A new royal start

QueenJess

Reviewed my finances earlier whilst I was stuck under a sleeping baby. I worked out that if I stopped contributing to my pension now and DH paid for everything until I "retired" at 55, I could afford to stop working now. However that is literally the minimum and we would need to be frugal.

It is starting to feel possible though and it means each month I am working or even working part time, it means we are increasing quality of life (eg can have holidays!). I just need to figure out how to be frugal day to day (it's very slow progress!).

I am sad that I won't be getting my fruit box delivered this week as there is some brilliant fruit in there. But I just don't need it and need to use up what I have. Trying to have a cheaper shop this week and so am getting the absolute minimum. I'm sure DH will add to the list as he does the shopping still, but I don't think he's quite on board with being frugal as he prefers a different quality of life. But the that's why I used to cook as I was better at it and could do it cheaper! I'll get there eventually!

Grogged

That's a great bit of retirement news and planning.
Even though we've been stuffing the freezer stupid, it did come as shock how much is in it, so I think we'll be joining you on a frugal next big shop, just fresh stuff.
Take care, G

QueenJess

Grogged said:

That's a great bit of retirement news and planning.
Even though we've been stuffing the freezer stupid, it did come as shock how much is in it, so I think we'll be joining you on a frugal next big shop, just fresh stuff.
Take care, G

I always find I just buy too much as I over estimate how much we will get through. I am concentrating on not wasting anything and using everything up, so hopefully it should all get cheaper!

QueenJess

Food shopping done for the week and £9.50 more than I hoped to spend, but still much lower than usual.  I don't think the ice lolly consumption is helping the food bill!  Not too bad considering I have only so much control over the shopping when I don't physically go myself.  Just need to spend no more money for the month and find another £115 saving to reach my goal for the month    Going to be tough since we are still at the start of the month!

Lunch today will be a Greek salad with two types of melon and yogurt for after.  Haven't had one for years and would happily eat one every day!  Just the sort of thing for a hot day.  Then off for my jab and not looking forward to it as planning it around a newborn feeding schedule in the heat is a bit of a headache.  I hope I'm not there too long..

Spent the morning packaging up some parcels for things I sold online yesterday.  It's all going towards the new phone fund (hoping to purchase in about October ish) as I will need a new one this year.  Will delay the laptop purchase to next year.  I realised I also made my target here a bit difficult and so am off to find some surveys to fill out this morning to try to reach my target.  Hope no one melts in this heat!  I know it's "only" 23 degrees this week, but it feels pretty hot to me when you are (a) strapped to a baby and (b) run around trying to get things done.

QueenJess

Got lots done this morning before it got too hot and whilst I had a sleeping baby strapped to me. Made a blueberry and coconut sponge for pudding later (needed to use up both blueberries and coconut), then dusted the house and got a load of washing on and hung up.

Quite enjoyed aspects of the Covid jab. I always hated queues pre Covid when people stand too close to you and here they were marked out nicely for 2m apart. No one invading my personal space 😀

Was just browsing second hand items online as I keep an eye out for things on the list of needed items for DS/DD that I have plenty of time to get. Why do people insist on putting second hand items online for more than they cost new? They must be deluded if they think anyone is going to pay that...

QueenJess

Yesterday was such an impressive day in terms of getting things done and DD was unusually easy to deal with.  I even managed to get out into the garden to pull out some weeds and cut a few things back for half an hour whilst DD happily watched in her chair, DS helped me and DH cooked the dinner.  That has never happened before.  Dinner is usually a stressful affair with DD complaining and DH and I often have to eat one after the other.  Fingers crossed this is a new thing, but I suspect it was a one off..

After the success of yesterday I am feeling particularly lazy.  I was going to make a soup for lunch today, but it feels a bit insane in the hot weather and so I ditched that and will make cheese on toast with chives from the garden and some salad instead.  We have a lot of salad to use up in the fridge anyway.  The blueberry and coconut sponge was a success and even DH happily ate it despite not liking coconut or blueberries.  Just as well since I still have another 7 portions of that left and it will all be used before I contemplate making the next pudding.  Plus I still have a fair amount of coconut to use up still and it is slightly out of date.  Need to get searching for some recipes online for inspiration.  I originally used them in meringue biscuits, but they take ages to make and I would like to make some other things instead.

I was going to attempt to clean some bathroom/toilet sinks this morning whilst DD slept attached to me, but have been sat down reading MSE diaries and other online sites to try and get some new frugal/money saving/cooking ideas instead.  Maybe I will attempt it later.. I like to at least achieve something everyday, even if it is as small as doing one load of washing or cleaning one sink.

DD is starting to outgrow her clothes again.  I already have the next size ready and she's been wearing some of the things for over a week now.  I think I'll have to get DH to get the next lot down from the attic so I can start the sorting and washing process.  That will cue a new lot of clothes to get listed on eBay.  It seems more complicated having a son and a daughter as not all clothes can be immediately shared.  Although to be fair she wears lots of boy type sleepsuits etc as she is in them for such a short amount of time at this age and I don't think she'll care.  We won't be able to do that forever though!

I've been keeping up with the daily watering of the seeds in the garden (using the water from the water butt).  Some are growing, others not so much (although lots of the seeds were years old).  I am determined to use them all up though before buying new ones and won't be buying anything new this year.  Happy to see that my blueberry plant is covered in flowers, as is the blackberry.  The few strawberry plants have fruit on them and I hope they will grow new plants again this year so I can cram them in somewhere.  You can never have enough strawberry plants.

themadvix

QueenJess said:

You can never have enough strawberry plants.

Too true! Glad you had a good day yesterday - fingers crossed DD likes the new way of doing things!

Grogged

Sounds like an idyllic day, hopefully a sign of things to come!

QueenJess

DD is being even more annoying at night at the moment.  DH takes her for the first stage and I take the vampire hours.  I am now unreasonably annoyed with DH as he got her to sleep in the basket downstairs for 2 hours in the first stage and I only managed 20 mins in the cot overnight (a new low..).  I feel like she will only sleep alone for so many hours and he stole them..

Trying to be organised in the mornings when I know DD will be asleep on me.  Then I can sit down by 10:30 for a rest having achieved something.  If I achieve nothing else, it is all fine!  Last night I preloaded the washing machine to put on first thing and then this morning I put out a box of things to be picked up (from my local buy nothing group), baked a chocolate marble cake for pudding (now cooling on the side), cleaned the bathroom sink and did a bit of waist height tidying.  All of this was whilst strapped to a baby.  Can't go for too long as she is heavy and I have to sit down after a while.  My pile of stuff to sell/give away for free is slowly going down.  Think it will drag on for a bit longer yet and I have yet to get the next size of clothes down from the attic for DD, which will create more listing.

A new (second hand £2) slow cooker book has arrived, so I can flick through that for inspiration later.  I still need to keep groceries much lower than usual to try and get rid of this joint account debt to myself.  I'm digging deep through the cupboards and freezers to use everything up this month!

DH has gone out for a drive (strange man... but he loves cars and driving 🤷‍♀️).  He said he is taking the afternoon off, so I am really hoping that he will be back at a reasonable time (before DS needs picking up).  Then I can offload the baby and possibly even watch one of the many dramas we have recorded on the box.  As we sleep in shifts now, we don't get any time to watch anything together at the moment and we are fast running out of space on the recorder!  We need to clear some of the backlog.  We managed to watch Taskmasker literally 1 task a day in about 10 mins we often (but not always) found after dinner whilst DS was chilling in his room playing and DD was asleep.

themadvix

I am so impressed at how much you get done with a baby strapped to you! Hope you manage to have some baby-free time later.