NST December: Frugal festivities

misstara

Just a very quick post before bed. Today I'm grateful for
- a NSD
- a very productive day at work (which hopefully means I won't have to stay late tomorrow or Wednesday)
- a lovely catchup with my gran

thriftylass

dolly84 wrote: »

Thrifty - a friend of mine once said no parent should ever spend all their time with their children, it's not natural:rotfl:.

A day back at work and I feel so much better. Got loads done last night, was a very patient and fun parent and even got my spreadsheets done.

I keep track but I think might still just lurk till January

dolly84

Hi all.

DS has his school play this afternoon so I will be buying some raffle tickets, just one strip at £1. Other than that no plans to spend on anything else today and not much else going on.

dolly84

Bobarella wrote: »

Well. Downloaded a quiz app on my phone as DS is crazy about quizzes at the moment. Specifically searched for children's quiz apps. Free ones of course. So there we are sat on the bus home from school and we go to take the first quiz. You could have blown my down with a feather when the first question came up and said ' what does libido mean' with options a to d. Queue son asking me in a loud voice what does libido mean mummy?
Face. Palm.

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:What was Q2?

The_Only_Girl

Good morning everyone! I'm off work for a few days yay! Will I get to start my Christmas shopping? Watch this space. The few £££ 's I was eyeing to squeeze into the EF from this month's budget before the year ends to make the EF a nice round figure will not materialise after all. DS2 came home yesterday with a letter from school about a trip to Harry Potter studio on Friday (that's like in 3 days!!!). The fee is £50 excluding food and spending money. DS2 said he really really wanted to go and can we please take the money from his cash ISA if we can't afford it from this month's budget. The way he said it just melted mine and DH's hearts. He is an avid Harry Potter books reader and it would make his Christmas so complete to be able to go to the studio with his friends. Not sure why DS1 didn't say anything about going, will ask him later.). DS2 went to school this morning with the signed permission slip and definite springs in his steps. I am just a bit miffed that the school has not given us plenty of notice to magic £50+ etc out of thin air. Have they not heard of the word BUDGET? Forgive my early morning rant.

I had a scary experience yesterday while driving to work. I big long lorry tried to undertake me, making me suddenly turn my car so close to the central rail of the dual carriage way just to give him space. He swiped the side of my car with the tail of his lorry as he squeezed past. It wasn't a very strong impact but it shocked me to the core, I didn't manage to note his plate number. He didn't even stop! My side mirror took most of the damage, some scratches on the side of the car and I was fine physically. It could have been worse had I not slowed down and given him room.

So happy to have DH back from his business trip in London yesterday. He's a homebody and I'm a traveller so I am not used to being left behind. In an effort to save some money he decided to take the bus from the northeast to London for the very first time. (He says that would be first and last - he'd rather drive next time). He booked the return trip at 22:00 because he's not sure what time his transaction would finish. But he finished at 1pm! So I went on the website to see if we could change his booking to an earlier bus. Upon finding out that the charge for amending the booking is only £5, I changed it to 4pm. He waited for the email of confirmation to come through so he could have the ticket printed in the Virgin Lounge where he was at the time, only to find out that I changed it to 4pm the NEXT DAY! Oops. I had to call their customer service (premium number ouch) to plead if we could have it changed to 4pm the same day and not the day after, without paying another £5. The lady on the phone was so nice and said she would allow it - only on this occasion. Phew! I saved £5 and other possible expenses if he stayed and waited for his original booking (He was thinking of going to the cinema and or window shopping, and then having another meal. Can you hear the kerchings?) although in reality, I probable have spent a few pounds calling that premium number twice in the process.

On a more positive note, I was so pleased I managed to make my (hopefully) last petrol top up for the month for only 99p a liter last night. It made such a massive difference. £30 nearly filled my petrol tank. Hubby said it's possibly going down even more. Makes a nice change doesn't it?

Today, I am torn between 1) blitzing the house and doing the ironing, 2) Christmas shopping 3) chilling out and doing nothing.

Sorry for the long post. I hope I haven't bored you too much. For somebody who said she's bowing out from this month's challenge, i've got a lot to say. Hahaha. Have a good day everyone.

Ps thrifty sorry to hear about your dilemma at the moment. Hugs! May the chicken pox not dwell too long in your household and not leave too much damage.

The_Only_Girl

Bobarella wrote: »

Well. Downloaded a quiz app on my phone as DS is crazy about quizzes at the moment. Specifically searched for children's quiz apps. Free ones of course. So there we are sat on the bus home from school and we go to take the first quiz. You could have blown my down with a feather when the first question came up and said ' what does libido mean' with options a to d. Queue son asking me in a loud voice what does libido mean mummy?
Face. Palm.

:rotfl: Oh Bob. You must have turned fifty shades of red!

GSRcat

Traveller- I quite often feel like that in those situations. Always have if I'm honest but now I care much less than I used to!

Boberella- that's just weird in this day in age however innocent it may have been.

The only girl- I could have written your post myself. I'm not getting round to posting each day and have so much to deal with at the moment that I am bowing out myself for this month.

The main reason being that I have only been able to make it to 2 NSDs over the course of 15 days due to paying builders and various other things. I'm really unhappy with them because although they have technically finished the main builder "can't get hold" of the flooring guy who knew he was due to come back yet he won't take any responsibility for it, quite frankly I can't be bothered chasing him anymore, there are a few minor things that need finishing but we can do them ourselves, I'm disappointed because they have been unprofessional and taken far too long over our build and have quite frankly taken the mickey. So I'm going to sort a different flooring person out myself, due to the fact that pretty much all building trades shut down in the next few days for Christmas and new year, it's not going to get done until the new year. I'm so upset and angry at this and I haven't got the capacity for anymore chasing.
that said the work done is good and of a high quality, I think we have just been unlucky tbh, hey ho, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

Moving on to the next thing, my mental health isn't great, I'm getting no time to just be, even an hour that isn't sleeping or work due to the fact DH and I are so busy with work. I had a massive meltdown on Saturday which resulted in me calling the Samaritans just so I had someone to talk to as everyone was busy
The lovely lady I spoke to suggested I call my mum as I said I wanted to but didn't want to disturb her at work, I did and she came over and helped me put the tree up for the kids which helped lift my mood.
I still feel pretty worthless though and feel it's best to plod on instead of worrying DH with how I'm feeling because of how stressed he is. Hopefully once the building work is completely finished I will start to feel better about things.
Sorry I've really blurted out loads there! Needed to really! But that's why I'm baling out for now, I'm not able to post each day and I'm failing on the NSDs miserably!
However, I will be making a donation to the Samaritans this month and I will be grateful each day for at least one little thing.

traveller

TOG-I'm glad your ok !!! What a carry on with that lorry! And well done on sending DS on that trip at such short notice. LOL Bob, at the quiz :rotfl: GSR please don't bow out!!! Your in good company here I too don't get any time to just be, but please come on! Take care everyone ,working at the moment but will be back later GSR-No need to apologise, your very brave and your not worthless!!! There are many people you make a difference to many of which you probably don't even know Fmess thanks for your kind words

apple_muncher

GSRcat - sending you a gazillion hugs x

TOG - scary lorry incident. Glad you are ok. Dh had a car do the same to him on the motorway and was shaken for several days. And I think you should email the school about that trip - it is unacceptable to expect that amount of money in such a short time.

dolly84

TOG - glad you are OK. Re the school, surely they must have booked that trip some time ago as the studio tour is bookings only and packed at this time of year.

GSRcat - hugs to you.