A new royal start

QueenJess

Yeah, but that's why we have a cleaner. DH never notices if things aren't clean or tidy 😬

TallGirl

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82033618#Comment_82033618

I live with someone like that and no longer have s cleaner so I feel for you.

Do take care of yourself get DH to do more a list makes sense as he clearly cannot see what needs doing. As for work just do your hours or at the very least take some time back when things calm down. Are you talking the summer off again or is that not possible?

QueenJess

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82033695#Comment_82033695

My plan is definitely to do less next week as I can't keep working to this level. Not sure what is happening with work as my contract ends at the start of August. Plan on asking tomorrow what they want. I suspect they will want me to stay a bit longer, but who knows. If I'm not needed then I wouldn't look for anything and take the summer off, but saying that I already have someone else I worked with before asking if I'm free for work. Seems silly to turn down work whilst we need a bit of extra cash and you never know what is round the corner with contracting work.

Bluegreen143

Just do look after yourself, you really do so much and don’t want to burn out. I think a lot of men don’t get how much goes into running a household, it’s one thing if you’re a housewife but when you are working a demanding career it’s a lot.

QueenJess

Just checking in very quickly whilst DD shovels yogurt in (she eats so much of the stuff!). Work have asked me to extend my contract another 6 months, so that should get me in a much better financial position and hopefully allow me to start paying down the mortgage.

I've not done any food shopping this week as we generally have enough. I did let DH go to the shop though, which was a mistake on Friday as he spent loads. He's going back today as he wants steak for dinner 🙄. On the plus side, the potatoes for the chips will be free because DD and I dug them up yesterday from the garden. I don't think she's ever had that much fun! We got a sack of potatoes out of it :) It was really easy to dig them up because they were in a raised container on the patio, so no back breaking work to fish them out.

Better go - DD is finished.

QueenJess

I hope everyone is staying cool in this heat. I am completely over it now. I can't cope in the heat, don't sleep very well and am now just grumpy. I'm slowly losing the use of one hand to really bad eczema..

So right now I am merely existing and budgeting is out of the window. I would happily pay whatever to be cooler! This evening I am taking the kids out for dinner in the lovely air con and will stay there as long as physically possible. I've packed them lots of colouring, stickers and things to do. DS has air con at school, so he's totally fine there. DD's school only has air con in 3 classrooms, so they are trying to limit numbers. Sadly I do still have to work, although I am at home as I don't want to get trapped there (need a train to get to work).

Popped to Lidl for some shopping and bought a very strange list of things for me. OJ, ice lollies, sticker book for DS, school trousers for DS, milk and a big pack of biscuits. No baking or cooking happening here due to the heat, but the kids are just as hungry. I am eating like a sparrow and mainly existing on drinks and ice lollies.

Bring on Sunday!

QueenJess

Just in case anyone panics, I am having a bit of an online break at the moment and concentrating on real life. I will be back probably in August. No cooking/baking right now anyway as I refuse to bake bread or anything else in this horrible heat!

beanielou

Enjoy your break 🤗

QueenJess

Well I am reluctantly back after a week of holiday and many weeks of low internet use (my brain is still on holiday mode). I missed very little bar these lovely forums!

I've been decluttering quite a lot recently and in July I decluttered grocery budgets. Instead, I've been trying to simplify life by reducing the amount of stuff in my kitchen (food included!) to really only be the things I need. As we now have a supermarket right by the kids school, it means the risk is really very low of running out of things as I can pop and get whatever we need right away. As I have a fear of running out of food and always end up way overbuying, I've used this as a reason to have less as I have a very good answer to the "what if I run out of X?" question.

So in July I didn't go to do the big shop until I really needed to - we really did have more than we needed and I only went once. I bought what we wanted/thought we needed more frequently in tiny top up shops as and when and didn't pay any attention to price at all and even picked up treats in M&S (I walk through there to get to/from work). I even deleted my Lidl loyalty app (it's a pain to use and basically useless for me now and I can do without the hassle of attempting to log into their wifi for £10 of food each time - my time is worth more than that :) ). I've totted all my food spends up for July and although we were away for a week, I spent the grand total of £316! Given my budget was £170 a week, it now means my grocery budget is in profit by £130 as of the end of July (that will be saved for Xmas spends as we host).

I'm now thinking that simplicity is the way forward for me and making sure I'm not overstocked as I lose control of what I have in pretty quickly that way and then buy more again. In this vein, after holiday we spent £30 on food on Sat and apart from some more fruit today, I really don't think I am running low on much at all.

I'm not sure how this will all work, but planning, and meal plans never worked for me as I found them too rigid, time consuming and stressful. I have various go to meals and so often just plan what to eat on the day depending on what I have leftover. Apparently budgets are also only partly successful for me. I know this is generally the opposite advice you find on these forums, but I think this is the application of minimalism/simple living to food?

Don't panic though, baking and cooking will still be done! Yesterday I went through all the cupboards and I have 2kg of oat flour my mum gave me to use up. So I looked up a recipe and made some yummy cinnamon and raisin cookies. Too hot to cook for lunch today so I am thinking of a simple lunch of french stick, cheese and grapes followed by a cookie (or possibly an ice lolly!). Dinner will probably be fish, chips and peas as we have plenty of that in the freezer. I had a croissant for breakfast only in the interests of not losing control of the freezer you understand 😂 I think my freezer is currently 20% ice lollies anyway!

If I can keep this up, I am considering keeping the joint account budget the same and diverting funds to a long weekend at the end of August or start of September.

Otherwise my budget is dull… my ventilation system broke (again!) and we only just got it fixed before we went away. Still waiting on that bill 😬. We think both the kids have outgrown their shoes so that's 2 sets of school shoes, 2 sets of trainers and 2 sets of wellies they will need for the Autumn. Good job they don't need anything else at the moment!

QueenJess

Trying to slowly get on top of boring life admin. I've finally got the childcare people to admit they have our payment so I can reclaim the £220 extra that went on the credit card… only taken a month 🙈

Filled out a tax return for this year and set up my payment. It's probably not worth me filling one out anymore, but given it takes so little time to do, it means I have flexibility for how I earn money in the future. I don't normally owe them money because it comes out of PAYE, but I guessed I would make personal pension payments as usually it takes 3 months before you get enrolled which wasn't needed in this job and the stupid online system wouldn't let me reduce my estimated pension payments for the year. No idea when they will actually take the payment, but asked them not to do it before the date of my next payday. Just means no savings for this month.

Still trying to slowly reduce the food stockpiles and trying really hard not to buy more than I need (easier said than done when it's a habit). I did pop into the shops yesterday, but only bought tomatoes. Today we need apples, bananas and yogurt as the kids have been a bit trigger happy with all of those! The test will be Saturday when I go to do the "big" shop. Hopefully I'll get better at it over time. I did have to resist stocking up with a few bits yesterday as I won't need them for a few weeks in reality.

Kids come back from swimming late tonight, so quick dinner of eggs, soldiers and baked beans. Yesterday evening we had fish, chard*, carrots (for picky kids), cubed roasted potatoes* with rosemary* and salsa (tomatoes, onions and coriander*). I had salsa leftover today and so added some feta cheese and a bit of french stick and ate it for lunch.

*All homegrown :)