22 Foxhole East

f0xh0les

Thanks redofromstart I have absolutely no idea, but at least I can plan for another tight month. If it does come out of the end of March pay cheque it is not a problem as the kids 5% interest accounts will have matured and I will have a fat wad of cash waiting to be drip fed back into their regular savers. We won't starve.

The eldest two have barking coughs now, and #3 is starting too. Lemon-flavour-paracetamol-based-drink-sachets will not last long with 2 of them necking them. Will have to pick up more today or tomorrow.

I have caved and allowed DS2 to go on his school residential trip to Devon (or somewhere) in June. £320, but it will do him good to realise not everyone has the quality of parents he has.

DS1 was actually shocked when he went on his, not only at what his friends did not know how to do for themselves, but what they ate or had never eaten before, and he came back with a bit more appreciation for us. Which was nice, it doesn't last long, but it made him much more aware he is definitely not hard done by. The thought of not knowing what an aubergine or avocado or (shock horror) an artichoke was. He is still traumatised his best friend has never eaten a walnut or an olive (his mum tried one once and was not impressed). His lunch is a constant source of amazement. Nearly every day he comes home with a new thing Tom has never eaten. The boy is 15! and totally averse to trying anything new. He also thinks that anything with a YS is 40 seconds away from mouldy.
Poor thing must be horrified by DS1s tales of my thriftiness. Must think I am a total nutter. I hate to think what he tells his parents about his best friend's Mum. Oh well.:rotfl:

f0xh0les

Welcome to February!

DS 3 is 10 today, he has a football kit, goalie gloves, boots, an ice cream ball thing, a couple of T Shirts and books and money. He can't complain!

He has requested a peanut butter and jelly cake. So I have made two victoria sponges, so 4 layers, made a peanut butter icing and will alternately sandwich jam and peanut butter cream to make a tall cake. Not sure I have candles though - good job I thought to post this or I would have made a major error!

It is a Chinese Takeaway for tea tonight. I make the rice at home so it is just the main courses we buy, should be about the £20-£25 mark.
He has 2 friends coming over to play tomorrow morning around 9.30, so that should keep him happy.

No further painting has been done, but what has been done looks marvellous, I will get on with it next week.

I paid all my outgoings first this month. Which makes me nervous as I worry I will end up being short. Silly really, I have a credit card for emergencies.

Bob the boiler man came and serviced my boiler, I have a crack in my probe (!) apparently, so I need to be aware of it, but it is still working and so we are hoping and keeping our fingers crossed my end does not drop off.

Recycled some old bits of the kids to the foundation stage (nursery) at school. A few very cute badger/ raccoon / squirrel glove puppets, and a couple of old rolls of wallpaper that just turned up in the post one day. They draw and paint on the back of them, so that counts as recycling and charity as far as I am concerned.

I feel like there is something that I should be doing, but I have no idea what it is.
I went to Aldi on the way back from school
picked up DHs dry cleaning,
made the birthday cake
made the icing
rang step-gran to make sure she is behaving herself
Checked the diary - there is nothing in there.

Oh well, it will either be remembered or not.

Birthdays tend to throw me, and it takes a day or so to get back into the routine.
There is only one week left until half term - then routine will be well and truly out of the window.

apple_muncher

Happy birthday to ds3!:bdaycake::bdaycake: 2 cakes = 10 candles - hope you found enough real ones.

f0xh0les

Hooray for Wilko
I was going to go to £land but found them for 75p instead.

Still no idea what it was that I feel I was supposed to be doing.

kerri_gt

Happy Birthday DS3. That cake sounds amazing.

Your story about DS1 reminds me of my parents taking myself and my best friend out for dinner when we were about 5/6yrs old. My mum was so used to passing me the menu to make my choice she was genuinely shocked when she realised my friend couldn't read it.

f0xh0les

Well they came for 4 hours and then went.
I think they must have dusted bits of the house, as they spent 2 hours playing hide and seek before they discovered the NERF guns. DS3's friends are the oldest in their houses, so do not have the benefit of two bigger brothers' hand-me-down weapons. Poor DS4 came off worst (of course, the smallest usually does). But they all seem to have had a good time and I did LM sausage rolls, chips and beans for 8 ( 8!!! I had to stick the extra leaf in the table!).

DS3 is now knackered, they must have been up and down my stairs a hundred times each.

Supper will be reheated left over chinese takeaway from last night. Can't be faffed with anything else.

f0xh0les

Morning!

Had to get out of bed at 6.30 as my face hurts it is all sinus / mouth / throat/ ears related. Having 2nd lemon-flavoured-paracetamol-based-drink of the day.

Ouch!

Will do a little light baking and laundry and spend the day drinking hot drinks and quietly asking the kids to do their homework. Ok, quietly begging them to do their homework.

DS1 and DH are off to the Workshop of Games to play with their tiny men.

Did I mention my face hurts? at least I have Endeavour to look forward to at 8

apple_muncher

Get well soon. In my pre-coeliac days I used to get rotten sinus infections and found that avoiding wheat and sugar, and bananas (?!) too, plus drinking copious quantities of water (4l+) helped alleviate them.

Hope the kids are cooperative...

badmemory

Not medical advice obviously, but have you tried ice packs on the sinus, it shrinks the inflamation and (sorry if this is TMI) allows the gunk to move, with the steam giving it an extra incentive.

f0xh0les

Thanks, copious amounts of hot tea help, as does chewing, there is nothing there really to shift, it just feels like the inside of my face has been sand blasted. But only on one side. It will probably be gone tomorrow and was my pathetic excuse at trying to come down with this cold everyone seems to have. Luckily I am most rubbish at catching stuff and am never really down for more than a day.

I knocked up a tray of peanut butter flapjacks, a pizza dough and a pizza sauce in the allocated half hour in the kitchen while making bacon sandwiches for the kids for lunch. They don't need a full cooked meal twice a day. They are spoilt.

They can have pesto pasta in their lunchboxes tomorrow. I can't be motivated to make pasties tonight. I reserve the right to be rubbish for the day.