Level One
Strip, wash and replace the bedding!
Declutter the floordrobe!
Level Two
Tidy a chest of drawers or a cupboard
put all the christmas paper etc in loft ready for stashing away with tree and decorations on Sunday
Vacuum the floors
Level Three
Polish mirrors and windows
Put away all the bags and shoes that are lurking
Clear the bedside units/tables/bookpiles
Extras

1. Sort through a box of gibble
2. dust and deweb
3. Straighten the linen/towel cupboard
4. Do a small job you have been putting off for weeks and weeks

In a day? Really? Noooo. It can't be done and just to prove it I'm going to attempt it. I bet no one else has a paritally built trainset in the corner of their boudoir to contend with or a wlk in wardrobe which operates on the principle of the cupboard under the stairs. Place hand on handle, take deep breath, position object requiring storage in wardrobe by door, open lob in and shut door as fast as humanly possible *sigh* its going to be a very very long day. But its a very good excuse to light the stove in their and increase the temparature to marginally above that preferred by polar bears.

moo2moo

Flylady is my friend.

Decluttering commenced withthe turfing out of a geriatric computer prinetr which has been replaced no fewer than three times since its purchase over a decade ago. Didn't get quite as far as disposing of it though as I realised that the inks that I was given but wasn't allowed to flog on fleabay fit it. Assuming I can find the driver disks for it (very likely as OH keeps absolutely everything) we can swop it for DD1s v. old and barely working printer thus freeing up cupboard space and exchanging DD1s old printer inks for Clubcard points. Feel the lurve.

Washing machine on. X-mas smellies liberated from their packaging and stashed in a drawer ready for use. Going to feed the DDs before tackling the next cupboard.

moo2moo

Flylady is my deadliest enemy.

Almost everytime OH has opened his mouth its to ask where have I put something. Away in a cupboard is not nescessarily the answer he wanted to hear. Achieved everything on yesterdays list appart from the towel cupboard since this extends to 7 large drawers I figured that was going overboard. Not as overboard as owning in excess of fifty towels though. Will need to shrink that considerably. We're still working our way through the mountain we were given as wedding presents.

OH is now complaining that all I ever seem to do is clean. Well yep it feels like all I ever do is clean. I can wholeheartedly agree with that. Think its because my frantic attempts at dusting disturbed his afternoon nap. There was enough dust lodged on the lightshade to trigger the extremely loud mains powered smoke alarm that lives within the light fitting. Will be having another go with a cloth later today.

Didn't get very far with the kitchen (or much else). OH went to a friends on pest patrol and came back with a trio of guinea fowl. It took a little over an hour to gut and defeather them. Two have gone to friends and the third is in the slowcooker for dinner tonight although I'm going to do the DDs some sausages too as I've a feeling they'll find the flavour too strong. Thankfully he turned down a brace of pheasant. I hate plucking them.

Plans for today include:

• handwashing. Still haven't done DD1s thermals and she needs them for Sunday
• return of the plant pots from whence they came. Ran out of time yesterday. Excuses excuses.
• The many towel drawers - left over from yesterdays flylady challenge
• Flylady....again... I must be bonkers.. although as it involves the DDs bedroomsand in theory they spent most of yesterday tidying them it shouldn't be too awful. DD1 did make the mistake of complaining she had more clothes than drawer space though.

Thursday ~ Childrens rooms and the bathroom!
Level One..
Childrens jobs: Collect ALL the dirty laundry from your bedroom and put it in the wash basket!
Parent jobs (includes daddy too!): Clear and mop the bathroom floor
Throw away all the empties and put the new toiletries in the bathroom in the correct places!
Level Two
Childrens jobs: fill a binbag with rubbish, or stuff that is no longer used for charity shop/bin
Parents jobs: Clean the loo and the bath and the shower and the basins and the bidet and the tiles!
Wash any shower curtains/bath mats that are in need
shine the taps!
Level Three
Childrens jobs: Vacuum the floor and take down to the kitchen and dirty cups/pots/beakers
Parents jobs: Inspect the childrens rooms and help them make room for their new stuff if they are not old enough to do this themselves! If it looks good then they are permitted a reward for their hard work..
Empty bins etc from upstairs
Strip and wash childrens bedding
Extras

1. Wash any windows in these rooms that need it
2. Binbag dance
3. Use up any remaining christmas food before it grows legs and starts running!
4. HHI.. or more for those trying to complete the challenge!

Guess its time to start by filling the washing machine for the first of todays many loads, thats aafter another cuppa and brekkie of course.

lucielle

Its fun, fun fun in your house. Good luck with the list.
L

mooomin

moo2moo wrote: »

Flylady is my friend.

moo2moo wrote: »

Flylady is my deadliest enemy.

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

moo2moo

Queen of indecision. Thats me.

moo2moo

Snoring OH halts progress. Bathroom assault commenced. All itmes contained within bathroom now banished to landing so I can do a mega deep clean. Towel store emptied and cleaned even venturing so far as to move it so I could clean behind it. OH arrived home several hours earlier than expected so bathroom has been abandoned leaving a trail of debris and disaster. Will recommence when he awakens.

Have chucked out a surprising number of empty tubes of the DDs toothpaste. I'm hoping only having one shower gel, one bubble bath, one bottle of shampoo and a matching conditioner, one bar of soap, one liquid soap and one type of toothpaste will encourage the assorted peeps to use them up rather than opening a new bottle everytime they have a bath resulting in four part bottles of shower gel and nine bubble baths. Well I can at least live in hope.

Can no longe shut the newly created toiletries drawer so will need to find an overflow storage zone temporarily.

Have delivered plant pots and posted some letters. On my fourth load of washing of the day. Going to brave the handwashing after lunch before taking OHs car for fuel.