Finally Debt Free After 34 Years, But Still Need to Live Frugally

foxgloves

I'm sure your decorations. a nice sit down by the fire & a good book are just exactly what you need, HHoD. That's what I'm going to do shortly (minus the decorations, although I have filled the advent calendar pockets today) & I haven't had nearly such a trying week as you/
Be kind to yourself. We all have bad days at work sometimes. We learn from them & hopefully we move on. Sometimes the 'thing' we learn may just be 'it is what it is' & there's no need to beat ourselves up about it. I encountered many difficult & troubled children & young people when I was working. Sometimes they could be so sweet & lovely, obviously craving adult attention. Other times, they went beyond any sense of acceptable behaviour. This was never as a result of anything I had done, said or left undone, simply that they often had very chaotic & difficult home lives with few meaningful boundaries & I think in some cases, also undiagnosed mental health issues. While I did work with schools, I didn't work IN schools for more than a half day or day at a time, & I did often think about the trials teachers must have been undergoing on a daily basis with some of these kids. They had so much going on n their lives, including stuff that they shouldn't have had to be dealing with at such a young age, that I think their heads were like pressure cookers. 
Just keep telling yourself that it isn't you. These children will always exist.
F xx

doingitanyway

Be careful how you lift. So easy to hurt your back. Take care.

milann

At school we see part of the child’s life....we will never fully know what influences they are exposed to and we can do the best we can at the time. What works one day with a child won’t necessarily work the following day or with another child.Be kind to yourself Hairy and remember the children haven’t read the rule book so don’t always behave the way we want them to.
Have a lovely weekend snuggled up with your book in the glow of your Christmas decorations 🎄🎄

HairyHandofDartmoor

foxgloves said:

I'm sure your decorations. a nice sit down by the fire & a good book are just exactly what you need, HHoD. That's what I'm going to do shortly (minus the decorations, although I have filled the advent calendar pockets today) & I haven't had nearly such a trying week as you/
Be kind to yourself. We all have bad days at work sometimes. We learn from them & hopefully we move on. Sometimes the 'thing' we learn may just be 'it is what it is' & there's no need to beat ourselves up about it. I encountered many difficult & troubled children & young people when I was working. Sometimes they could be so sweet & lovely, obviously craving adult attention. Other times, they went beyond any sense of acceptable behaviour. This was never as a result of anything I had done, said or left undone, simply that they often had very chaotic & difficult home lives with few meaningful boundaries & I think in some cases, also undiagnosed mental health issues. While I did work with schools, I didn't work IN schools for more than a half day or day at a time, & I did often think about the trials teachers must have been undergoing on a daily basis with some of these kids. They had so much going on n their lives, including stuff that they shouldn't have had to be dealing with at such a young age, that I think their heads were like pressure cookers. 
Just keep telling yourself that it isn't you. These children will always exist.
F xx

Thanks Foxgloves .

milann said:

At school we see part of the child’s life....we will never fully know what influences they are exposed to and we can do the best we can at the time. What works one day with a child won’t necessarily work the following day or with another child.Be kind to yourself Hairy and remember the children haven’t read the rule book so don’t always behave the way we want them to.
Have a lovely weekend snuggled up with your book in the glow of your Christmas decorations 🎄🎄

Thanks Milann

doingitanyway said:

Be careful how you lift. So easy to hurt your back. Take care.
Thanks DIA . I'll try to be careful.

HairyHandofDartmoor

I had a good weekend where I put up some Christmas decorations 🎄 and did housework on Saturday, and did ironing, more washing and relaxing on Sunday. I did feel more rested after that and my cold is nearly gone.

I had a pleasant day at school on Monday in the nice class, only  marred by a boy coming up to me at hometime and saying he'd accidentally done a poo in his pants  😱. I had to laugh at lunchtime when I saw a boy eating a satsuma sandwich 😂, he'd rejected the frankfurter on offer and put his satsuma inside his bread roll instead 🤣.

Today I was in the rowdy class, but I persuaded the tricky boy to do all his work and he only had one meltdown. I was chatting to his usual TA after school yesterday and it sounds like he behaves just as badly with her, so that made me feel more confident today 🙂. The shops near the school have put up Christmas decorations 🎅 and the children were pleased to see them and we also saw a truck full of Christmas trees parked by the florist🎄. 

It's pay day tomorrow, whoopee 🎉🎉🎉, and I need to think about Christmas presents now I can afford to buy them. Stepdad wants a charity donation instead of a present and lots of family live elsewhere. I don't want to buy a load of presents and then have to spend £4 each on posting them, so I'm thinking of vouchers from the rainforest people as they sell a numerous range of items and I'm always pleased to receive one if I get given one. We had a relative who used to give DH and I whsmth vouchers a few years ago which were useless to me as I never buy anthing there, but it got worse as they then started to give appel vouchers and I don't have an appel product so that was even worse. The moral of this tale is to give vouchers that you know a person likes, or if you don't know what they like give money or a rainforest voucher to give them a wider choice.

I've asked the DS1 and DS3 to give me their Christmas lists. DS2 always wants a surprise though so we do need to put some thought into that 🤔. I have plenty of Christmas gift wrap for the presents of the people I live with, plenty of cards and even a box of crackers which were all bought in the January sales last year 😇. I'll start making some lists at the weekend so I can get myself organised. 

I've no idea if we'll see stepdad and new wife this Christmas as I don't know what the rules are going to be or whether they will feel it's safe to see me as I work in a school. It might be safer to meet them for a socially distanced walk rather than have a meal together indoors, but we'll have to wait and see nearer the time 🤔. I don't like not having plans this close to Christmas 😐.

The vaccine news keeps getting better and better so I have real hopes that life could be back to normal by the Summer 🎉🎉🎉. It was a real worry that we might have to live with these restrictions for the rest of our lives, so it's a massive relief that the vaccines seem to be so effective. I hope DH will be near the front of the queue as he's in a high risk group due to his diabetes and his weight, although he is only 58 so theoretically he may have to wait a while. It depends upon how they work out the system 🤔. Judging by the mess the government have made of everything else the system may not be as well thought out as it should be 🙄.

I hope everyone is having a good Tuesday so far 🙂.

Sun_Addict

I’m also hoping we’ll be back to normal by the summer too. I can’t wait to see the back of face masks, Covid posters and 2m distance markers. It’s a pain not being able to make plans for Christmas, hopefully we should know more later in the week.

Your school stories are so funny, satsuma sandwich 😆 

Willowtree222

Here's another hoping for a normal summer. 
I think your DH should be up there but like you said, Who knows!
Not sure how you deal with the children you do. I'd be running if one told me he'd done a poo in his pants. X

HairyHandofDartmoor

Sun_Addict said:

I’m also hoping we’ll be back to normal by the summer too. I can’t wait to see the back of face masks, Covid posters and 2m distance markers. It’s a pain not being able to make plans for Christmas, hopefully we should know more later in the week.

Your school stories are so funny, satsuma sandwich 😆 

Nicnak said:

Here's another hoping for a normal summer. 
I think your DH should be up there but like you said, Who knows!
Not sure how you deal with the children you do. I'd be running if one told me he'd done a poo in his pants. X

I also had to fish a pencil sharpener out of one of the toilets 😱 (it's lucky I've got rubber gloves), the culprit said it accidentally fell out of his pocket. Hmmm 🤨🤔🙄.

beanielou

HairyHandofDartmoor said:

Sun_Addict said:

I’m also hoping we’ll be back to normal by the summer too. I can’t wait to see the back of face masks, Covid posters and 2m distance markers. It’s a pain not being able to make plans for Christmas, hopefully we should know more later in the week.

Your school stories are so funny, satsuma sandwich 😆 

Nicnak said:

Here's another hoping for a normal summer. 
I think your DH should be up there but like you said, Who knows!
Not sure how you deal with the children you do. I'd be running if one told me he'd done a poo in his pants. X

I also had to fish a pencil sharpener out of one of the toilets 😱 (it's lucky I've got rubber gloves), the culprit said it accidentally fell out of his pocket. Hmmm 🤨🤔🙄.

🤣🤣🤣🤣

milann

What are the festivities like at school this year? I’m missing being there at this time of year as the Christmas productions, parties and carol concerts usually make for a lovely atmosphere. I’m presuming with no singing and no bubble bursting it’ll be a very different scenario this year even if I was there. 

The vaccine news is very encouraging- hopefully we will see things change sooner rather than later.🤞🤞🤞
Fishing things out of toilets reminded me of a little one I used to work with in nursery - she used to throw her glasses and hearing aids down the loo at every opportunity . We had to watch her like a hawk....in the end her mum stopped sending her hearing aids and her glasses had a strap around them to help keep them on😂😂😂😂 i often wonder if she ever got used to wearing her hearing aids as she grew older 😂😂😂