Changing our lives....

amber03

its amazing how much thinking gets done during the night especially when you have little un's but thats the best time, just remember to write all your ideas down because during the day when your running around after the little darlings you can easily forget them.

As for lists i love making lists, shopping, xmas, hols, birthdays you name it i can write a list and the feeling when you cross things off the list is brill.

EB69

I love making lists - but never stick to them!

cloud_cuckoo_land

I even write things I've already done on my lists so I can cross them off!!

Cuckoo. xx
:rotfl:

Sessie

Hehe CCL, I've heard of others that do that!

So, whilst my IDEAS for the New Year New Me stuff are coming thick and fast, the TIME to get them down isn't. Mum is now out of hospital but can only walk a few steps and even then, with sticks, so her recovery is going to be really slow. Therefore I have no childcare for at least another month or so. I don't mean that to sound selfish (as I think it did) but simply to say that from 7 to 7 every day it's just me and the twins and once they've gone to bed, it's cleaning, ironing etc... so I can get to bed by 9ish as Boychild is enjoying his 5 am starts muchly at present!

On the GOOD NEWS side, the bank called to say the mortgage extension money should be in our account by THURSDAY!! So we can pay off that darn CC and (mortgage aside) be debt free!! :j
YAHOOOOOO ! I SOOO cannot wait!

The elves arrived on Sunday - the children went to Mr Sessie's mum and dad for the day and we moved all the toys from the living room to the kitchen (where they will stay, they are in those partly-clear stacking boxes so are quite tidy) and put the tree up in the living room and decorated it. It has a little train that goes round the bottom too. We put up a little tree in the children's bedroom, on the windowsill, that has sparkly LED presents on it too.

When we brought them back we all went into the living room together and their faces were a PICTURE!! Then I brought the boxes with the elves in all covered in little LED battery powered lights and Mr Sessie opened the letters and read them and gave them their advent calendars and little toy. It was all really exciting ... until Girlchild realised the lights round the living room door had red, yellow, green on and so from them on it has been, "traffic lights on the door mummy, loook at the traffic lights" and if the red one is on when she's near it she has to "stop mummy!!". :rotfl:

Yesterday they were pretty well-behaved to say we were totally snowed-in and our house isn't huge for them to run around in. So they got a book each from the elves (pound shop ones, with sounds). VERY delighted they were, though if I hear another fire engine this century I will explode!!

TODAY..... Girlchild was on Wilful To The Max. EVERY opportunity she got she was taking things off the Christmas tree or knocking them underneath. Later, when I went up to the loo, she went into the fridge, got a trifle out.... you can imagine the rest.. and the mess..... OMG!! So, even though it was planned that today's elf gift was only a small one, we told her it was because she had been naughty that it was just a little thing! Yes, yes... I'm a bad parent... but she looked suitably chastened so let's see if the threat works that if she's naughty tomorrow, they might not leave anything!!

Haven't been online for a while so a few other things to check out, just wanted to stop by and explain my promise to come back being followed by yet another absence. Once things settle down in real life I'll be back a lot more often.

Hope everyone's Xmas planning is coming along well, and you can get out and do your shopping!!

x

cloud_cuckoo_land

Don't you dare disapear on us - I am relying on hearing what the elves are up to!!

Cuckoo. xx

amber03

Hi sessie hope you are doing ok know its a busy time of the year and having little ones its a magical time as well, have fun.x

Sessie

I am still alive!! Promise!!

I have been "writing" posts in my head in bed the last few nights and hope very soon to get time to sit down and write a novel on here about what's been going on in Sessieland (including elf info!!) and plans for 2011. Of which there are many. Oh yes.

So I say again, "I'll be back".

And I will.

Honest!

x

pennywisepoundstupid

Good to see you back sessie, hope you had a good xmas.

Sessie

... then I'll begin.

This is all probably going to take me DAYS. I have a LOT to say, a lot of thinking has been done over the last month or so and I need to start making the title of this diary a reality - in more areas than just money.

To start off with (and maybe all I'll get done tonight!), a bit of a general catch up of what's been going on with me....

I know I've said in previous posts that I have a bad back - a nasty disc problem that I've had for years. I had epidurals a few years ago (which I paid for myself, as at that time we had no children and disposable income) and they worked really well, lasted about three years before they began wearing off and it has slowly been getting worse. Surprisingly when I was pregnant, when I THOUGHT it would get REALLY bad, I didn't have anything more than my usual level of pain plus a bit extra which I put down to carrying two babies around.

Lately though, the last six months or so, it has got immensely bad. I cry pretty much every day at some point - partly because of the pain but also because of the limitations it puts on my life. I can't go shopping on my own any more as I can't lift the bags, I can't carry the hoover up and downstairs (well, sometimes I can but other times not), I can't wash the floor/clean the bath ... but most of all it is affecting me with my children. Boychild will get toys out and pat the floor next to him, "Ma...(he calls me that, it's SO sweet) sit HERE..." and I just CAN'T sit down there with him. Or he'll want to run back and forth and I can't do it, I can't lift them on and off the change mat or swings or slide or stay long at indoor play centres. Also we LOVED having long bubbly baths where we had toys and letters that stick to the tiles, we would stay in there AGES but now I have to cut it short as I simply can't kneel down and lean over the side of the bath with them.

Aaaaanyhow, I'm sure you get the picture.... so I had gone back to my GP who had written to the Exceptions Committee of the NHS which is... pretty much what it says. On the whole the NHS aren't doing... well.... anything they can get out of due to cuts etc... but there is a Committee who will consider people for exceptions.. and both my own GP and my hospital Pain Clinic who I see wrote to the Committee to see if I could get further epidurals on the NHS. Of course, the answer came back, no. So, the private cost is not far short of £2,000.... which we have had to find. We had used the money left after paying off the credit card to set up a "rainy day" savings account - one of my first reasons for starting this diary, when I realised we had nothing to fall back on if anything happened, like Mr Sessie or me losing our jobs. Now that we have the children it's doubly important that we have it and I was really pleased that no only had we got rid of the credit card debt entirely (tiiiiick!), we now had our backup plan in place.

So, now that backup plan is almost gone again. Or will be when I have the private epidurals in February or March time. Also, the Consultant who did them last time has now retired. When I saw her last year she had said I wouldn't need to see her again if I had to go private, she would just do the epidurals as she knew me and my history. So I also have to pay the NEW Consultant a £200 fee to see him so he can look at my notes and say, "Yes, you do need the epidurals, nice to meet you, goodbye, that will be £200 please!" :mad:. (Not his fault I know, I can't really expect a man who's never seen me before to stick needles in my back whilst I'm under anaesthetic the first time he sets eyes on me!).

So that's a big downer.

I also get really depressed in the winter and it seems to be worsening as I get older. I become really lethargic and lacklustre, lose interest in everything, become quite reclusive and just want to hide away. It has been really quite bad this year, added to the constant pain, I've got myself into a bit of a bad place mentally and haven't been able to shake it off.

Also, my mum has hardly been around as she had to have a knee replacement and her recovery took a while. She is almost there now but I have been worrying about her (and my dad, but that's a whole other post!!) and (I mean this in the nicest sense!) because she hasn't been around, having to cope with all of the above and the twins by myself (Mr Sessie has been working RIDICULOUS hours, but how can you say no in this economic climate? If you won't do it, your employer will soon find someone who will).

The final nail in the coffin has been that my job is about to change pretty dramatically. I'm sure that when it happens it won't be half as bad as it seems now, it's just.. on top of everything else and in this down state I've been in, it's the last thing I need. Also, I'm having to put off having the epidurals because we're having training for the new job and then I want to be doing it along with my colleagues at the same time, so we all learn together rather than be off and come back when they've all got to grips with it and be left behind!!

So, all in all, it's been a bleak time for me and I hope it explains why I kinda disappeared off the face of the earth....

In true Sessie style, I think I'll break off there and start a new post... back in a mo!

x

Sessie

Anyhow, we did have a good Christmas, especially the children. They got so much stuff we're going to need to have a really good clearout soon to make room for it all!!

Mr Sessie and I didn't get each other anything for the day itself but set some money aside and went shopping for a day in the sales. Mum and dad had the children for the day at their house so we could go into whichever shops we wanted and take our time, that in itself was pretty much bliss. I got so much stuff from Boots - a lot of the sets of bath stuff and body lotions and what have you were down to less than half the pre-Christmas prices so I got a truckload! Luckily I had my sister with me as I couldn't carry it with my back problem but wanted to buy lots at those prices!!

Also we have an out of town outlet that has a Body Shop there. The prices are already cheaper than the main Body Shop ones but they also had a sale on and I bought another truckload from there - I think I can safely join the "No more toiletries..." thread for 2011 and probably even 2012!! :rotfl:

I also bought a LOT of books - nearly always on 3 for 2 or BOGOF and I had also got a good lot of book tokens as presents (I'm so easy to buy for, any occasion just point a book token my way and I'm happy as Larry!).

Also found in ELC, a set of fairground toys that matched a ferris wheel the children got for Xmas, that was reduced from £35 to £10! They didn't need another THING as they had already had THREE separate "Christmas Days" with presents galore but.... I couldn't resist that bargain and they have already played with them to death so.... :T

The Asda Baby Event starts tomorrow (18th) so time to go and stock up on boxes and boxes of nappies and talc and baby bath for yet more savings.

It's funny, I can't seem to think anything OTHER than MSE now. If there's a bargain, I'll spot it and if it's useful for me, I'll have it. I find myself telling so many people, "Oooh go here for those, it's cheaper than there..." these days!!

Wow, I almost "sound" like my old self in this post, I've been making little lists of what I've got to talk about to remind myself as it's the only way I can remember stuff at present. I'm going to work on some more posts now in Word - stuff that I want to work on this year but I want to get the explanations right before I post them. When they are done I'll copy and paste them here but it won't be tonight. Have almost had enough for today. I decided this morning that I'd make my way back here and stop posting "promises" and I've managed that. Now that I've started the floodgates will open and you'll all be sick of me soon!

x