One income family of four - can we get ahead even after pay cuts?

MagicCat

Sorry, throwing not growing 

Bluegreen143

Thanks @MagicCat! Faded page sounds fab, will check it out & thanks for the reminder re the library ebooks - I do borrow these for myself but haven’t yet for the kids. 

Busy day in the kitchen:

- hummus
- loaf of sourdough
- chocolate beetroot cake (annoyingly put this in my silicon loaf tin I forgot I hate, so the shape is awful & I burnt it a bit - middle tastes amazing though so defo one I’ll do again 😂)

Lunch was tuna pasta, dinner was veg & chickpea curry with rice and homemade pakora. Curry was so-so, pakora were fab. Monkey literally only ate about a teaspoonful of rice and a nibble of pakora before pronouncing himself done 🙄 oh well, he’s eaten well the rest of the day. 

Need to get back on putting the effort into curries. The problem is I’ve been making them very mild and bland and sweet lately so the kids eat them. But then they aren’t really eating them anyway. So think I need to scrap that and go back to making proper flavourful/aromatic (but not fiery) curries and mix theirs with a bit of yoghurt before serving. 

No spends today. This morning we took the kids to a sandy beach & woodland park that’s on the banks of the Clyde. Never been there before but friends have been raving as it’s the closest sandy beach any of us know about it (we are about an hour away from the seaside and all the bits near us for paddling in the river are stoney, not sandy). The kids loved it so much! They were paddling (in their waterproofs and wellies as it wasn’t very warm today), making sandcastles, digging holes in the sand etc, content for ages. They’ve only just lifted the 5 mile rule for traveling in Scotland so it’s been a killer not getting to the beach at all with the hot, sunny spring we had. Hoping we can get to seaside before Red goes back to work but at least this beach was a fun alternative today 🙂

Bluegreen143

No spends today! We are down to 1/4 tank of petrol in the car though so unsure if it will last... amazing how quickly I am starting to get into habits of driving daily again now we are allowed to. Partly cos I’ve been really enjoying taking the kids for outdoor adventures a bit further afield. And partly getting lazy! I drove them to a community green space that’s a mile away today whereas we were walking to it during full lockdown. It was in the afternoon and I wasn’t sure there was enough time to walk there, play and walk back before dinner. But during lockdown I would have gone to the local, perfectly good park instead in that case.

Sitting doing some planning tonight. Meal plans/Tesco order, plus making some lists of housework and routines. Wanting to ease into a better morning routine before nursery restarts and Red goes back to work. He leaves the house about 7.30am and then we need to leave 8-8.30am for nursery depending on the start time, which nursery haven’t confirmed yet. Needless to say during the last four months we have not been up, dressed, breakfasted and ready to go by 8.30 any morning 😅

joedenise

Definitely a good idea to get back into the habit of making sure everyone is ready by 8.30 before nursery restarts.  Routine is so important when you have little ones.  I'm sure you'll soon get into the swing of it again.

Bluegreen143

@joedenise oh totally agree, we love a routine here! Though it hasn’t involved getting out early we have still been following a pretty strict routine all through lockdown - I even had it written on the fridge for the first few weeks so my husband could learn it (as obviously before furlough he wasn’t as familiar with the kids’ routines). 

At the minute it’s up by 7.30, kids play & get dressed, breakfast about 8, housework while they play & I’ll get showered etc. Usually go for a walk most mornings (or meet friends at the park now we can). Home for lunch at 12, kids play in the garden while we do a tidy up, little one down for her nap about 1. 

During her nap I try to have some special time with the big one (baking, reading, activities) then he will play by himself (doing things like Lego that his sister disrupts) or listen to audiobooks or help his daddy in the garden while I have some chill out time/get stuff done. 

Little one is up by 3, snack about 3.30 and if we have gone out in the morning we generally we hang out in the garden most afternoons. Sometimes there is painting, reading, playdough, getting them involved in planting etc, otherwise they just run about feral for an hour or two while we do stuff in the garden or kitchen 😂 5pm is tidy up time where they have to tidy away their toys and they get to watch an hour of TV before dinner. Dinner at 6, bath/stories/bed and lights out by 7.30.

This is literally our day every day and at the moment it’s quite chilled as us adults trade off on watching the kids but obviously I’m soon to lose that help! And it will need to change quite a bit when Monkey is at nursery 9-12.30. Poor Bambi won’t know what to do with herself without her brother every morning and I will need to change our walks/park visits to the afternoon sometimes or else Monkey will always miss out. I’m glad nursery is restarting to give him that structure and socialisation but if I could I’d just keep him with me, I’m such a softie & love us all being at home 😂 his nursery is term time only so it’s reopening 12th Aug which is when terms starts here in Scotland - not long to go.

joedenise

You'll soon get back into the swing of things.  I agree about Bambi missing Monkey when he goes back to nursery but you can use that time to spend time with the little one.  My two were similar ages to yours and they do miss the older one to start with but soon get used to being on their own with you.  Bambi will probably quite happily "help" you with the dusting etc!

Monkey probably needs the structure of nursery after all this time at home.  I think you're probably doing the right thing by keeping him at nursery a little longer.  Not long until the new routine gets worked out.

Bluegreen143

Bit of a mixed day today. Pouring rain all day and both myself and Red were suffering a bit from cabin fever I think. We had a few disagreements last night while finalising the Tesco order. Think he’s feeling constrained this month re not spending freely. We will go over this month on groceries as I agreed to add in some of the bits he wanted- it’s all good though, it’s still less than we were spending. Baby steps. 

Did go for a lovely impromptu walk on the canal with the kids and a friend who lives round the corner in the afternoon once the rain eased. And did some fun bits with Monkey - games and that playdough activity to make 3D shapes which he loved. 

Used some dried out bits of beetroot chocolate cake to make a chocolate orange trifle (along with squeezed orange juice made up with gelatine sheets, tinned mandarins, chocolate custard). It didn’t set properly and Red wasn’t keen but the kids loved it even though it was like a trifle soup 😂 made a loaf and a big batch of apple/pear/orange purée for the kids.

Fruit & veg boxes arrived today:

FRUIT
Bananas
Oranges
Peaches
Apricots
Nectarines
Strawberries
Blueberries
Grapes
Pears

VEG
Onions
Red onions
Huge garlic bulb
Carrots
Beetroot
Potatoes
Celery
Courgettes
Peppers

Cucumber 
Red cabbage
Aubergine

Red was quite annoyed I’d forgotten to add aubergine to the don’t send list so I rehomed it with my friend as I was taking her eggs anyway 😂

Got the Tesco order too (also had to get milk from the corner shop this morning as Bambi needed it for her pre nap & bedtime drink) will update spending totals tomorrow as time for me to get to bed! 

MagicCat

   Rehoming the aubergine 

Reducing the shopping bill is definitely a win, even if it's not quite where you want it yet - I think it's better to do things gradually and stick with it in the long term than do too much too soon and find it harder to stick to

Hope you get a bit of sunshine today!

Bluegreen143

Ah thanks @MagicCat! Bit rainy this morning but I took the kids (kitted out in their waterproofs and wellies) for a lovely walk round a small loch some of my friends had mentioned to me as it’s their local walk. It’s about 15 mins drive & I had to pick up a bunch of jam jars I’d bought for £5 off FB marketplace nearby so good use of petrol combining the trips. The £5 I’m cheekily not counting as it was cash I scavenged from round the house that I hadn’t put in YNAB.

Sunnier this afternoon and I got lots of blackcurrants picked. Between what I got and the freezer I’ve got plenty for jelly now 🙂

Today’s meals:

B - weetabix & strawberries

L - lentil & tomato soup, sourdough and leftover trifle from yesterday 

S - peach & apricot muffins, red pepper & hummus, blueberries (kids have also picked lots of redcurrants from the garden and raspberries on our walk too)

D - marmalade glazed pork loin steaks made in the pressure cooker, rice, roasted carrot & beetroot, peas 

joedenise

I'm like you in that I don't track cash or vouchers!  If I withdraw cash it goes on YNAB but if it's a voucher it doesn't go on there, same as if anything is sold or I'm given money for birthday, Christmas etc.

We're still working our way through the Lidl £1.50 box of fruit and veg; think there's probably enough to last until this time next week; there's a red cabbage so think that's going to be turned into some coleslaw plus making some braised red cabbage with apple but will need to buy a couple of apples as haven't got any!  Will buy those tomorrow when we go out and then make that over the weekend in the slow cooker.