How do you not feel like you are working for nothing when you are Old Style?

coocoo51

I am a mum and gran now and I am so grateful that I was a SAH mum when my children were young - in fact it was only when I was divorced that I had no choice but to work and I hated not being 'there' for the children. At 61 I can count the number of holidays I've had on my fingers but always said that it wasn't worth being poverty stricken for 50 weeks just to be away for 2 weeks. I think all the ideas above are pretty much what I would recommend. This summer I had my three grandsons staying sand not much money to amuse them so we packed up home made picnics and went to the beach, and to the woods. We went 'bear hunting' with boys using cheap binoculars and turned one visit into a film location - middle GS (8) wrote a story featuring little brother (3) and his teddy. Little one 'acted' his part while the middle one used my camera to take still pictures, and the oldest one (10) directed and managed the 'props'. When we got home we typed up the story, added in the pictures and made a book for them to take home.
The most helpful thing I learned about enjoying my children was to put a lid on anxiety about mess - the housework will always be there, the kids won't. And although it seems a long stretch you will look back and wish you could do it all again.

greengoblin

Just wanted to add to all the wonderful sugguestions that if your local park is the kind with a visitor centre then check it out and ask the rangers what's going on in the park (e.g. events, things to look out for etc) even if you see nothing available.
As a ranger at one such park I know we try to put all our events on for £4 or under, have a range of free activities in the centre or sheets to take out in the park and have things to do in the park that can be done for free (like our maze). If your park doesn't have a centre then try the woodland trust's website as all their nature detectives stuff is awesome - their autumn pack is over 150 things to do!

sj999

If you want to have a fun but cheap birthday party all you need is a group of adults to run it and some really exciting games. There are lots of fun games at www.kidzpartygames.com including "This is my elbow" -

Get all the kids to stand in a circle with one standing in the middle. The kid in the middle points to a another kid and says "This is my elbow" and points to a different part of the body (i.e the head). Kid responds by pointing to the head and saying "This is my ......". If kid points to correct part of body or is too slow kid moves to middle.

Uniscots97

I have a stepson and he didn't arrive in my life until he was 16. He found it strange at first my ways with vouchers etc, but then thought it was cool getting to see films for free (freebies board) and some of the freebies that came through the door (had full size perfume/aftershave, body lotion, shampoo, pastry, pizzas, sweets, toys, gadgets, chocolate and many more). Don't get me wrong there has been clashes about it but in general he knows there wouldn't be money for other things if I wasn't OS. In my mind I started out OS out of necessity and I've ended up loving it. It's nice saving money on something meaning there's pennies left over for something else or getting a night out free.

kangamama

I'm in a similar boat financially, 3 kids - 6, 2 & 1. My husband is a stay at home dad and I work part-time so money is very tight (but I'd rather that than miss out on my kids growing up )

I'm on my lunch-break at work so have only had chance to scan the replies (which are great and I'll be adding a couple to my list!) but a couple of things that have helped us to have more treats and days out have been to search out all the local indoor play places, swimming baths etc and follow them on social networking sites - we've had a good few discounts and freebies that way (if they're expecting a quiet day then they'll often offer out entry for £1 or less ) we even got a course of 4 swimming lessons for £3.50 the lot recently as the local baths were training their teachers!

Also, are there any grandparents who might want to splash out on you all at Christmas rather than buying toys etc? My parents are buying us membership to the local zoo so we'll be able to go whenever we want and if we pack a picnic it'll only cost us the petrol to get there. They could do the same with vouchers to somewhere you'd like to go or treat places like the cinema perhaps.

sonastin

Loads of great suggestions already re: spending time with the kids. As I'm childless, I'll leave that for others with more experience to comment

But as for "being OS means you are working for nothing", I think that simply means you aren't valuing your own time properly. If you had all the money in the world, you could for example pay for someone to enterain and/or look after your children. That might cost you £10, £15, £20 per hour of that persons time. So the time you spend in the park, playing dress-up, making stuff or whatever with your kids is "earning" you that much in not paying for someone else's time. The cake you bake would cost you a few ££ to buy - some of which goes to pay for someone else's time. Having a cleaner used to cost me £20/week. I "earn" £20 by cleaning my own house now.

My OH is currently carrying out a major renovation project on our house. Technically he isn't earning anything but we would have to pay easily £30k+ for someone else to do the work for us. So he'd need a job which brought home £2.5k/month to justify getting someone in to do it. There aren't many jobs in his field that pay that sort of money so we have more cash in the bank because he is spending this year working for "free".

oldtractor

If you feel worn out and you are working for nothing then simply go on strike. A couple of days should do it. 1 week max. with no washing done no meals no tidying up no ferrying children here there and everywhere.oh yes, you do a lot.

catwoman73

Hi OP

You've had some great ideas on this thread, but have you also made sure you're getting the best deals on all your bills in order to maximise your disposable income? Do you budget and have you drawn up a statement of affairs?

sarah222

There are some lovely home school websites now I know that sounds poop but on a wet day they are great - we set a subject for the month ie this month Guy Fawkes. Search that on homeschool subjects and you will get colouring sheets, word searches, cross words all age related. The kids have fun working together colouring and doing the puzzles etc but learn as well. The prints are all free and are so varied in subject they are great. We did chocolate last month, learnt where it came from the plants, etc etc then did some cooking with chocolate kids really enjoyed and it kept them very entertained. They then went in garden and took photos of plants and tried drawing flowers. You can make as much or as little of it as you like. I have found tho one subject sort of leads onto another and if you have daughters a really good place to start is fairies and then mushrooms!!!

lessonlearned

Some great ideas on here.

Here's my tuppence.

Holidays - Sun Holidays - The Sun Newspaper voucher ones that is . We went on loads of these when my boys were small. They were fantastic value and we had some fabulous holidays over the years. I would take quite a few groceries with us - stockpiling a few treats on the run up to the holiday. I also used to take the slow cooker and some of those disposable bbq's for easy meals. They were so cheap we used to manage two or three little holidays a year this way.

Days out - we joined the National Trust - a family ticket will give you free days out in all the local houses and gardens etc for a year and of course when on holiday there would be new ones to see too. Many of the houses do special activities throughout the various school holidays.

Theme parks etc - look out for two for one offers and vouchers.

Zoos - if you live reasonably near to a zoo then an annual family ticket is fantastic value (You could maybe ask for this as a Christmas present from Grandparents). You can then visit as many times as you like, that way you needn't spend a whole exhausting day trailing round the whole zoo, you can ring the changes which animals you see. Because you visit regularly the children will soon begin to think of their favourite animal as "theirs".

Museums, science parks etc are great fun and often have activity days in the school holidays.

Definitely agree with the "at home" birthday parties. I think some of the birthday party spending that goes nowadays is totally over the top.

Having fun and good times is not always down to money, you just have to think out of the box.

A good place to start is regularly looking at your local tourist office to get ideas and find out about any offers.