The long haul supporters thread...

Happytogetdebtfree

haha ahh poor babe... im just watching bb who goes you decide lol xx

climbintheladderouttadebt

Sunfleur - hope you & DH have enjoyed the time together? We've been watching DVDs & playing monopoly & we couldnt be happier! lol. Bedroom was rearrranged today & we suddenly have tons more space, its a great feeling! Kids room cleared out a bit more. A day or 2 selling on ebay maybe coming up now!
Have you got any tips on which fruit & veg freeze best? Thats exactly what I plan to do but having tried it with raspberries n strawberries once, which went all soggy, I gave up!
mmm dinner sounded lovely may I steal the recipe for my little book please?! lol

Baby due in 4 weeks, this is number 2, & the last! I have been in a lot of pain & discomfort since yesterday (lots of hot baths & laying around has helped tho!) & have struggled to keep my cool with our daughter - she's 3 & an angel but rather hyper at times! OH just takes over, lets me relax etc. even rant n rave if I need to, then sits there a lil scared! lol
(He's currently playing with the Toy Story 3 figures his mum bought for him!)

Happy - congrats on the big chunk off your debt! We paid OH's credit card today, all £400-odd & now he owes no money, unlike me! We opened a wedding savings account too, I feel very grown-up! lol. How's BB going? I gave up on it all after the first night all those weirdos put me off! Is it any good?

Hi Poorbabe! Great news on the payrise, especially in this climate! Budgeting is very hard (having my daughter was a huge shock to me & my OH!) I still struggle a little some months now & I'm rubbish at maths so that doesn't help!
Have given some thought to your living situation, &cto be honest I don't know much but agree with Happy. Hope you used your clubcard to get those extra points?

Soma have you talked with OH yet? Wish I'd done so sooner, he'd offered help 12 months ago but being stubborn I refused, now I realise how much better off we'd be if I'd not been so determined to handle it myself, & it's brought us closer together.

CLOD

sunfleur

Happytogetdebtfree wrote: »

Morning all, i have updated my sig just a mini payment for me today to the virgin cc, but every payment makes a difference.
Hi soma, good luck at discussing with oh, hi poor babe glad your feeling good about things..... keep up the positives and have a good day all xxx

Yay:T that number is coming down....... It's good to be alive! Well done Happy keep it up.

sunfleur

poorbabe wrote: »

Well I've had a good day. I didn't buy the vacuum cleaner in the end but I did buy a frying pan a glass measuring jug in Tesco and a windup radio instead To be fair, with the exception of the radio, the others had been on my 'need' list for a few months.

Wine and chocolate mini-rolls now :beer:

LOL Just wondering if the frying pan and jug would help with the hoovering........ Do the chocolate mini-rolls taste good dipped in the wine LOL Actually a new frying pan is also on my list as there is no non-stick left on the non-stick frying pans I have LOL

sunfleur

climbintheladderouttadebt wrote: »

Sunfleur - hope you & DH have enjoyed the time together? We've been watching DVDs & playing monopoly & we couldnt be happier! lol. Bedroom was rearrranged today & we suddenly have tons more space, its a great feeling! Kids room cleared out a bit more. A day or 2 selling on ebay maybe coming up now!
Have you got any tips on which fruit & veg freeze best? Thats exactly what I plan to do but having tried it with raspberries n strawberries once, which went all soggy, I gave up!
mmm dinner sounded lovely may I steal the recipe for my little book please?! lol

Baby due in 4 weeks, this is number 2, & the last! I have been in a lot of pain & discomfort since yesterday (lots of hot baths & laying around has helped tho!) & have struggled to keep my cool with our daughter - she's 3 & an angel but rather hyper at times! OH just takes over, lets me relax etc. even rant n rave if I need to, then sits there a lil scared! lol
(He's currently playing with the Toy Story 3 figures his mum bought for him!)
CLOD

Hi Climin

Of course you can use the recipe did I put enough info down for you to follow or would you like a PM with most of the recipe? Unless anyone else wants it then I will put it as a post but I don't want to clog up the list with recipes so let me know.

I remember what it was like 4 weeks before my DD was born - I just gave up work and thought I would get 4 weeks to relax.... Huh! One week later I was in hospital with high blood pressure - kept in a week on total bedrest, induced then stayed in two more weeks with DD having problems! I had never stayed in hospital before that time and felt really weird when I came out. BUT it's not going to be like that for you LOL My DD loves lego too and I got her the 'free' little pieces from the Mirror the other weekend that was advertised on here for Toy Story III.

You can freeze most vegetables, peas, sweetcorn and french beans I always have in the freezer - I'm not that keen on frozen carrots although they freeze well enough I prefer them fresh - if you grew them you can usually just pick them out of the ground when you want them and they can stay in the ground for a long time or you can store them in boxes of sand and they will stay perfectly OK until you need them. You can also freeze brocolli, cabbage and other veg - usually after blanching in boiling water for a few minutes, things like courgettes and aubergines etc I'm not sure about freezing as they are softer although I have never done it or looked into it. Fruit - Strawberries are the only one that do tend to go to mush but you can freeze them if you want to have them in some mushy way after freezing. Raspberries freeze really well but you have to lay them out on a little flat tray individually without covering them up and let them freeze individually then when they are frozen put them all in a bag. They defrost really well and you can use them as normal. You can buy frozen raspberries all year round too. Apples are better not frozen although not sure if they can be frozen after peeling and cutting - I know they tend to go brown once peeled but they are better made into an apple sauce or slightly cooked with lemon then you can freeze them ready for apple pie or whatever. Lots of other fruit can also be frozen.

I recently learned that you can even freeze cheese although it is better if it is grated cheese as blocks can tend to crumble a bit after freezing. You can also freeze milk although full-fat isn't as good as semi-skimmed or skimmed to freeze and it's best to take some out of the top of 2/4 and 6 pint bottles to allow for expansion. Bread I freeze all the time but it's best if you can allow some time for it to defrost as if you microwave defrost and it goes too long it can get a little hard sometimes. Meals that you batch-cook in advance can either be defrosted then cooked or cooked from frozen. There is so much information available on the internet about all of this too. Just type in Google or whatever web browser you use and put How to freeze ...... or freezing food or whatever and loads of answers will be at your fingertips. One thing I started last year was making my own chicken stock and ham stock. After using a whole roast chicken on Sundays I would just chuck the full carcass and any bits of chicken left on it into the slow cooker with lots of water, an onion peeled and chopped, some celery, a couple of carrots and possibly some herbs and leave it overnight on low. Then sieve everything down and freeze the stock in either small containers after you find out how much they hold and/or ice cube blocks. These can then be used from frozen in all sorts of dishes including a fab chicken soup.

Sorry if this was too long for everyone.....

climbintheladderouttadebt

WOW thank you for the tips sunfleur! Shall be getting the fresh raspberries to freeze then, along with some milk, bread, carrots (am trying to do all fresh fruit & veg & essentials). My slow cooker hasn't seen the light of day for a long time so I look forward to trying some casseroles, stocks etc.
I'll check out the butchers for good quality meat like mince (we've got 1 round the corner luckily). I wish we could grow veg etc in the garden but we're in a block of flats & the neighbours are very...difficult to please shall we say?! lol. Will have a try grating & freezing cheese, too. This is all so handy, thank you!
What temp do you cook the wraps at & for how long? Am going to find a recipe online for guacamole to use in the wraps and experiment with chicken etc.

Soma

morning
thanks for the tips sunfleur. I've already tried freezing grated lactose free cheese in portions and it worred really well and made it last a lot longer. Off to London today so won't be posting for a little while.

sunfleur

climbintheladderouttadebt wrote: »

What temp do you cook the wraps at & for how long? Am going to find a recipe online for guacamole to use in the wraps and experiment with chicken etc.

When I made the wrap layers (Wrap/chilli sauce/mince mixture/cheese/sour cream/wrap etc - I put four wraps in alltogether) I just bunged it in at gas mark 7 which is a medium to high heat - sorry don't know what it is in electric temps but you can get the conversion - and it was in about 20 minutes covered with foil so as to not burn the top layer of cheese then another 15 minutes without a cover, and I put it into a pyrex casserole dish - until you can see all the sauce/cheese mixture bubbling and the cheese on top is lovely and brownish. When you are cutting it when it is done it behaves itself quite well and doesn't tend to fall apart. If you are cooking it with less layers I suspect it won't take so long - just see if it is hot enough.

sunfleur

climbintheladderouttadebt wrote: »

WOW thank you for the tips sunfleur! carrots (am trying to do all fresh fruit & veg & essentials).

As a PS If you do want to freeze a glut of low priced veg make sure they are 'healthy' as in no bad bits on them and for most veg you treat the prep the same - put them peeled and chopped how you want them into boiling water for about 3-4 minutes - no more - salted or not as you prefer - then quickly put them into a colandar and doosh them in cold water to get them as cold as possible as quickly as possible - then bag/box and freeze.

sunfleur

Didn't want a fuss made but it was my birthday yesterday. Because of MOT costing £342 didn't go where we wanted to for the day so we went somewhere nearer (a National Trust property) and a friend (and family) invited us to their house and cooked a birthday tea for me, DH and DD - including a cake with only one candle or there would have been a forest fire! The day wasn't too bad. I think I got the least amount of cards ever though LOL MIL didn't sent me one - first time in 23 years! I got two from close friends, one from DH (home-made) and DD (also home-made by DH so impressive) and one from Step DD. That was it impressive for 47! I did get early call from one of my brothers from Aus and a song.... The rest of my family - not a chance LOL

The point of this post LOL is that we still managed to spend £25 and this was us being extremely careful about what we bought/spent. I made a lovely packed lunch and we used our electric coolbox so everything was nice and fresh. When we looked back over the day it really didn't take much to spend any amount of money on really very small items - mostly for DD despite the fact that we didn't have to pay to get in (NT memberships). We are really watching what we do spend very, very carefully and are now changing the way we think about stuff we wouldn't really think too much about before. I'm not saying we would buy any old tat before but when we think about it a lot of it were not good 'happys'. Happys are what my American friends call little incidentals and things that are attractive but wouldn't really make any difference to your life if you didn't have them. Now I want REAL Happys - something to make a difference and that you can treasure. This doesn't mean we can't have 'pretty' things but I want what I buy to have a proper effect on my life. I have always been a 'practical' gal and now I'm just getting mingy with my money LOL (NOT a bad thing in my estimation and considering the situation..:rotfl:

Sorry guys too philosophical for a Saturday? Must be the age.....