greent's mfw journey

cookie9

Merry Christmas. Love your 2017 plan. Good luck

Watty1

Loved reading about your family Christmas. Not having a family at this time of year is sad - but - reading about yours was a joy

debtfreeoneday

Glad you had a nice Christmas!

greent

Ahhh - I do love Xmas - but we have had a very lazy one this year I did pop into town the one day to exchange the faulty present. Picked up individual cards for next Xmas at half price and then a further 25% off, so was pleased with that. Haven't spent any money in the sales other than that

Rest of Xmas so far has involved games, reading, tv watching, sleeping and lots of Leg0 building/ looking at! NYE will be spent here - oldest friend and hubby are having a party at theirs but it will be full of people we don't really know, and the smallies would be bored (they could stay at home with DS2 who would also be bored (whereas DD would quite enjoy being an adult and going out) - I'd rather stay in with a nice takeaway, a bottle of prosecco and a night of games (again!) Xmas money from my nan will pay for the takeaway :T

Leftovers have been eaten/ frozen and fridge is now looking almost back to normal - except for the huge amount of chocolate and the tub of various cheeses! DS1 is doing his best at consuming all the cheese though! :D DD will end up taking some of the freezer contents back to uni with her, keeping her Jan food spends down and meaning we might be able to fit something else in there at some point!

Decorations are all still up. I have recycled all the 'standard' cards (from children's classmates, ex work colleagues, the neighbours etc) - I snipped some of them to make some tags. As well as having a massive stash of (mostly used once) giftbags, a decent supply of Xmas wrap/ tags/ bows/ ribbon/ cards I have a lot of brown paper - one massive roll (we're talking the ones used in factories) and 1500 A4 sheets...... May look at wrapping some presents in brown paper with lots of lovely ribbons next year

Under my bed is looking soooo much clearer! - I have 2 underbed storage boxes - one of Xmas wrap/ cards/ bags etc, and one for birthdays. Then there is a very small stash of presents for random others (mainly duplicate/ unwanted gifts of DS2 and DS3's which I can maybe use for any party invitations from their friends) - but I did think earlier about putting them on a local selling site on fbook and then the children can have the money - and I get space

Off to watch one of the HP films now - we have them all on DVD but for some reason people seem to prefer watching them when on tv! :cool:

xx

It's DS2's birthday on the 6th. I wrapped his presents earlier today

chumpy45

Sounds like a great Christmas. We had Taboo this year which has given us a lot of laughter! Love games like Cluedo and Monopoly and still prefer the original monopoly despite the boys having about 6 different versions between them lol. Staying in tonight then our traditional trip to the beach on new year's day. Happy new year to you and all the family 😊

newgirly

Glad your Xmas went well greent, we are also enjoying the Harry potters on tv even though they are on DVD here too

brizzledfw

Glad you had a great Christmas...and here's to a wonderful 2017 for you all

Xx

Fortune_Smiles

Happy New Year GreenT!

Fortune x

greent

And Happy New Year to everyone!

We had a quiet NYE in - takeaway (McD/ chipshop for small ones & DD, 'nice' Chinese for us & DS1 - paid for by my Xmas money from my nan - a worthwhile use of it, I felt. Plenty of Chinese leftovers to feed at least 2 if not 3 of us again for a main meal tomorrow ) and board games with leftover Xmas chocs and snacks followed by watching Robbie on tv and fireworks from the windows/ driveway I didn't drink any alcohol - had prosecco at the ready but didn't want alcohol with dinner so had a soft drink and then was all sore-throaty so had tea the rest of the evening! OH only had one beer and DD had smirn0ff ice - very rock and roll of us

DS3 managed to sleep in until 8.15 this morning (he managed to stay awake until just after midnight - was offered bed several times) - was ok as I did not have a fuzzy head

DD is off back to uni tomorrow so we had another big roast dinner (her fave meal) - large YS chicken from freezer (I still have another 5 large chickens in there....), unused sprouts, parsnips, carrots and cabbage from last week, leftover red cabbage from freezer, cauli cheese, peas, roast bns (my mum gave us an enormous one she'd been given by a friend) , pigs in blankets, roast pots, yorkies and sausage-y stuffing - all very yum Only needed to buy the cauli - had the rest in Leftover breast meat has been frozen in portions in gravy for DD to take back to uni and there are also lots of roast pots for her to take and freeze too (I made extra deliberately) along with stuffing balls and little sausages - enough for about 4 or 5 meals in total - very easy Sunday meals for her for the next few weeks - just add frozen yorkies and some carrots (the only fresh veg she buys) She's not planning on coming back until sometime in March (for either my bday weekend or mothering Sunday)

Decorations are still up here - but it's DS2's bday on Fri, so I need to ensure all cleared away before then. Will be strange doing it without DD to help. I have my eye on a couple of decs for the charity shop or bin (as appropriate) when I take them all down. May make a start on some tomorrow - the (6) small Xmas trees around the house are easy to sort as a starting point

Enough for now - wishing you all a happy, productive and mse 2017 xx

debtfreeoneday

happy new year to you too!