22 Foxhole East

f0xh0les

Kerri - cornflour is your friend! fixes everything.

Hi Science_mum - Thank you! Glad some of my ramblings are making sense to someone. MF is the way forward!
DH is well aware he could not afford to pay someone to do all the stuff I do because I am "at home" - makes me sound like a dog with a cone on its neck 'poor Rover is "at home" at the moment. I just get a bit down that we have such majorly different priorities, and that this summer was such a major washout. I never even got near a beach! The kids were happy though.

But I know it wouldn't matter where we went or what we did, DH would be working, or marking, he loves what he does and can't switch off. it is what makes him so good at what he does. Apart from that he hates doing 'kid stuff':rotfl: can't see the point in after school clubs / holiday sports schemes etc.

He must have been so bored as a kid!

I agreed to take another ( working) Mum's kid with us next cross-country session (October) - she can't get to school in time to pick him up as she works in a school nearby. So I am taking him with mine, and she is meeting us on the field. She should just about get there in time to see his race. Shame he missed the first one, the school are not great about letters, they let the kids choose which ones they want to take home!!! so we only found out about cross country the day before it happened.

How they expect working parents to arrange this stuff with less than 48 hours notice is beyond me. The letters requesting payment for school trips always come out in good time though. First week back of primary school was the swimming lessons request, plus 4 after school clubs to choose from, second week back was £10 in school time trips. DS 1 and 2 are already talking about the field trips their teachers are planning for them. It all adds up, plus the pointless meetings for parents to tell us word for word what it says in the powerpoint - with identical handout in case you get amnesia on the way home. Then you get home and they have already emailed you a copy in case you were not there, or due to the amnesia, forgot where you got the handout.

Right, nearly time for bake off, will hoover, and lay the coffee table in readiness. Then hoover again when they all go away.

kerri_gt

Sod's law I'd used the last of my cornflour in the first batch of sauce before I needed to make more. It is on my list of things to restock after today's cookathon. Oh well, I sometimes find that stuff thickens a bit when frozen and recoiled so fingers crossed. Whatever I'm sure it will be perfectly edible, even if it deconstructs into pasta sheets and ragu with a cheesy sauce. Would be charged double for anything deemed thrice cooked or deconstructed in a posh pub.

f0xh0les

I love a lasagne, as usual one kid hates lasagne.
I am sure they get together and draw straws as to who gets to hate which thing. Then they forget, and have to draw lots again - I am sure it is not always the same kid who says they hate ************.

Hillwalker11

A tip for lasagne makers, per a Jamie Oliver recipe. Creme Fraiche makes a good topping.
Doesn't taste very different to a white sauce and is a lot quicker. Plus the consistency is always the same. Worth a try especially when time is a consideration.

in_need_of_direction

I used to have to leave a quarter of the top of my lasagne cheese free for DS. He then went to uni and discovered that he liked cheese!

f0xh0les

We have to do a cheese free half pizza.

DS1 swore blind for years that he hated coconut, until I bought coconut ice cream. Now he loves coconut. He was the same with bananas. unless they were frozen

I think when they were little they managed to confuse I don't want _______, with I don't like ______. Then they remember that they dont like it, when in fact they do, they just didn't fancy it at the time.

They drive me nuts.

I have moved all the mdf sheets that made up DS3s cabin bed, down three flights of stairs, and turned all the mattresses. Knackered.
Found DS1s mattress topper, which in 3 weeks he has managed to turn into the Turin Shroud of LeShire.
It is currently in the washing machine, with a lot of stain remover, and a lot of powder, on pause so it can work its magic. Bleurgh! Then it can go on the line and get bleached back to normality by the sunshine that is supposed to appear this afternoon. It might even be back on the bed by tonight!.

DH is down the road on a training day thing. Hopefully he will be home early.

I also thought I would ring DS1 & 2s school and find out when their open evening is for DS3 to go along and have a look before I sign him up (Oh, school admissions team, go on, deny him a place, I DARE YOU!), which was handy, as it is on Wednesday at 6!

Not a word has been said !! Will tell everyone I meet on the playground for Yr 6 tonight and tomorrow.

Right, off to rescue the poor topper.

f0xh0les

Topper survived. Had to go through the wash 3 times and half a bucket of stain remover. Really should have put it in the bath and just chucked bleach at it. Nearly killed the poor washing machine, the door was bulging and I had to stand with my foot on it to provide resistance.

All kids happy with their mattress toppers and the shapes of their new rooms.

Start of term germ is appearing, 3 down with a sore throat and a bit of a cough. Yeuch. Other people's dirty kid germs!

DH is knocking about the house this morning in an attempt to assuage his guilt about meeting travelling academics in the pub tonight so he will not be home for supper. Meeting people in the pub is not a meeting as far as I am concerned. It is a social.
Nevermind, he gets to miss the football tonight (ha ha ha!) I have a beer free beer in the fridge ready and waiting for 5.55pm, which is a stupid time for a football match, but it is double summertime in Europe innit? so practically 8pm over there.

Going to do some baking today, as the kids demolished every last scrap of everything on Sunday. Greedy hogs. Then they started on my diet ice cream last night. I should have chased them away with a wooden spoon, but hey, it is nice ice cream.

Stupidly busy week with kids Dr appt, eye tests, open days for prosepective secondary schools, and DH is elsewhere for two days being important.
DS3 is going to the same school as DS1 and 2. I can't get him elsewhere, and I would not let him go alone. Still, I think most of his friends are going to that school anyway. I don't expect him to be doing his GCSEs there, as we will be 'elsewhere' by then no doubt. Will go and have a shoofty and let you know.....

f0xh0les

Got back from the school run this morning and DH is bouncing around the living room with excitement...
Two jobs popped up in his inbox this morning.

One in Sheffield, one in Manchester. Both start February 2019...

I have just packed him off to work. He has an insane workload this week, but next week he will be applying for both and pretending he is not nervous, or excited, or waiting.

I would not mind moving back to either of these places.

So doing a little round up of the budget, we have money to replace the roof, and the bathroom. But that would clean us out completely, and DH is too much of a worrier to have less than £5k in the bank, now he has got the 'regular saving' bug.
We have 8 days until payday, and he has over £800 left of his money for the month. After buying DS2 a laptop for his birthday. So really we are doing well and if he would stop buying a mountain of tat every week, we would be doing really well.

So, there you go, if he started in Feb, then we could move at the end of term in July. But he has not even applied, nor been accepted for interview, nor offered a job. But it goes to show there are jobs out there, that he would be excited about, and that would slot in nicely between the end of GCSE's and the start of A levels.

So it is a good job that I have the plan to:
Finish the top floor by October
Finish the middle floor (bar the bathroom ) by November
and the bathroom in December.

So that in the New Year the only things I have to worry about are the ground floor and recarpetting. The mortgage will be down to £999.999.99 so I can overpay as and when I have an excess and no project going.

I am pinning my hopes on him getting one of these jobs.
He loved working in both departments, and they wanted him to stay, but were not offering a permanent position, only the promise of making sure he got any hours going, but nothing guaranteed.
He needed to get that permanent position for his CV. Now he has it.
It has given him some security (which he needs) and he was in a proper bouncy mood this morning. It was nice to see.

PurpleFairy26

f0xh0les wrote: »

So that in the New Year the only things I have to worry about are the ground floor and recarpetting. The mortgage will be down to £999.999.99 so I can overpay as and when I have an excess and no project going.

I am pinning my hopes on him getting one of these jobs.
He loved working in both departments, and they wanted him to stay, but were not offering a permanent position, only the promise of making sure he got any hours going, but nothing guaranteed.
He needed to get that permanent position for his CV. Now he has it.
It has given him some security (which he needs) and he was in a proper bouncy mood this morning. It was nice to see.

HOW much is your mortgage :rotfl:

f0xh0les

oops. So used to it being a 3 figure number, then comma, then three figure number, dot, two figures.

So, for clarification £99,999.99 not £999k because 999 would be an emergency. Obviously:o