Pay Off Before Lay Off!

Lois_E

Glad he's safe for the time being, Tabatha. Hope all well on the job front for you and yours, Hbbb.

Habibiboo

Tabatha_Kitten wrote: »

Hi Hbbb, cheers for the tip about the thread on the OS board. I have been reading with interest.
We have had some good news today. Hubby has managed to swerve the latest round of head chops ("Corporate Restructuring" they are calling it !) so I can breathe again for a little while.
It makes me more and more determined to put as many measures in place that I can, whilst I can.

:wave:
Hi T*K,
Thank goodness he survived this time around ~ although that sense is always tempered with feeling so sorry for those poor souls who have been restructured out of the door!

Yes, I'm very much an OS girl too and as you say, it all helps towards being set up for when the worst happens and if it doesn't then it all adds a little extra time to the planning and preparation stage! Good luck!

Habibiboo

:wave:

Sorry I slipped away for a few days ... busy time with OH being off so I took a couple of days off too and we've been trying to do a few holiday-ish things rather than the norm. Will be our only "holiday" together this year, so we made the most of a bit of time together, lots of dog walking and I had to make a point of not being online so that I didn't get suckered into work mode! Still trying to hold off on that until tomorrow!

So, a general overview of all things MSE-ish!

MFW actions:
1) Frugal finances all week, although did have a pub meal to celebrate anniversary! Apart from that and odd bag of veg we are still eating out of cupboards and I'm hoping to keep that going for the rest of this week!
2) I've investigated pet insurance for our girlie dog but because she's a bit of an older girlie now, the renewal Mr. T insurance has offered seems to be about the best (even taking QCo cashback into account). So, I'll leave that one to renew and will see if I can save a bit when the boy's renewal time comes around (he's 4 years younger).
3) Have started to plan our planting for spring (P*M, you would love my so not to scale diagram). Will check my seed stash tomorrow to compare what I have with what I want to plant.
4) Spent chunk of today breaking up old blown down fence panels into kindling. Now sitting by roaring recycled fire!
5) Henhouse now relocated away from flooded area of garden and roof frugally fixed, approx cost £10 - hoping they will repay us with eggs!

Grey clouds: Still waiting on 2nd comparison quote for front door. Will phone someone else next week if haven't heard anything more.

Silver linings: Two rainbows this week! Time with Mr. Hbbb and pooches.

Daily Decluttering: a little stutter on the declutter front as Mr. Hbbb has been a total distraction, but we did declutter all the old fence panels from the garden today (as above). Not sure how to count this into the total so will just add 2 items onto total (although we had 4 fences down in total, but I haven't done them all yet)! Total so far = 38 / 365.

Simple pleasures:

* We've rediscovered Chess ~ I haven't played since I was at school and I still call the horse things, well, my horses actually but we've been having real fun with it. OH feels he's on more of an even playing field as I tend to be the winner at cards and Scrabble. (I realise this probably makes us sound really boring but we are extremely silly as we play, it's not all silence and concentration)!

* Family of Great Tits checking out our nesting box today! It's been there 4 years and is eagerly awaiting its first tenant, so I'm hoping they move in.

* Small kindnesses which mean a lot.

* Squash curry!

I really hope everyone is OK and has had a good week. I will try to catch up with all your threads tomorrow! X

Alchemilla

Great news on the chess and loving your woodburner/fireplace style!

Habibiboo

:wave:

It didn't rain today! Saw a couple of snow flakes earlier though, but just random single ones!

Today's MFW actions: worked all day and no spends, £1 into sealed pot.

Today's grey clouds: another fence seems to be coming adrift, didn't notice it until it was getting quite dark tonight, but hope daylight will show it's fixable rather than being another replacement jobbie!

Very tired today, made spicy squash flan with other half of yesterday's roasted squash but missed out vital step of adding butter when making pastry for flan case! Madness, tasted like cardboard! Ate it tho, waste not want not mentality prevails (also power of positive thinking = fat free flan case! that's gotta be good, surely)? Carnivorous Mr. Hbbb ate his free range sausages chortling merrily to himself

Today's silver lining: finally opened yesterday's post to find £5 Royal Mail survey reward voucher!

Daily declutter: sorted a file pile in work room and relisted more items onto freecycle and Fleabay - 4 of last weekend's listings have sold so that's another £23 to add to coffers! Won't count the parcels in the total until they leave here though so today's total just includes one extra item as file pile disseminated into being properly filed, burned on fire or recycled = 39 / 365.

Today's simple pleasures: it was light till about 5.30, hens were happy hopping about for an extra hour enjoying the new orientation of the hen house!

Hope everyone's Ok - have failed miserably to catch up with everyone's threads today, will try again tomorrow! X

Lois_E

You are doing so well on the decluttering. I am in awe!

Habibiboo

Lois_E wrote: »

You are doing so well on the decluttering. I am in awe!

Thanks Lois, I'm just trying to include it as a small task each day rather than marathon sessions I just don't have the ooomph for!

Hope school was OK today!

Habibiboo

:wave:

A mostly productive day today although for every single thing I ticked off my to-do list I added another, plus work catch-up is just silly ...

Today's MFW actions: NSD; have booked two more door folk to come round for quotes on Thurs ~ Ok so this will be spendy when it happens but overall it should be a short term pain, long term gain kind of jobbie. Also, once it's done I can get down to the business of having students (a major MFW action for this year). With the new door I won't have to worry about them not being able to get in or out, or not shutting door properly behind them - any one of which is a daily occurrence for everyone else around here!

Today's grey cloud: Have run out of mealworms and local wildfowl and domestic fowl are clearly sulking and making me feel very guilty. Will buy more when current Ebay bods have paid me!

Today's silver lining: A long time ago, on a planet far, far away I had an old credit card I used once to help my son out with a plane ticket to Brazil (to help his romantic endeavours, not a banishment of the first-born kind of thing). Anyhoo, I sent a PPI claim in for it last year but they told me no, it didn't count on that one, so I forgot about it. Today I got a letter saying my complaint was upheld and enclosing a cheque for £74! :T

Daily declutter: 15 mins in garage sorting hen feed and corn into plastic bins I've freed up. This in turn condensed big sacks into smaller, sealable bins all of which takes up much less space and means two plastic sacks which I used to trip over in the garage (OK, sometimes I just couldn't be arrised to put the light on and forgot they were there) are now empty and in the recycling, whilst empty cobwebby bins at on top man cave shelves are now usefully employed! Total = 41 / 365

Simple pleasures:
All sunshine based:
* Today I actually got to hang my washing out and it nearly dried ... just finishing off on rads. Surprised how dry it did get considering it's blurry freezing although very bright!
* Happy hens actually sunbathed and made themselves a dust bath rather than mud-bathing.
* Apricot tree showing lots of blossom in the sunshine.
* A little warmth on the sun bringing on a real scented waft from the large Daphne we've got growing near the house. It's amazing that it flowers this time of year when there are no real pollinators around for it, but it's having a real cheering effect around here.

Hope everyone's OK and has their own sunshine moment too x

Lois_E

Habibiboo wrote: »

Thanks Lois, I'm just trying to include it as a small task each day rather than marathon sessions I just don't have the ooomph for!

Hope school was OK today!

Yes thanks. As others have said, once you walk through the door, you just slot back into it again.

Must get cracking on the housework this evening, though. I started unloading the DW when I got in this afternoon, and got interrupted, so I must finish it so I can put in the pile of "stuff to get dishwashed once there's space to put it in"!

Nice to start getting to know you anyway. :wave:
Do drop in on my diary some time.

muddywhitechicken

Habibiboo wrote: »

Today's grey cloud: Have run out of mealworms and local wildfowl and domestic fowl are clearly sulking and making me feel very guilty. Will buy more when current Ebay bods have paid me!

Oops, chickens are very good at that!

Where do you buy your mealworms? I pay 99p for 100g in Home Bargains :T

MWCx