make do and mend for tougher times

Evie74_2

Fuddle - you may be on to something there! :rotfl:Wine and hormones are a dangerous mix - chuck fishing widowhood into the the equation and look what happens...!

It sounds like your tablets are similar to mine - I still have plenty of ups and downs (mainly downs, with odd slightly manic up) but they do generally keep me on a more even keel. They don't hold the panic at bay, but it's easier to quell the rising tide than before. I have tried CBT (GP prescribed after panic attacks started following the fire referred to above) - they taught me some lovely relaxation techniques, which are good for getting to sleep at night if insomnia strikes, but less good when the spontaneous hyperventilating starts - it's too late by then! I just have to live with it and do the best I can (and hope I don't embarrass myself too much if panic descends in a public place!)

Evie xx

kezlou

sounds like you had a great day out pah
i saw some books like that at the imperial war museum but couldn't bring myself to them. Just thought the price was extortionate.:o

Fingers crossed for all interview results xx

welcome to new posters!!! Sorry i'm terrible with names

I've been stocking up this week, well spent £60 and thought well it better last the month. It was mainly dried foods and some fresh, we've just been paid tax credits and thats our income for the month. So its tight here in the mad house, luckily the kids meals are paid for and then they off school. they currently have school dinners as my eldest has far too much to carry, told him last week after he spent nealy £15 on school dineers :eek: His bidget is £10 a week, £10 for my youngest, can't believe he went well over .
Next year both are getting a mixture, no way can i afford to do it any more.

Went to m & s with my vouchers and ended up getting the £10 meal deal. Found a very large chicken after searching through them, other people looked shocked while i did it, but i don't care. I'm feeding a family of four. CAme out with a strawberry / rhubarb flan, cheesey bread and a bottle of while. All paid for via a voucher. Had the chicken and boy was it scrummy, the boys and i loved it. OH hasn't came back yet from London, it was meant to be used for a welcome home meal. But i don't like leaving raw chicken for more than 24 hours in the fridge.

so will strip the chicken later for stock and freeze the cooked chicken for later use. tomorrow i will make a batch of mince mix or lentil, mince for tomatoes ready for spag bol etc


Thanks for the link to the uk-prepped site .
I can understand the mind set for being prepared for anything, but no way can i afford to stock pile, never mind finding the space to put it all. But i must admit i try and keep my cupboards in the kitchens filled. I know for a fact that last year when SHTF i managed to feed us all and our friends for about two months from the cupboards alone. No one knew about out financial situation apart from OH and me but we did it and it brought me and him closer together. During winter i tend to keep more in especially after the horrid winter of 2010. Literally the shops ran out of fresh food / bread / milk , it was crazy.

Well i did it i finally made the boys sort though the giant box of cars / toys / generally junk and it is not its new home in a giant box. Spent £13 on boxes and it was well worth it. Now the middle room is prepped for OH's tools and junk for when he gets back.

Now going to chill, make the lads some toast and collaspe into bread. Need a glass of something but think i'm too tired, after dranks in over a month. So think the fumes off the wine would be enough for me :rotfl:

SpikyHedgehog

Pooky wrote: »

Byatt - the way I've read it is that HB will only be paid for a set period (and then a gap between reclaiming) and will be based on need, not on where you actually live. So for example, I have two teenage DDs so we could only claim for a two bed flat LHA as that's all we officially need to live in. So it will effectively be cutting the benefit to those who live in a property that is outsized for their needs. I think a single person allowance will now be based on a room in a shared house rather than a one bed house/flat etc.

I don't know how old your DDs are, but if 1 is over 16, they can have separate bedrooms & you could claim for 3 bedrooms - I think it used to be based on the actual age gap, which makes more sense. The boys used to share in the old house as it only had 2 bedrooms, but we could have 3 bedrooms when we moved here as there's more than 7 years between them. Much easier for DS1 to do homework in his room then! Whereas now, if someone has twins of 16+, they could have separate bedrooms to do the same homework in... DS1 says it's all very confusing!

Byatt wrote: »

Spiky, thanks also for the explanation. I will read again in the morning when brain is working better, but that's why I had to move to a smaller place, when my DD left home (suddenly and without warning!), when she met a man and moved in with him. I was left in a 2-3 bed (it was defined as 2 bed but had arguably 3), on my own trying to find most of the £700! I don't get full HB now, might do in September, so still have to find most of the rent.

Does it not make any difference that your son's main address would be yours, if he went away to uni?

There's so many pitfalls that you don't see until you're in it. My biggest fear has been the insecurity of being at the LL's whim. Like I say though, although this place isn't perfect, things could be worse, and at least the LL wants to rent long term, plus I have a small garden.

I'm hoping that as his home address will be here, I will be ok, & we've got 2 more years to find out as he starts 6th form in September - but it is so scary. And as you had, sometimes people don't have time to prepare. I would like to move as the neighbours here aren't great, so could look for 2 reception rooms instead of the sitting room & kitchen/diner we have here, & 2 bedrooms so we could use the dining room as a bedroom for DS1 when home... But it takes time to find the right house.

annie123

katieowl wrote: »

Before we left London the local electricity sub-station caught fire one Sunday morning (electrical fault caused by numpties stripping copper IIRC)... "Oh -the powers off" I said, and took my stove top kettle out to the garden where I'd rigged up an outdoor kitchen with the camping gaz, because it was boiling hot (remember those summers :D0 and I'd turned the Aga off. I made tea and went to answer the door to one of my neighbours having forty fits, as were all those out on the streets to see what was happening "I can't get any cash out" "I've just been to the station and there's no trains running" "I can't get any petrol" "my phone's flat and I can't charge it" "how am I going to cook lunch"...etc went on for hours. I think the leccy was off about 12 hours for some people, ours was about 4. Doesn't take much these days with all the gadgets to cause mayhem. Supposing it had been one of the main power stations? (Fukashima anyone??)

I remember that one Kate, we went to the Dulwich woodhouse pub instead, not very MSE but very nice
The only power cut here of any length of time since the 70's.
Ours was off for around 6 hours, with no computers hubby and I had to talk to each other :eek: :rotfl:

[Deleted User]

I bought 7kg of loose carrots yesterday and shredded and dehydrated half today, they took 10 hours and turned out brilliantly, filling a 2 litre box. I went to look at the remaining carrots this evening and see to my horror that they are already getting limp, so they are also shredded and now drying overnight. I am really shocked because they should have remained in good condition for longer. I think this is going to be common after all the constant rain

Mrs_Chip

Evening everyone!

Phew, tonight's session was manic, starting with a order for 18 meals for a party of French students - all fish 'booked' before we even got the fryers on! I hate having to disappoint people when we run out of fish.

Came back and spent some time looking for Jesus, no I've not found the Lord, but watching Superstar - JCS is my joint favourite ALW musical with Joseph (Lee Mead-drool:rotfl:) so I have to watch. Live progs all next week oh dear .

At least it stops me thinking about packing my Armageddon knickers and SHTF pyjamas - on which note nighty night all!

Popperwell

Spiky and Byatt,
It is frightening and lots of information there that started to confuse/worry more as I see there is a link of a new assesment that has been done on July 4th and lots of tables...I'll try not to get too worried at this time...

I suspect I will be having lots of chats with the CAB and HA in coming months. They have admitted originally they were leaving tenants alone who had occupied a property for years and years and only new tenants were affected. Now it's everyone...and there may be some of us where the cutbacks are tight but perhaps we could manage to pay if we don't spend money somewhere else. But until it comes in or it is nearer the time figures may be difficult to work out...

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/social-sector-housing-under-occupation-wr2011-ia.pdf

prepareathome

Fuddle I would have been:mad: as well - this past year I have have had to take back quite a few things bought in argos that have not worked, stopped working with in a few weeks, blown up ( a lamp and metal shade was melted) or just fell apart. I am beginning to feel they are buying the seconds from company's to keep their prices down.

Well replaced my stocks but totally forgot to put water on my list so will have to either go or get hubby to go tomorrow, I think I am going into a flare as pain meds are not touching the pain. Been lucky not had a bad flare for quite a few months. No specific area worse than another just feels like I have been systematically been beaten all over - except thankfully and please let it stay that way my neck and head as if they start I just have to lay in the dark with ear plugs in till they go away.

Anyway away from that cheerful note, smilet I am same with my three - well sophie - 14 in october - I brought up from birth as her mum didn't want her. Pixie and Tyson came to us via three other homes and were only 4 months old when we took them in - temporary that was supposed to be until a full time home was found for them. That was over 14 years ago and they are at this moment all snuggled up next to me on the bed. I would not stay sane without them and would starve myself before I saw them starve. Sophie has always slept with me - first in bed with hubby and me and now with me alone with hubby in other room. Other two have this massive big bed we bought for them so they can stretch out fully and still not touch each other, especially poor old Tyson who is blind and has arthritis and so although he usually is to be found lying on or next to Pixie sometimes pain makes he take advantage of the space.

Their bed takes up so much space in my room its 40in square thing and very, very thick cost a fortune but they are worth every penny we spend on them. Even though they adore hubby if I am in they are always to be found with me, you would think they would be bored to tears being in the bedroom with me most of the day but they will not go out for walks without me so they rarely go out for walks and have not done so for quite a few years - but vet is happy enough with them. If a good day for me coincides with nice weather and hubby being off we will bundle them and my scooter into the car and go off to some deserted beach and let them have a run, but they will not go further than 20ft or so from me, never have, you would think I have them on elastic.

As we don't claim HB we of course are not affected by the bedroom tax but if hubby lost his job or me my ESA then we would have to claim and that should be fun as this house has been adapted for me by HA and there are no one bed adapted properties with in miles of me - my HA took over the last of the council houses and so their properties are scattered all over the city with most being in the north of the said city. Most near me are under a couple of other HA but as we were such a few properties that were still exactly the same as when they were built in 1932 none of them wanted us. Our HA would gladly get shot of us as managing so few properties here is costing them as we have been told many times and so unless it must be done under government decree we get zilch but in the north oh they get clubs for all, garden make overs, new kitchens every 4 years and same with heating and windows, every week I get there email newsletter informing what they are running that week in the north oh its a real bug bear with me as our local manager told me in the north 85% of the properties rents are paid by HB yet we pay full rent and only get what HA is paid by government to do ( this HA was set up to take advantage of governments offer of set up HA transfer all council stock over and we will give you the money to modernise them but if council wanted to keep us they had to find the money themselves). I have lived once in the north of the city and never again, cannot explain but I hated every minute of the three years we lived there, nice people, area ok but just never felt settled, I like the south and adore where we live now in the village yet on right on border with fields just 5 mins walk away ( my front fence is border so we pay far more CT than people across the road :mad: and they get much better services) . I would move across the road but HA will not let us transfer out of the city, can move anywhere in it. So if we have to move out of here and they try and move me to the north you will hear the screams all over the UK. As so few of us we are not allowed our own tennant assoc we are lumped in with other areas much further away and they don't care about us as their areas are bigger so they get more, but not as much as the north.

Prepping is something I have always done, mentioned how when hubby was off sick for 8 months 2004/5 on SSP if it wasn't for our stocks we would never have got through, they helped us eek out the money. Just never been able to get them back up to the levels they were before then as hubby's wages first were reduced to min wage then hours cut and finally contract cut to 20 hrs with over time. All drivers agreed to all the cuts as it meant they still had a job.

Water must be bought tomorrow and must see about getting more puddings in as all I have is a couple of tins of rice pud and 4 tins of fruit so they would not last long but do have 10 instant custards and five jellies.

Right ranting over I will go away till pain goes and I can stop moaning...........maybe count how many tins of tomatoes I have now see if I am creeping up on GQ :rotfl:

Popperwell

Wishing you well PAH, I would be not be doing so bad if these changes were not being threatened and the worry of the unknown.

It's a pity that I seem to be coping with the loss of Mum and other things have to mess things up.

I don't understand if it is definate or still depends on a vote in the Commons(It will get through on numbers)

Oh well enough of that for now...

stiltwalker

Mrs_Chip wrote: »

Came back and spent some time looking for Jesus, no I've not found the Lord, but watching Superstar - JCS is my joint favourite ALW musical with Joseph (Lee Mead-drool:rotfl:) so I have to watch. Live progs all next week oh dear .

We watched this tonight too Mrs Chip - thought it was fab, good mix of lads and looking forward to the live shows. Have a secret (ok not so secret now I've told you all!) weakness for this type of show.

Well our silk paper making workshop went well today - fewer people than the feltmaking one we did a couple of months back but several folks were away on holiday. We over ran rather as no-one wanted to pack up - they were all having too much fun with the gloopy paste!

Got to get up early tomorrow as the kids are going to a birthday party at a soft play centre at 10.30. Still have the present to wrap - bit of a mad dash this afternoon as it'd crept up on me so wasn't organised. Went out into town after the workshop to get a couple of long sleeved tops for pressie (mum's request) and went into Next, the only shop in town that sells kids clothes and the sale was on so no ordinary clothes just sale stuff! and needless to say no kids clothes in birthday boys size at all! Did get a skirt and top for me and some tops for DD for all of £12. But ended up going to Mr T's for tops.

Right - must away to bed now. Night all.