Week 2 - There's so much we can do.

RubySewSew

Unless I have my hair very brightly coloured I don't feel like me! It is something that I realised a very long time ago that good hair sets the pace for everything else. You can wear cheap clothes with good hair but you can't wear good clothes with cheap hair and have half the effect! And when I say brightly coloured I mean poppy red, bright blue, cerise - with the exception of one miserable, dowdy pregnancy I haven't seen my natural hair colour since I was 11! I have considered it, I tried it once and I hated it!! I did have a hot bath and a deep conditioning treatment and my hair feels softer and looks shinier. I stripped off weeks old nail polish and defuzzed everything. So, felt a lot, lot better. I was moderate with my wine intake last night too which helped. I did manage to clean the sofa off, I did not get as far as the kitchen table! I have done it since though althouh the bf has just been cooking in the kitchen - goodness knows what I will find!! So, I have managed to clean down the kitchen (bf excepted), sort myself out a bit if not completely, rinse a load of washing I left in the machine (whoops!), cleaned down the bathroom, spent a good 20 minutes scrubbing some yucky black stuff off the shower hose with a toothbrush, shopped for DS3's party.... phew! I really need to make his birthday cake tonight but I've only just sat down!! Boo hoo! I don't want to!!

Eager I'm fascinated by all your poultry. My Dad used to have a smallhold and I loved it. He kept sheep, goats, cows, chickens, ducks, guinea fowl and a pig. The goats were my favourite. The bf would love goats. I love my chickens - they are such personable, funny girls. Why are turkey eggs so valuable? What do people want them for?!

I empathise with the DH needing to be outside to manage the depression. My garden keeps me sane. I've always had depression on and off and it is particularly difficult to manage from November to March. From March onwards a cup of tea in the garden first thing and last thing chatting to the plants and the chooks makes me feel more grounded and centred than anything else.

DS1 is much better. So fingers crossed for a bug free birthday weekend

Eager_Elephant

RubySewSew wrote: »

Eager I'm fascinated by all your poultry. My Dad used to have a smallhold and I loved it. He kept sheep, goats, cows, chickens, ducks, guinea fowl and a pig. The goats were my favourite. The bf would love goats. I love my chickens - they are such personable, funny girls. Why are turkey eggs so valuable? What do people want them for?!

I empathise with the DH needing to be outside to manage the depression. My garden keeps me sane. I've always had depression on and off and it is particularly difficult to manage from November to March. From March onwards a cup of tea in the garden first thing and last thing chatting to the plants and the chooks makes me feel more grounded and centred than anything else.

Turkey Eggs are valuable because people incubate them and then hatch the poults and grow them on for Xmas to either eat or sell themselves.

We sell Turkeys at Xmas and Easter and charge a lot more than the supermarkets because ours are free range. People have said they would never go back to supermarket turkey.

I can see your point about your hair, I just assumed you were just blonde instead of brown not poppy red - I would love to have that colour but my poor hair has had so much colour put on it over the last 17 years it probably would not cope.

Funny (not in a ha ha way) but my DH suffers November to March as well, we have mentioned SAD a few times to the doctor and he has said he does not have that. Usually he has to increase his medication over the winter to be able to cope - this year we managed it but then with his head pain he has had to have the meds upped as he is not coping.

Good luck with the birthday party.

EE

RubySewSew

I read about the head pain in your diary - I can really empathise I have always had the seasonal thing and have wondered myself about SAD although talking it over with a lovely, wise friend she suggested that the winter months just made it so much harder to manage my life. Either way I'm not sure but I feel so sorry for my bf because every year we have been together I have been evil to him over Christmas and his (January) birthday and then finish with him in February only to fall back in love again come March. Poor boy, I don't know why he sticks with me! I have to take ad's for the depression, a different lot of ad's for the migraines and I have just come off antibiotics after 3 years on them! I also have a whole pharmacy of painkillers to manage both acute pain and chronic pain. It's been a mental couple of years!

I've never fancied keeping turkeys. I think i have bad memories of a massive stinking barn full of turkeys that we used to live near when I was a kid. I love ducks but can't stand the smell! And my garden isn't big enough. And the eggs really freak me out! My sister has ducks but we're equally freaked out by eating the eggs. I know it makes no sense. It took me ages before I could eat the bantam eggs because they are so small.

I have cleaned the kitchen again!! Have made up sandwiches, chopped melon, supervised muffin making and baked a sour cream and chocolate cake with sprinkles as ordered for DS3. Am keeping everything crossed for sunshine tomorrow as we are going to be outside!

Am looking forward to the party being done and catching up on some sleep. This week has gone quickly but it has been hard work. Have opened a political can of worms at work by offering to start a gardening club for the kids. This has trodden on some toes and caused all kinds of staffroom !!!!!ing and belittling. I am constantly surprised by people's behaviour. Nobody else was running one! And my intention is to run something that is open to everybody. Grrrrr! And grrrrr again!

Ok. Party tomorrow. I'm wondering how much more it is realistic to expect to achieve. I would like to get my living room cleaned and my paperwork straight. And I have a grant application to complete for the aforementioned garden. Oh and 2 more birthday cakes to bake. And birthday presents to make. Oh dammit! I'm destined to never, ever relax, ever!

Eager_Elephant

Oh Ruby

Your poor BF :rotfl:

The weather is supposed to be lovely all weekend but the temp at night is dropping quite low.

My turkeys are lovely, if you were closer you could come to visit some nice free range turkeys but they do make a racket so beware of neighbours. Any loud noise including lorries going past set them off which is bad as they are just off a main road :rotfl:

I like the idea of the garden club :Tand if no one else has one set up why should you not to one, children get so much enjoyment from gardening and also if you are growing veg it helps them to understand where they are from and the energy needed to grow them.

I am wondering if you could say no to a few things so you are not as busy or if this was the summer would all the work/requests be ok and it is just now you are feeling overwhelmed.

I can't wait for the clocks to go forward as it will be much lighter and I won't feel like going to bed so early and can hopefully get some work done in the evenings.

EE

RubySewSew

I agree!! Bring on the clocks! Have had a fab sunny weekend. We were so blessed with the weather - a truly warm sunny day in Stanmer Park with good friends, plenty of food and happy, entertained children. They rolled eggs, spent hours running through the forest looking for easter eggs and ate lollies until they came out of their ears. We stayed on for an extra couple of hours but left because DS2 was feverish (and DS3 coughed himself sick!!). Got home and decided I could not cope for a single second with the living room in the state it was so got stuck in for a couple of hours until all floors and surfaces, were dusted, hoovered and cleared. And then sat back to relax!

Had a lie in this morning and woke up to another sunny day. Perfect! A whole day digging in the garden! I have decluttered, cleared and swept, moved 2 trees, scrubbed all the pots, dug over the beds, planted out some peas, runner beans, broad beans, onions and butterfly mixed seeds. Hung up about 70 loads of washing all of which is now piled up on the stairs. Have had a very poorly DS2 today - he spent the whole day crashed out asleep on the sofa with a nasty cough and sore throat. Went to check on him and he was burning up and had a rash all over his face and chest. Kept an eye on him, dosed him up on calpol, ibuprofen and hot lemon and honey and panicked about the prospect of yet another day off work. Called his dad, asked my brother who came over for tea and no-one can have him tomorrow. I am looking forward to the prospect of an extra day at home but feel really bad about letting work down. I have texted my class teacher to let her know. I'm worried that it makes me seem unreliable. I did raise it in my interview that I am the primary carer (the school know me and my kids and my situation well) but I don't think any of us could have anticipated that I would be off nearly once a week. Oh well, I can't let that be a dampener on what has been a fantastic, productive, relaxing, enjoyable, celebratory weekend.

Oh, and DS1 cleaned my car inside and out for a small fee (£5) and the bf topped up oil, petrol and checked tyre pressure etc. So my car is fully functioning and cleansed. Whoop! Whoop! I feel half way to being a normal person! DS1 wants to set up his own little business washing the neighbours cars which I think is a great idea but I have told him he has to reliably clean mine without help first. He's being pretty grumpy about my intervention but hopefully it will encourage him to take responsibility for his customers. What do you reckon is a reasonable rate for a carwash?

So I have planned, cleaned and started planting the garden. Cleaned the front room (slightly at the expense of the kitchen), catered a birthday party and have enough food left over to keep us in dinners for the rest of the week. I have a clean car. So now, the big, big job for this week is to sort out the paperwork, banking and bills. It does seem never ending but for once, I feel a little bit closer to resolution

RubySewSew

I'm at home today with a poorly DS2. The sun is still shining and I would really like to be outside gardening. Instead I am going to clean up and tidy a bit inside and sort some paperwork and phonecalls. Virtue is a hardship!

Eager_Elephant

Wow Ruby, glad to see things have improved for you except DS being poorly.

Just think that at least you can get some paperwork done instead of trying to cram it in during the evenings.

EE

RubySewSew

I have idled and procrastinated a bit today - probably a hangover of being up in the night with DS2. However, all is not lost. I have done a couple of loads of washing, hoovered the front room, gone through the weekend papers and chucked in the recycling and most importantly of all I have tackled the massive box of paperwork. I have sorted into categories, found all correspondence from my creditors and batched with post it notes of actions. I feel like I can sit and go through that in front of the TV tonight now. I also managed to surface all the school trip letters so can pack for DS1's residential trip on Wednesday. And I found all my hospital letters, phoned up, found they were out of date and decided to discharge myself. They have been really little help so I will only make contact again if I have a recurrence. I do need to sort out repeat prescriptions though.

Right off to collect other two DS's then might have a little nap before phase 2!! Tonight's dinner already cooked as it took so long to cook last night I had to give the kids eggy bread instead! You win some you lose some!

RubySewSew

Oh, Eager, I have posted a new thread on debtfree wannabe board because Santander are asking for more information - I'm not sure if they have any right to or not as they seem to be requesting a lot of evidence.

Eager_Elephant

Have replied over there but am also posting here for info:

As someone else has said they do appear to make it up as they go along. If another person had picked up the information they may have accepted the offer without asking for the other info which appears to have happened on the bank account.

If they want to confirm the balances on your other debts then they could check your credit files as most of them are probably on there but I cannot see what can be gained from doing that as you have not offered pro-rata payments which they might want to check.

The only time creditors have asked for proof of other debts is where there is a CCJ and the court has ordered a set payment to be paid, in that instance we sent copies of the court paperwork and it was fine.

I have been asked for proof of benefits before now and if I have them I send them, if I don't I don't send them and the offers are usually accepted anyway.

I personally would not send bank statements or proof of other debts and if I sent my wage slips I would cross out all information not relevant (as someone above also mentioned), no need to send proof of benefits as these are for the children. The next thing will be you have to provide birth certificates to prove you have 3 children :rotfl:

You could send a letter explaining this and re-offering £1.00 per month again and enclose a copy of one wage slip (if you want to).

Whatever you do make sure you keep sending the £1 payment each month.

EE