13 Moons part 2 - Freebird & Frugabulous

taxi73

all sounding good and love your philosophy on work..what will be will be no point in worrying over it

Karmacat

Lula-Hula wrote: »

Hello again,
Hello! :j
Had a very pleasing afternoon driving to & then wandering around gardeny places. In the first one I noted they had huge pots ( easily big enough to fit all of downstairs kids & DD as well ) at remarkably reasonable prices. A wide variety of shapes & sizes & colours, although I do tend to be boring & favour plain terracotta.
I didn't tell you that I nearly fell into a pool at the garden centre on Friday - reely reely did, Wol pulled me back just as I was overbalancing :eek:
So, we went there & for just £5.70 I got enough to cover the patch & 2 bag of the pegs for £6.98. The netting is sold on a roll 8 metres wide so you can have as much as you like, brilliant
Sounds brilliant :j

DD now gone to club & dear father called to ask when we were seeing him, so will pop in there briefly tomorrow & plan to see Grandmother in the same car trip too.
And that sounds nice

All laundry gathered in & filling up the airing cupboard in an alarming manner ... will tackle that tomorrow.
That doesn't :rotfl:

Netting now installed on veg patch & his royal furriness immediately demonstrated how he coud walk straight across it & sharpen his claws on the wooden edges . We've now banged some sticks in to raise the netting but I still want to get some raised beds. Saw some lovely sleepers that would be perfect for making edges ... at £49 each :eek:. We also came across amazing 'features' in the format of victorian folly's, gothic ruins & garden rooms. We both fell in love with the gothic ruin ... but not the starting price ... £2,099. Yes, I did put the comma in the right place .
:eek::eek::eek: Thats quite dear! And don't pay £49! Check out 2nd hand, even ebay - I sold two sleepers for my sister, at a total price of £30! You have to collect them, of course, on ebay.

I have a few bricks lying around, might try to start creating my own :rotfl:. Definitely.

Bye for now
xx

Enjoy your day visiting

Lula-Hula

Morning all,

I'm not sure that 'enjoy' is the appropriate term for the visiting ... my grandmother will certainly enjoy our visit & I enjoy that she gets pleasure out of it. She'll be 97 later this year & I find that I'm already starting to withdraw emotionally as I prepare myself for her leaving my life within the next few years.

She has hung in there for so long inspite of deteriorating memory & ability to provide her own daily care & I cant help but feel that she is just waiting until my lovely aunt comes home. Aunt has been trying to sell her home in Portugal & now it seems that the sale is finally going through. It's great that she will be living in the UK again, but rubbish for my summer holiday plans :rotfl:.

So, we shall be a-visiting this afternoon & right now I'm sat here with my second coffee of the day, while my hair colour is 'revived' .

The ironing pile is still looking grim but I know that it rarely takes more than an hour & it does please me to have all our stuff in an immediately wearable state. Mornings are such an effort, that I'd hate to have to iron DDs shirts before school

I saved myself £90 last night, I found some half price bikes at Argos, but the one I wanted was out of stock. I've been checking out phones again too I found one that came with a much cheaper monthly contract ... but it didnt have everything that I require, so I didnt buy that either.

I'll be taking a look at the M&S offer & using bob suggestion to try to get stuff delivered to store. I dont want anything, but I though I might use the giftcard to buy some good quality school shirts for DD.

Task for the day is to check out the prices of the high school uniform. I'm half way through working on the budget too, although I cant see much room for manoeouvre as so many expenses are fixed.

Away to wash my hair now & turn the bathroom into a crime scene look a like

Lula-Hula

I'm now well on my way to not being a complete lightweight .

I need to be careful that I dont get used to being on the booze every night ... much as I am enjoying it. I used to drink a lot & I dont need to go back there again; my face is too fragile for such activities these days - late night + booze = HAG

We did the rellie visiting & were rewarded by some yummy chocolate for DD & a nice bottle of gin for me . Not Gordon this time though, but it's fab square shaped bottle with 'made in london' embossed on the side & has a man in a gorgeous red frock coat on it

So far I'm on my second & it has shown no inclination whatsoever to hurl itself kamikaze style on to the keyboard. Perhaps men in nice red coats are more refined & this should be the way forward from now on. It was free too - although, having requested that dear Dad bring it, I did offer to pay & DD is still loving her phone to the extent that when I said I needed a lemon but didnt want to ruin a NSD, the little darling insisted on buying it for me :A.

Perhaps, I shouldn't be so proud of her willingness to support my booze habit, but it's not like I was getting her to buy rizlas ... I mean a lemon is fruit for goodness sake .

Anyway, my grandmother was in fine form & doesnt mince her words; DD was wearing one of those pretty flower corsage/clips in her hair & dear grandmother said " what on earth have you got stuck to your head ?". She wasnt appeased when we explained, just asked why DD would do that :rotfl:. DD thought it hilarious & wasnt the least bit upset, even when half an hour later, Grandmother put down her cup of tea & specially baked heart shaped biccie to exclaim " I just cant get over it, I mean, why are you wearing that on your head ?"

I thought that was a bit rich coming from a lady who was wearing a minnie mouse pyjama top with her trousers at 4pm on a sunday, but DD was in such fits of giggles that I let it go.

We giggled all the way home & I also discovered that my car can dance. This is indeed a revelation & thank goodness for the long empty stretch of road where she can dance along to a David Guetta cd to her hearts content & without alarming any other traffic. It may just have looked like I was warming the tyres up a la Formula 1 formation lap stylee, but believe me, that baby has some moves :dance:.

I'm very lucky with cars, the last one could swim ... she may have been an old banger & made us feel car sick when on a roundabout, but show her a flood that lapped over the bonnet & she just kept going without even a cough ... totally shaming the 4x4 that choked & died in the middle of it :rotfl:.

Back to business : NSD 12 achieved :j

Uniform sussed - no change from a £150 note & that doesn't include footwear .

Have just given away £25. Not intentionally either :mad:. Checked the virgin CC to make sure payment gone through & discovered a mystery £10 payment. Searched back through emails & it turns out that when I bought the Killers tickets, I also signed up to some con of a shopper discount site that for a monthly fee of £10 promises to give you discounts on your shopping. They took the payment from the virgin CC & I got bored so didn't read to the bottom of the email where it states that they'll take £10 a month of you :mad:. Had my CC not been cleared, I would probably have gone on paying this for ages without noticing.

I'm also very hacked off that inspite of my having actually only owing this £10, bloody uncle Richard still took it upon himself to extract £25 from my current account via direct debit, which now leaves me with a credit balance of £15 on the card :mad:.

I am so far away from having my finances under control that I may well need that railcard to get to that state.

I'm loving this gin though

More boring money stuff :

I have finally made a payment to the shiny new CC that exceeds the amount I have put on it during the past 7 days :j.

Maybe I am cured *snorts*.

Seriously though - I now have a balance of £1200

That's not even scary although I confess that the chances of clearing it by August 1st are optimistic at best. That would require payments of £133 a week :rotfl: & again I say :rotfl:.

I'll do my best, really I will, but I need to live a bit too & there's my booze & ebay habits to maintain.

I was thinking that I cant get too trashed on thursday as will need to get up & take DD to school on friday ... however, having finally got around to reading latest newsletter, I was somewhat relieved/delighted to discover that friday is an inset day. I can now lay in with my hangover in peace .

Must go to bed now, there's washing up to be done in the morning . Inspite of having done a Davina at 7pm ( I hate my ugly body ) & had a bath straight after, we didnt eat until 8.30 & then it was time for the men in red coats to come out to play ....

Hope everyone's Monday passes quickly & happily

G'night
xx

moo2moo

Would DD qualify for a one off secondary school clothing grant? I know the criteria varies widely by area as does the amount allocated but its usually somewhere between £50 and £150 for a child entering Year 7 of High School.

Karmacat

Lula, you are so funny :rotfl: I can see you get it from your grandmother :rotfl: well done for not rising to the bait - it doesn't sound like you'd get a reasoned exposition over the issue of whatever's "stuck" to DD's head :eek:

A car that dances .... okay, I can see that, having watched Top Gear but damn, damn, damn, that you got conned by one of those "discount and then pay us double monthly" things - Next were doing that, they offered a £10 discount and to get it you had to sign up to exactly what you're describing :mad:

My Monday is chugging along nicely at the mo, tho I *still* haven't had breakfast, as my stomach just reminded me. Off to fetch Hope yours goes well too.

Lula-Hula

My Monday has chugged along just fine thank you KC .

Half the workforce seem to be off sick or on holiday but not a problem as not busy.

Gropey has started training me on the new computer system & frankly I cannot see what all the secrecy & drama is about. It's pretty much a self explanatory thing. It's just a shame that it completely freezes on my computer ... wonder how much Goblin paid to ensure that :rotfl:.

Grumpy loathes & detests the system & sees it as unnecessary & hideously time consuming. He may well have a point, but the way he imparts information is one of the reasons we need it .

I'm just doing whatever it takes to keep boss thinking that I'm valuable although I did decline Grumpy's request for me to massage his thigh after his physio session .

NSD all day long :j & just a small amount of home-job stuff to do. I've suddenly realised that I have 2 weeks booked off in the summer & so far nothing to do / nowhere to go during that time. We've investigated various hols options but I cant help but feel that beaches & sun are essential. Even searching for cheap deals has shown that I'll need to be spending approx £1,000 to go abroad.

I'm really keen to do the campervan hire thing & just wander about , kipping where we do, but today DD finally revealed that she has some issues about that. They are mainly 'personal space' issues & i dont think you get much of that in a camper van. I have a nasty feeling that I'm about 5 years too late for her to be happy sharing a small space with me.

Interestingly she feels ok about camping, but has the same 'facility sharing' issues that I do. I could probably get my head round that, but no way can we pitch our large tent on our own unless we grow Mr. Tickle style arms & the small one is just that. All this becomes completely irrelevant when faced with pouring rain, howling gales or coldness, all of which are perfectly feasible in the UK.

As to caravans on one of those sites with 'entertaiment' ... we both have the fear of that type of holiday.

Mustique would suit perfectly, but I'm not sure just how far Uncle Richard's generosity towards me will go :rotfl:

I'm a bit saddened by the camper van revelation as I still really want one, I'd love to be able to go off somewhere every 2/3 months, even if just for a long weekend. Perhaps I should make shorter & varied trips or breaks my focus & set up a super secret campervan fund just for me :think:.

Thanks for the thought Moo, I've not heard of that fund but assume it's for people who are in real hardship ( ie unemployed & on free school meals) rather than those who moan that they cant afford to rent a villa with a pool for 2 weeks .

I have a nasty feeling that it's time for another workout so had best get on with it.

Bye for now ...

se999

So sad to hear that the campervan dream is disappearing - what about the narrowboat as a replacement? I loved your campervan dream.

On our last camping holiday we did have one night with the car used as a windbreak, and to pack the tent away I had to lie on it to stop it blowing away in the gale as hubby rolled it up, it was a 2 person job but also quite wierdly fun too, there are so many 'fun' things about camping

Unfortunately with travelodges if you can get them at the £19, they can be cheaper than the extra petrol plus campsite charges for quick breaks, than campervans, Ok you don't get the freedom, but it is an option.

Hope you find a new dream soon.

makeup

Lula-Hula wrote: »

( I hate my ugly body )

I really dislike reading statements like this...:o At the risk of sounding all californian tree hugging hippy but your body isn't ugly and you shouldn't hate it!

I understand that you are hoping to be fitter, stronger and more flexible and that will bring being toned and slimmer and healthier but don't hate on yourself now!!

Your body is still really great and amazing even if not exactly the shape you want it to be. And it goes without saying that you are f fabulous!

End of lecture.....

Lula-Hula

One more workout done

Apologies to makeup for hate comment. You are correct, it is an amazing piece of kit ( particularly considering the abuse it's endured over the years) & I am endlessly grateful that it is healthy & fully functioning. Motherhood has not however, been kind to it & whilst the expansion of my hips may well be helping to prevent osteoporosis, it is doing nothing to help me into my jeans.

What I really hate is how I cannot seem to sustain any form of healthy eating & exercise programme beyond 5 days :wall:. All weight loss / fitness results are short lived & I seem to be caught on a loop. Having lost 8lbs .... I've regained 4 :mad:.

Se999 - thanks for your lovely post. I like my campervan dream too, & the boat one as well. I did suggest the idea of a narrowboat holiday to DD, & she seemed to like that idea so I'm going to investigate further. I've also found a lovely little holiday cottage in norfolk, about 50 metres from the beach. I agree that camping can be great fun ... just not not in either of the tents we have, so would need to invest in yet another one that DD & I can easily put up.

Just to keep the dream alive, I've also been drooling on this site :

http://www.vanillasplits.com/html/home.html

I'm cross with myself for dithering about & not maintaining the focus on just one dream/goal/ thing & putting all my energy & finances into achieving that.

Maybe if I we have a short break in both a campervan & then a boat, then it would help me determine what I really do want.

Feel a bit like a hamster in a ball at the moment; running wildly in no particular direction but with all possible paths in sight & on a constantly changing course :rotfl:.

G'night
xx