22 Foxhole East

VintageHistorian

Congratulations to DS1! I got BCC in 2004 and finished University with a Master's degree in Ancient History. Many students dislike and struggle in school and really find their groove at University.

The Foundation year is a good idea, a lot of students are going to struggle with the jump from A-Levels to University, especially after the year+ that they've just had. Getting back into the swing of learning is hard and a Foundation year can help with that. Hopefully he enjoys himself and settles in fast!

f0xh0les

DS2 got a D in History that he cannot for the life of him understand  (but I wrote 8 pages!!! - yeah, but did you answer the question kid?) an A in Maths, B in all his sciences and essentially C in English  (if you get a C or above you never need do it again was my mantra with him) - the rest were a random assortment of mostly Bs and the odd C so he can go on to his Biology, Chemistry, Criminology A levels and has signed up for college in a fortnight. 

Found his predicted grades email which were pretty much all D's - he is extremely bright, but will not draw attention to himself in a large group, like a classroom of 35. They just did not know what to make of him.

Told the Child Benefit people he is staying in education, did not tell them about DS1 leaving yet, but will once he gets some accommodation. If you tell Child Benefit, they will inform Child Tax Credit (I owe you nuuuuuthing! ).  So that should be fun.

Still waiting on the mystery payment of £350 -£1100 that they wrote to tell me they might owe me at a future date, sometime to come, maybe.

Not going to apply for the charity job - they have included Van Driving in the job spec, not there the last 2  times they advertised it, and I may be many things, but I ain't no van driver. Not when they have sent someone off on a 120 mile+ round trip this month.  So I am turning my back on that one.  It is written in the job description, they mean it to happen.

To the untrained eye, it may look like I am sitting on the sofa, drinking coffee, but in reality I am drying laundry on the line, I am dyeing my dress sunflower yellow ( paid with survey vouchers - no real money changed hands), and I have put the kids on warning that I am coming upstairs to their bedrooms as soon as their dad gets out of his pit, and hoovering  (and dusting - shock horror!!) will occur.

I have no money (if the kids phone bills come out over the weekend, it will leave me with £0.06 in the bank.   Luckily Child Benefit comes in on Monday - I completely overextended myself on the mortgage overpayment this month. 

Well, I mean I still have sixpence so maybe I have just budgeted extremely well. ??

The pantry is full of food, the fridge looks like a greengrocer's shop, the fruit bowl is practically obscene in its decadence, and the freezer appears to be full of bags of spinach  and pots of blueberries (4 at the last count, but I fear they breed in the darkness). So nothing to complain about.

I want to go blackberry picking this weekend.  It is my reward for doing as much cleaning and clearing of the house today as I can.  So there.

What are you up to?

kerri_gt

Well done DS2 - he's got into college to do what he wants and that's the main thing.
I remember when I was doing my A-Levels there was one class with a particularly overpowering clique 'It girls' so I just didn't bother engaging in class because I didn't want to be ridiculed by them (I was not in the It girl group by any means). Hopefully at college he'll have a fresh start, smaller classes? and find he's more able to openly participate. 

Well done on the food stocks - I had a great Olio haul the other day, 8 rolls, 2 pretzels, 5 pastries, bag of radishes, iceberg lettuce and two mini watermelons - nothing at all wrong with any of them. Such food waste it's criminal (not that I was complaining!)

I'm itching to go blackberry picking too - up to the last few from last year's stock so need to replenish for the winter like a squirrel. 

f0xh0les

In the last week  I got rid of two frogs that have squatted on my list for so so long. 

1) Candles made ready for winter - refound my lovely coppery/brass metal bowl that came to me 20+ years ago with a huge 3 wick candle in it, so made a new one, and used up all the odds and sods of candle ends to make new  smaller ones in other containers.  Lighting a candle or two in the living room in the evening can put back the date the heating gets put on by a week or two without a certain gentleman complaining bitterly about his bits falling off from cold. -  The one good thing about him going back to work on site is that I will not have to have the whole house heated during the day. My heating bill more than doubled with him in the house.

2) The dress is slightly more 'wasp' than 'sunflower' at present - will see how it looks when it is dry, but the dye took fantastically and it looks like a totally new dress - the discolouration has not come through at all.  Whether it was deodorant, sunblock, or whatever, it has worked brilliantly. The dress is also more than 10 years old and going strong. I baulked at spending £80 on it (for a wedding) but it has paid for itself so many times over.

Top floor cleaned, hoovered, damp dusted, one chest of drawers sorted and too small clothes removed.  All beds changed (huge pile of laundry downstairs now) and will do one more chest of drawers before making lunch - very simple today, garlic cream cheese with a jar of garlic stuffed olives stirred through a packet of spaghetti and served over rocket salad and 2 bake in the oven baguettes. 15 minutes from start to table.

Best get on.....

Deni_debt-free_dreamer

can i come for lunch please f0xh0les as that sounds yummy!

Failing that, i will copy that idea for sure

I have been WfH this morning but on A/L this afternoon.  Was going to visit DD2 at her uni house but she is likely working late so we wouldn't have had much time together (i'd have still gone though  ) So i have an unexpectedly free afternoon..... Going to pull some weeds out the garden to keep it tidy and go to greengrocers and zero waste shop - how exciting!!

Deni x

f0xh0les

DS1 has had confirmation of his maintenance loan.  The housing office have said they will contact him to offer him a place (probably Mon/Tues) or if they run out of accommodation, they will point him in the right direction for private rentals.  So he has done all he can do (except for not applying in June), and now we wait.

Going to blitz the ground floor tomorrow after taking DS2 out for his eye test (I take him, they prescribe glasses, we pick up the glasses, flippin boy does not wear the glasses) and hopefully this time he will wear them.  Will have a quick whizz round the charity shops and see if I can find a blazer in the right size for ds3, I have the 2 sizes above him, but not the one we need. Also missing school trousers in the right sizes.  All very odd. Plenty of shirts though! 

crazy_cat_lady

Hey f0xh0les
Just catching up after being MIA for months. Well done to both of your boys. They both passed everything (no matter what your dh says) and the results are the stepping stone to get them where they need to be next. They have both gotten to where they want to be next so that's fab.
Also noticed that you discovered the joy of C00plands whilst 'oop north'. That's where my dd works - and it's absolutely no surprise at all that my weight has rocketed since she started working there. They do an absolutely beautiful (but not vegan unfortunately) mini victoria sponge.

f0xh0les

Ooooh 'eck MIL is on the war path again.

Not seen them in 2 years (f-i-l was ill, then we lived in Covid Ground Zero - so obviously our fault), they are currently wandering around  Europe with their dd, and announced they do not want to come at Oct half term after all (the relative she really wanted to visit is going away that week) - and they realised DS1 will be at Uni by then, so they want to come sooner, not for a short visit ( 3-4 days), she wants a long visit (undisclosed amount of time but more than a week seems to be on the cards).  

DH will be working 9-4.30 in the back room, the school starts back in ten days, and I have the most god-awful feeling the doorbell is going to go the week after next and they are just going to be standing there  on the doorstep shouting 'Surprise!!' and then being offended because DH will have to work - he is presenting at conferences, and the kids will be back at school, and I will be expected to entertain them again.

She honestly has the idea in her head that her family should be like The Waltons, and everyone gets together for Sunday lunch and shares a Summer House by the lake with all the children.  Deluded flippin' nutjobs.  Not even seen s-i-l for 5 years as Burma, Japan, Madagascar, and the islands in the Caribbean are much sexier holiday destinations than the East Midlands - and she has some very sexy bikinis. But we are the bad guys for not going to see her in the land of Alpine Goatherds.

Let's face it, whatever happens they are going to be disappointed. I am going to have to listen to them bleat on about how s-i-l has not yet found the right man and what a great pain and sadness that is to them that she will not give them the granddaughter they really want, and what a fantastic lifestyle she has, living all alone, travelling the world, having pots and pots of lovely money, and a cat that hates her so much it still p1sses on her bed  if she leaves her bedroom door open, and attacks her - it has been a ten year war of attrition .

While I smile sweetly, and fantasize about putting arsenic in m-i-l's cinnamon and turmeric herbal infusion, and wonder if 7pm is too early to claim exhaustion and a need to be naked, horizontal, and not in their company.  Last time I did go and hide, she came and found me, and lay on the bed next to me - luckily that time I was not naked (I am sure you were wondering).

Right, need to pull up my big girl pants and just accept, and endure, and make a mental note to marry an orphan next time.

kerri_gt

Oh god, is there enough time to move and not leave  forwarding address maybe? Failing that join a cult, or a convent...although i fear the latter may be too late and not entirely practical?

VintageHistorian

I was wondering, thank you for confirming it wasn't the case, but it wouldn't have surprised me.