A new royal start

QueenJess

Popped out to A*DA this morning on the way back from dropping DD off at nursery.  £25 for a stock up of vegan butter, yogurts and some mince for the weekend!  It doesn't seem that long ago when I could do the whole shop for £50 a week.  Anyway, just trying to make sure I only get exactly what is needed and use up every scrap of food in the house.  Still not quite worked out a shop that works for me as I seem to end up shopping in a million places,  but at least I always combine them when I'm already going past for another reason.  I also spent £20 in a zero waste shop stock up, but comparatively I feel like I got quite a lot for that and can even get it delivered to my door by the owner for £1.73 (which is cheaper than I would pay to park to go there myself!).

Wasted lots of petrol driving to and from work this week whilst IT failed to fix my work laptop, gave me a new one and then failed to install the software that allowed me to do anything with it whilst working remotely *sigh*.  On the plus side, my promotion has been confirmed and my pay increase is from 1 September.  It all sounds good, but when you work out the net increase, it's not that big.  However, it will offset some increased costs from everywhere else and I will feel less guilty for spontaneously booking a cottage for October half term.... we are going to go into crazy work time very soon and I figured I'd need a break by then!

Otherwise generally trying to cut a bit of slack on leisure activities, whilst trying to minimise all other costs where possible.  Ironically whilst the economy is rubbish, my job is stable for longer, so may be a 3 year horizon now before we are all made redundant.  Means I need to make sure I've put myself in the best position I can by then and be cautious with the amount of savings I may need.  No change to the short term though - cash savings for this year, then next year I'm going to try and round down the mortgage to the nearest thousand each month with any bits and bobs left over going to cash/stocks and shares ISAs.  Will just see where I get to.

Gym tonight for me, so I had leftover pasta bake for lunch and a sandwich for dinner.  Will have cereal when I get back later.  Everyone else has pasta for dinner and there are fresh flapjacks, ice cream, yogurts or choc chip muffins for pudding.  There are tons of apples on our tree and on the one over the road that they never pick and just rot.  I think I may steal some that are hanging over the fence to the road and make a crumble with them tomorrow.

themadvix

Congrats on the promotion Jess! And an October half-term cottage sounds like a good idea - from what I recall both of you have extremely busy work Septembers, so will be a good way to wind down and reconnect with each other and the children.

QueenJess

themadvix said:

Congrats on the promotion Jess! And an October half-term cottage sounds like a good idea - from what I recall both of you have extremely busy work Septembers, so will be a good way to wind down and reconnect with each other and the children.

Thanks   It looks like the madness has started already at work and it's getting really busy.  Not great news as this will go on for 2 months yet   DH stopped the project that kept him busy last September, but is doing a different one instead that's meant to be one off for this year, but also has to go to the US for a week right when I'm busy and DD changes nursery.  Not looking forward to that.  Trying not to think too much about it and just trying to get through as much work as possible before the actual busy period is meant to start in the hope I don't have to work past midnight every night like last time.

Trying to stay on top of the food and making sure everything gets used.  Went out and picked a massive box of blueberries from the garden.  The best thing is that I love them and no one else in the house does, so I will be happily munching my way through them.  They've gone mad and are the size of grapes!  Not really had time to do anything with the garden this year, but there is tons I need to sort out at some point.  Might be a longer term project over next year.  I also picked some apples from our tree as there is so many that the branches are touching the ground.  Hopefully it thins it out a bit so they grow nice and big.  The ones I picked are in a crumble with some redcurrants also from the garden that I'll throw in the oven with dinner later.

I also ordered some lemons from Riverford and just cut them all into slices and put them on the tray in the freezer.  Once they're frozen I will put them in a bag.  On holiday I treated myself to an expensive bottle of locally made gin, so every Friday night I will be able to have my gin and tonic with a slice of lemon.

I did finally cash out from OnePoll, so £25 is on it's way.  Opinium is taunting me with £1.10 off the cashout amount and no surveys all week.

Lots is getting done this week, but so much more stuff work and otherwise to do.  Washing done and hung out today and the beds are stripped (just need to put them back together again).  Looking forward to putting my feet up later.  Dinner is fish, chips and peas (it's Friday!), followed by the crumble with vegan cream and for me a gin and tonic!

Aimingforthegoodlife

Hi Jess, I haven't been here for quite some time and have just caught up on your diary! I am not surprised you are tired and overwhelmed, you do so much! Congrats on the 4 days and promotion, hopefully it will make a difference after this busy period!

QueenJess

Oh gosh.. been a bit AWOL again.  Work is starting to get manic, but as a lot of my stuff is back end loaded, I am doing more flapping around than the full on work yet.  Picked up a virus thingy and was in bed for about 4 days.  My throat is still killing me and I have a slight cold, but really hoping it goes soon.  Not least because I booked myself in for my wisdom tooth to be removed next Tuesday.  Completely dreading it, but booked the first available appointment to just get it done.  Finances will take a bit of a hit for that.

DH is out all evening at a work thing.  Somehow I managed to prep the dinner and put it in the oven whilst the kids watched some TV, then took DD to bed who was very compliant.  I came back down and took the dinner out the oven.  DS was very slow eating, so I'd already washed up, stacked the dishwasher and wiped all the sides down before he'd finished!  He then helped me hang out the washing and then we had time for board games (his choice), I read him another chapter of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and he went to bed.  I came back down after that with very unusually nothing left to do and could relax in a clean and pretty tidy house.  It always seems to be easier when DH isn't here for some reason!

Some good finance news; £34 from TCB and £25 received from Opinium at long last, which means I made more than the £75 for my dentist assessment (not £175 that may have been needed if I had to have another X-ray, which I didn't).  Also I haven't spent anything for ages as I've been ill! 

Operation use up all the veg before the new veg box arrives on Thursday is ongoing.  Today I completely made it up without a recipe to use what I had.  It was a kind of veggie hot pot.  I cut up the last onion and sweated it with all the carrots, then stirred in stock, seasoning, cornflour and a tub of mushrooms.  Added it all to a pie dish with loads of frozen peas, then topped it with thinish slices of potato (cooked for 5 mins in hot water) and dotted some butter on top.  Threw it all in the oven for 40 mins.  Amazingly it came out quite nice and I forgot quite how little me and DS eat, so there is absolutely tons left for another night.  The spinach will be mostly used tomorrow as I'll make little pastries from some puff pastry I took out the freezer adding spinach and cheese to them.  We can have them with lettuce and spring onion (to use that up).  The beetroot is being saved to make chocolate brownies later this week with my favourite recipe, which I will make loads of and freeze some.  The only thing left in the veg drawer will then be some potatoes and two huge corn on the cobs after all that.

Dessert for tonight was more of the apple and blackberry cake I made last week (some is now frozen) with some hm vegan ice cream.  The apples were from the garden and the blackberries were ones my parents picked and put in my freezer for me. 

Just need to decide before the end of tomorrow which size veg box I think I need.  I always seem to overbuy food and whilst it all gets used up in the end, I do need to just buy less in the first place.

QueenJess

Today was a very looongg day. DH took DS out all day (he packed lunch, but they got fish and chips for dinner). I had a full on work day but also needed to get loads of other stuff done.

I finally finished everything and got myself dinner at 9:30pm. So today, on top of a work day I:
- changed all the beds
- did a load of washing and hung it out
- put all the dry washing away from yesterday
- in my lunch hour made flapjacks, cheese scones and an apple and blackberry crumble (using foraged blackberries and fallen apples).

The plan was to make nice snacks for the kids (plus I have lots of fruit, teacakes, crumpets and bread muffins) to stop them reaching for expensive bagged snacks that are less healthy. DD has already turned her nose up at the scones, but did eat 3 flapjacks 🤦‍♀️. She was disappointed that there was no cake in the tins!

Lunch for me was the last of the hm cheese and spinach pastries with salad. Dinner was a veggie finger sandwich with salad leaves and sweet potato chips followed by the crumble and custard.

I think I’ve planned how to use up my veg box for this week (roughly). Tomorrow will be spag bol for dinner. All lunches are still up for grabs as I’ve not got those worked out yet!

QueenJess

Well the wisdom tooth extraction was absolutely fine and I didn't even feel them numb the area at all.  However, the afterwards has been pretty awful.  They really had to yank it out and my jaw is really sore still and I can't open my mouth enough to eat or chew proper food.  I've been eating with a teaspoon and only things I can just swallow and don't have to chew.  I also have a massive bright yellow bruise that stretches all down my neck... I can't go out as people keep asking if I'm ok as it looks like someone has punched me I'm sick of the poor eating and I love food.  I can't see the point in eating if I can't eat lovely things and so I'm not eating much and have lost a ton of weight.  I didn't really have much to lose, so it isn't great.  I really hope this starts to get better a bit quicker.

On the plus side, an issue at work means that DH isn't flying to the US tomorrow and so he is around to help, although we are both busy.  My work is all kicking off and Weds is my last day off before 4 weeks of full time working.  I like the way this works as then I get to take 4 days time off in lieu which means I have the whole of half term off without needing to use any holiday days.

Not much happening here (or probably for a while) as I'm trying to rest my jaw as much as possible and not do too much as I'm a bit weak with not eating much.  DH has been minding the kids and after 3 days "ran out of things to feed them with".  If I wasn't here they would have the same 3 things cycled and live off junk...  Yesterday I made them flapjacks and shortbread for nice snacks.  Today I made fairy cakes (which DS decorated) for dessert and I made a huge cheese, potato and leek pie thing from a war recipe for dinner.  The kids absolutely loved it and I could eat it as it was basically loads of mashed potato.  Good job as we have another meals worth for in the week.  It used almost all the potatoes and did use all the leeks, so the veg drawer is already half empty ready for a veg box delivery on Thursday.

It cost me £400 to be beaten up by the dentist, so I have a vague plan to try and make that back (may take quite a while!).  I've tried to restart with Prolific and almost have £10 in there already and tried to make sure I'm on top of One Poll and Opinium.  I don't really like any other survey sites, so it'll mostly be these plus cashback stuff.  The credit card bill coming out this month is enormous as it includes the holiday spend on food etc.  I'm hoping to try and reset now and keep the general spending much lower.

On the food front, instead of tracking all my spend and going to a million places, I've decided it's better that I get quality ingredients from a limited number of places that make my life a bit easier and only go to a supermarket every so often for things I can't get elsewhere (like appeasing the bran flake habit, tins of chopped toms etc).  I will also not waste a single thing, cook as much from scratch as I can and run down the freezer that has mysteriously filled itself up again.  This may not be the cheapest way, but I should be able to save money and it completely aligns with the way I like to cook/eat/live my life, so is more likely to work.  My staple places are my independent zero waste shop (that delivers to my door for about £1.26), my weekly Riverford order and milkman delivery.  I also buy cheese every other week (or 3 weeks) in the farm shop which I drive straight past when coming back from gymnastics with DS, but can get it from Riverford or others if needed.  I also have easy access to an Aldi which is opposite DS's swimming in the week, although apparently the one closest to our house (not close) is moving so it'll be less than 10 mins drive away as well.  By cooking from scratch it keeps things simple as there are only a certain number of things I need.  I may get to the end of the month and see how much I spent compared to usual.

DD went to nursery for a full day on Friday and was absolutely fine, so that should buy us loads of time when DS goes back to school on Tuesday.  They do things a bit differently and most the things actually work better for us, so it's been very positive so far.  Plus of course a 5 day a week child is cheaper than 4 days a week in the old place, so all cash back in my pocket.  DD is full time at the moment as I will be full time at work for a month and then we are going to remake a decision when work calms down.  If we can afford it, I may leave DD there for 5 days a week and just pick up early that day when I get DS from school.  That way I have dedicated time in the morning to get through washing, household admin stuff and baking so we can all eat well, rather than ramming it into my work week.

Jessy103

Wishing you a speedy recovery, jess, so you can eat all the yummy foods again x

QueenJess

Still in recovery and it is more than boring now.  I am trying to make the most of my last Wednesday off for a while and am getting stuff done.  Before it got too hot I made a loaf of white bread, an apple crumble with some apples that were going soft, more flapjack for the kids as they ate it all, butternut squash soup (for my lunch), stewed up some pears that refuse to ripen for my morning porridge and I tried making some welsh cakes that I am hoping the kids will snack on.  I keep trying different things as DD seems to not like many of my snack ideas so far... DS loved the cheese scones, but DD won't touch them.  She was also indifferent to the shortbread, although I think it's because she loves the flapjack so much.  We have been managing without any expensive shop bought snacks though, so they are slowly adapting not to expect these.  I think I will try some popcorn soon as I have loads of kernels and a microwaveable thingy to do it in.  I am determined to find some savoury snacks that DD likes!

Yesterday felt much more relaxed around pick up time.  I left at the same time I would have previously, but walked to pick up DS and DD and then we went to the park on the way home for 35 mins.  I haven't actually driven my car since last week, which feels really weird!

Well better go and get washing on, clear up the mess in the kitchen and do a general tidy up before I leave to pick up DS (depositing the soft plastics recycling and popping into the chemist on the way) and get him to swimming (DH is picking up DD).

QueenJess

Just reporting back that DD absolutely loved the popcorn, so that’s good news. I can get it at the zero waste shop as well. No to the Welsh cakes, although DS and DH are happily devouring those!

I’m still brainstorming ideas, but I think next on my list to try are:
- flapjacks with my other recipes that uses banana and much less honey
- oatcakes
- pizza rolls
- savoury muffins (although I expect it’ll be no to these as she didn’t like the cheese scones, but DS will love them)

I also got £7.48 from Ziffit from a pile of books I posted and completely forgot about. Only another £392.52 to go until I’m dentist bill neutral 😂