Second Time Lucky

amycool

Muser1 wrote: »

I'm absolutely loving that you want an older child. I watched a programme last year about adoption and it broke my heart that 5 year olds were so hard to adopt. I hope it happens quickly for you. Good luck with the garden.

Unbelievably "older" can mean 3 or 4 years old. I guess most want a child as young as possible because they initially wanted a baby. I've never yearned for a baby so we want to adopt a child who fits us best, regardless of age.


Gave my Mum her birthday money today and she was really pleased. Her garden will probably be done before ours!!

Certainly not as MSE day as we went for lunch, but ate so much that we didn't need dinner. :-)

First sunny day in forever today! 18.5 degrees in the lounge with no heating on! Can't wait for spring.

optimistic-mummy

hi, ive spent tonight reading your diary. well done on everything you have managed to get done so far.


I have subscribed just wanted to wish you the best of luck on you MF and adoption journey and well done on the 9 months you have already managed to slash off your mortgage from overpayments keep up the good work your doing great

debtfreeoneday

Makes sense then!! Hope you are matched sooner.. as you say sooo many children waiting for families.

amycool

Hi optimistic-mummy! Nice of you to pop by and write such a lovely comment.

debtfreeoneday - The wait to be matched is the thing I dread the most so I hope we're matched quickly too!


Well, I survived the medical so that's another hurdle crossed. Won't get the full results for ages though.

My hairdryer, which was on it's way out, is now dead. The flames were the clue. :rotfl:So I've just ordered a new one for £11.99 and we had £3.50 credit left over so not even that much.

The washing machine is hanging on. I was reading a thread about how often people wash everything and they'd be appalled at us, but it does mean that our appliances last longer. How do people get so smelly so quickly? My rule is if it smells or looks grubby, it needs washing. I was once amazed to discover that if I sit at home doing nothing strenuous (a rare week off a few years ago) I can wear the same clothes all week and not smell. My OH isn't quite so blessed.

Still to do on my To Do list is "Plan the holiday", which I'm normally really up for and have finished planning months in advance. I also haven't put the chicken wire in the gutter. The spreadsheet is also a mess.

Tomorrow I must get on with the painting and try to get the bedroom finished this week. There seems to be less time in the day of late!

greent

amycool wrote: »

The washing machine is hanging on. I was reading a thread about how often people wash everything and they'd be appalled at us, but it does mean that our appliances last longer. How do people get so smelly so quickly? My rule is if it smells or looks grubby, it needs washing. I was once amazed to discover that if I sit at home doing nothing strenuous (a rare week off a few years ago) I can wear the same clothes all week and not smell. My OH isn't quite so blessed.

I do a lot of washing - there are 6 of us, after all - but I do try and keep the amount down where I can.



I've finally trained one of my teenagers that it *is* possible to wear a pair of jeans for 2 days!:D Tops are changed daily, but that's ok I'll happily wear a pair of jeans/ trousers for 3 days if they're clean - I'm only at home, after all. And it's a clean (showered) me wearing them. I will wear a jumper twice in this weather (but always have a vest top on underneath, which is changed) - IF it stays clean (a very big IF with me!!) My smallest 2 wear a totally clean set of school uniform every day, but I don't change them after school. My eldest 2 wear clean shirts every day and change bottoms (trousers/ skirt) every 2 days, unless dirty (DS1 rides a bike, so sometimes gets mud spattered) and they both change into jeans & tshirts when home. Blazers are washed termly.


I gave up changing bedding every week when I had children - changing 5 beds every week is just too time consuming and creates waaaaaay too much washing and ironing!!! Depending upon whose bed it is, every 2 or 3 weeks is fine, and much more manageable for me. Providing everyone showers/ baths enough (a challenge at first with DS1 when he became a teenager:eek:) then this works ok. Invariably there have been plenty of times when there have been bedwetting incidents (daily at one point for DS2) and vomiting incidents (DS1 & DS2 have a tendency to do this) where it gets changed far more frequently, anyway!


Am sure some people will be appalled at this, but I would reiterate that we are clean (ie: showered)!

amycool

I have the vomiting and wetting the bed to come...:D

And not looking forward to the smell of teenagers. Sweaty boy smell is the worst!

It's funny to find out how often others clean everything. I know people say you don't realise when you smell, but believe me, my family would let me know if I did, and I can certainly tell the difference between a top I've worn at work and one I've worn doing nothing round the house. I wonder if skin type makes a big difference. OH has oily skin and his side of the bed gets dirtier much more quickly than mine (I make him wear PJs now!) and his bath towels smell worse. I have very dry skin and unless I've been running or been for a brisk walk, I don't really sweat. My Mum is the least sweaty woman I've ever met! Even after a run she smells nice! :rotfl:


I've been fairly productive today. Clothes are dry, ironed and put away. The stairs, hall and kitchen have been vacuumed. The pots have been put away. I've completed a load of adoption paperwork and e-mailed.

In money saving news, I've started doing surveys again and so far I have accrued:

YouGov - £9.50
i-Say - £6.50 (ish - why is it 1380 points for a voucher?!)
Valued Opinions - £16

I had a particularly slow and boring one on VO yesterday but I've now got enough for a £15 amazon voucher, which would have been useful a few days ago for my hairdryer!

I did try swagbucks but didn't get on with it at all and then their search thing kept coming up despite not agreeing to download it.

TCB still has £22.90 pending so I'm thinking it won't be confirmed until we actually go on holiday. I've made £407 on TCB so far, which is pretty good.

I'm so glad I switched to the 123 account too as I have made £584 in cashback and interest!! In 19 months, although we only recently got the credit card too.

Still on my To Do list for today is to continue planning our holiday. It looks like most things are closed out of season so it might be quite cheap.

amycool

:mad::mad::mad:

I am currently having a minor breakdown due to a missing ruddy camera lead! When we moved in here I emptied all of the drawers out and carefully sorted them so that all of the wires and leads were in one drawer. Fast forward 6 months and every single drawer is a random jumble of stuff, and not only can I not find my camera wire, I also can't find my MP3 wire.

I have turned the whole house upside down and looked in every drawer and box.

So now I'm thinking, when did we last upload a photo, and I believe it was my dearest husband when he uploaded some snowy pictures. So what on earth has he done with the lead?

I'm so cross because I need to get some photos up to get rid of the clutter in the garage and also to get a quote to demolish the garage. I'm sick of it dragging on and thought I might finally be getting somewhere. And OH is in a meeting so can't answer his phone, not that he'll have any clue where it is.

Breathe.

It's not helping that I've pulled a muscle in my neck so spent the whole weekend in agony and couldn't get anything done. Or that I've just walked all the way to the chemist to get my prescription, which was very painful, and they only had 2 of the 5 things in so I have to go back tomorrow, which I can't because I'm working. Or that I'm dreading work tomorrow because of a certain colleague who I can't stand.

This is definitely my most ranty of posts so far.

2 minutes later...

Hallelujah! I thought to myself, It was last seen in the dining room, so I calmly (ish) surveyed the dining room, and of course where would you put a camera lead? On the floor, in the corner of the room. I despair!

Right, now I've calmed down a bit I'll write something less crazy.

Progress made

1. Lots of the junk from the garden and garage has been taken to the tip
2. I've decided to clean up the big ugly desk and store it in the conservatory until we get the new shed, where it will be my new woodworking/potting bench
3. I have taken photos of the conservatory furniture and will put them on freecycle today. They're horribly grotty after a winter in the garage (a cat got in with muddy feet) but a bit of upholstery cleaner should sort them and they are free after all
4. I have measured the garage and taken photos ready for the demolition company to give me a quote
5. I've started looking at suitable sheds
6. OH continues to paint the bedroom when he can, but it is taking 4 coats to look even halfway decent
7. We've decided to get a carpenter to box in the pipework and create some new shelves as we will no doubt do an awful job of it

Everything looks quite expensive at the moment but hopefully once the bedroom and garden are done we won't have any more big expenses for a few years and we can try to save a bit.

Not that today has been particularly MSE. The prescription (that was so incomplete I may as well not have bothered) was going to take ages so I went round the bargain shop. Big mistake. I spent £5.50 on; a new little twirly thing for drying your smalls as ours snapped in two, a nail brush as OH keeps moaning that we don't have one, some vaseline for my dry skin, some turps to wash the brushes so we don't have to bin them, and 3 tupperwares for storing food so we can freeze things.

So, things to do today

1. Freecycle - advertise conservatory furniture
2. Get a quote for garage
3. Dry clothes and put away
4. If neck isn't too sore, start cleaning the disgustingly dirty desk
OR 5. Get more painting done

In the near future I need to get all of the drawers re-sorted as they drive me insane.

Right, enough procrastinating...

debtfreeoneday

I hadn't seen your 'how often do you clean' posts.. so here goes..

Bedding - once a month if it's lucky.. do try to do it more
Tops - a few days
Jeans - will easily go 4-6 weeks between washes.

Am sure some people will be going urgh now.. but my washing machine loves me and that's how I do 2 washes a week!!!

amycool

We're a 2 washes a week household too.

If it was just me I'd save a fortune as OH' s clothes are so much bulkier. It's worse when we're both running regularly. You wouldn't even attempt the sniff test on those clothes in the summer.

I can't believe nobody wants our conservatory furniture! It's free!!! Gutted because we'll have to tip it. It's too grubby to give to charity and I can't face trying to clean it all.

Got a quote from the garage people. Could be £600 if the access is okay but need a site visit first.

amycool

I am a moron. I actually had about 8 responses to my freecycle advert but they'd gone straight to junk and they don't show up on the kindle. It dawned on me 10 minutes before I had to leave for work, so that was stressful.

Anyway, someone should be coming on Saturday afternoon and if they don't show lots of people would like the furniture.

I've e-mailed the garage people for possible dates.

Meter readings this week were:

Electric - 22
Gas - 23
Water - 1

The dehumidifier is hopefully going away for now. Hooray! Should save a few pennies.

The heating is quite high unfortunately as we're both home quite a lot and OH insists on working in the darkest coldest room in the house so has the light on (3 bulbs - not even energy saving ones) and the heating on full. It's hard to moan as he works long hours and spends 16 hours a week commuting. He's also constantly got the kettle or coffee machine on. I guess I just need to pick my battles! It used to be worse because everyone he worked with was single and carefree so they constantly mocked him for not spending a fortune every week on going out.

I am without my spreadsheet today (it's in Edinburgh with OH), which makes me jittery! :rotfl: I wanted to work out how much we could overpay this month.

A very unproductive day today after being woken by a power cut and loads of alarms (including ours) going off and getting no sleep. Instead of sowing seeds and collecting prescriptions I have been watching TV and knitting. I started knitting a 1940s sweater pattern about 18 months ago but it's on small needles with 4-ply yarn and I knit very slowly. Every so often I do a centimetre! I'm about 25% of the way!

Apologies if this post is disjointed but I'm on a tiny kindle screen and can't see what I've written.