Life is what happens when you're busy making plans

twiggy86

Sounds like you had a lovely weekend DNMS! I swear part of it is the weather - my OH's away and I'm never very good at keeping myself entertained so although I was busy which helped, I swear the weather just makes it seem better!

La_escocesa

Hey DNMS :hello:

I just spied your diary and thought I'd pop in to say hello

You are amazing with everything you are doing for your dd and dgd.

I'm looking forward to keeping up with your diary - we haven't had a good catch up in a looooong time! :beer:

xxx

determined_new_ms

twiggy86 wrote: »

Sounds like you had a lovely weekend DNMS! I swear part of it is the weather - my OH's away and I'm never very good at keeping myself entertained so although I was busy which helped, I swear the weather just makes it seem better!

Definitely twiggy! These last few days of summer have been a real treat! It's definitely much harder (and more expensive!) to keep dgd entertained when it's wet and cold. Hopefully we'll get a few more days before the winter truly sets in

La_escocesa wrote: »

Hey DNMS :hello:

I just spied your diary and thought I'd pop in to say hello

You are amazing with everything you are doing for your dd and dgd.

I'm looking forward to keeping up with your diary - we haven't had a good catch up in a looooong time! :beer:

xxx

Hey La E :hello: shucks thanks for popping in and reading my loooooonnnnnnnnnnnng ramblings actually was thinking about you yesterday! Not sure why but think it was something about the small things thread. How spooky you popped in!

How did the house move go? x

determined_new_ms

Didn't have the energy to pop in last night. And am *trying* to not be online so much - it's such a life suck isn't it???!

Went to visit dd in her new home and spent the day with her. I took her a week's shopping - not luxury by any means but enough food to last her a week if she is careful and doesn't let anything go to waste. For £17.36 I got her a whole chicken, a pack of mince, a pack of sausages, a tin of tuna, potatoes, pasta, pesto, pasta sauce, passata, milk, bread, cheese, Jam, coke, squash, butter, eggs, pot noodle, frozen green beans. I also took the ingredients for brownies and made a large batch there split it between the 2 of us. She was a lovely host and dgd loved being with her. I gave her £20 because she is still waiting for her money to be sorted out but has to pay £13 pw service charge to her rent. Hopefully she'll use it to pay for that.

So yesterday was expensive! I put £25 petrol in the car as it is 1 1/2 drive and I wasn't sure how much petrol it would take. Fortunately I have about 1/2 what I put in left so that will do me for the next week :T

So total spends £62.36 :eek: however the £17.36 can come out of our joint account as we did have a small surplus this last month , I put £10 a week of petrol in my car so that can be just included as a normal expense. So £35 additional spends :eek: but I was contacted by a MS company and asked to do a MS assignment today for £19.50 :T so technically that cancels out some of yesterday's costs so in actual fact I am down a net £15.50 :rotfl: I can afford that!

Glad to see she's got somewhere to stay, the girls staying there that I met seemed nice, as did the staff. She has an appointment today with the gp to get a referral to the MH team (or at least that's what she tells me. She has had a problem in the past of telling me what she knows I want to hear rather than the truth so we will have to see). Her illness is so frustrating as people who suffer from it are so resistant to having treatment despite the fact if they do and can go the distance it is one that a full recovery can realistically be expected. External hope!

Anyway it was a nice day.

3 things I'm grateful for:

1. I easily did 15 minutes with the hula hoop. Didn't manage 15 in the evening as I was knackered when I got in

2. I left feeling reassured that dd is ok, so peace of mind for a little while.

3. My dd gave me a small gift of something she had been given but knew I loved them (salt & vinegar snackajacks ) so saved them to give to me

4. dgd was happy to be with her mother. In the morning when I told her where we were going she went around the house and found a toy dog (teddy) and a leaf to give to her mummy and asked to make a card :happyhear she's so sweet. So she's worked out it's a social convention to give gifts to people and then wanted to give some to her mummy :A

5. the gift of 4G on the way home kept dgd entertained on a long journey

6. I managed to do a small shop for the week just getting a few bits we had run out of, including a 12 pack of baby wipes for £5 :T which should last until the new year if we don't go baby wipe crazy :rotfl: for £18.99 :T

7. At the moment I have a car that safely takes us from a to b and the money to put petrol in

8. The drive to dd is all through the country so I got to see lots of lovely views on a wet autumnal day

9. I was called to be asked to do a ms assignment today which cancelled out some of yesterday's spends

10. We came home to our lovely home and had a hot chocolate and oh read stories to dgd before bed time. The evenings are now drawing in, so lights are on and the house is inviting. There's something I really love about the change in season at this time of the year

Phew what a lot of lovely things yesterday :T

twiggy86

Thank you for your list DNMS! It's so easy to overlook things that we take for granted but are actually very fortunate to have, like a car and an inviting home (not that my home is inviting as it's a building site, but it's home, it's warm and dry and it's mine!)

crazy_cat_lady

That is a massive amount of positive things DNMS. I love it

determined_new_ms

Twiggy that's exactly what I've been realising since doing this for 5ish days. Funny thing is now I'm sitting and thinking about what to be grateful for there seems to be a lot. That's what I was trying to say on your thread ccl, it's already changing my outlook.

Am pleased to say that even though I didn't get through the list of things I wanted to do today I am pleased with what I've done! I did a number of adminy things, a ms assignment (just need to type up the report), spent an hour stripping the wallpaper from our room. I want to repaint dgd's room. Now it seems she's here for the foreseeable future I want to make her room really nice and have pinned some ideas of what to do. But oh said we can't do it until our room is done. So... challenge accepted!

I think I need to think about what I want to do over a month and have a list rather than a long list of things each day. I tend to not make enough time to do hobbies and things that bring me pleasure. Particularly thinking of the daily thread....

3 things to be grateful for today:

1. Had the day to myself to do some money making/homemaking/me time while dgd was at the the CM's

2. Dgd came in all excited about playing with one of her friend's at the CM's. Unexpected bonus to reducing her hours means it's kind of a treat/play day for her rather than the daily grind!

3. Didn't fancy cooking as was later home than I hoped so defrosted chilli & potato, chickpea & spinach curry frozen last time I made it and had it with rice mmmm

4. Had a slice of brownie and some (free) squirty cream (given to us by oh's parents) for desert

5. Have been asked to do another ms assignment on Thursday for £25 :T

6. Dgd asked oh to give her her bath and read stories so I have unexpectedly had a bit of free time after I tidied up the kitchen :T

7. Will have a few glasses of wine once dgd has gone to bed as oh treated us to a bottle to say thank you for having dgd all weekend. He went on a tour of micro breweries in Kent on Saturday and then felt shocking on Sunday

That'll do for today!

determined_new_ms

Quick post this morning as have been up since before the crack of dawn :eek:

Today is a day with dgd and we are trying out a new playgroup at the local woods. Still have £18 of her cb left and it's due again on Monday so can afford 2 groups this week :T

Need to re-email oh the activity pack to print as he deleted the email. I might even pop into The range on the way home and pick up a colouring book as we have no paper or colouring books left....

Have discovered a wonderful blog recently athriftymrs.com which has loads of interesting blog posts and loads about Christmas. The changing seasons means I'm now starting to think about the winter festival we don't really celebrate Christmas. Discovering minimalism about 4 years ago we decided to scale down Christmas and for a couple of years we didn't celebrate it at all. But with dgd coming into our lives we have revived the celebrations but in a very scaled down way.

So this year with no regular income I am going to say to everyone can we do no gifts except for the children. For my godson I'm going to fill a washing machine box with balloons, for my godson's sister (who is 17) & dgd's aunt (who is 15) I have just bought a Zoella Fizz Bar - it's like a large bar of chocolate but is a bath bomb and you break off a square at a time. It'sd currently £4 at Superdrug :T

For dgd I picked up a fantastic idea from someone on the small things thread. They give their children 1 gift an hour so they get to enjoy each gift and the magic is spread over the whole day. This seems like such a great idea, I just hope dd is happy to do this - she has a tendency to over compensate at Christmas and birthday's and gets a bit intense... This means we probably all will get her 3 gifts (if dd is agreeable). I am going to do the box of balloons, am watching a couple of micro scooters on fleabay currently and think I will hunt out some nice jigsaw puzzles and that's that done

The hardest people to get for will be my ex-mil & oh's parent's. Really don't want to spend more than £10 each on these gifts but want to get them both something nice. Will need to put some thought into these... Also my kids will be difficult as it's going to be a huge shock to them that the funds for a gift for each of them is only £25

Oh is easy - we won't get each other anything :T And then other than that I will invite people over for food, drinks and games. Hopefully a lovely Christmas coming in at under £100 :j

determined_new_ms

Need to keep track of spends as weekly spend challenge isn't up and running :eek:

So spends not accounted for elsewhere:

£6.70 on fish and chips on Saturday
£15.50 on Monday going to dd's (only going to include the net amount spent as the other spends can come from other pots already accounted for )
Treated myself yesterday to a Superdrug Hot Cloth Cleanser With Muslin Cloth 150ml which was on offer @ £2.95 (from £5.95) and it's got good reviews :T

So £25.15/£50 (knew it was going to be an expensive week as was going to visit dd and have a couple of social's)

Also bought 2 Christmas gifts but the money for them comes from savings I have throughout the year (stopped putting money into these pots when I lost my job but already had £165 in the Christmas pot )

crazy_cat_lady

Sorry DNMS - I will definitely put one up next week xxx