A new royal start

QueenJess

I actually wrote a list of things to do this morning, so I have already made 2 batches of chocolate chip oat biscuits, flapjacks for DH and melted a bar of chocolate down and put into car shaped moulds ready for father's day.  Also got a load of washing on.  DH will be getting car chocolates, loose leaf tea and a tea strainer thing that's meant to be good for single mugs from DD and DS.  DS just needs to make a card.

DD was very grumpy yesterday evening after the jabs, but woke as usual for feeds overnight and is now fast asleep, so I am hoping she is back to normal.  These ones shouldn't be as bad.

Sitting down with a biscuit now as my back is killing me.  Hoping to clean some sinks later and possibly start the tedious task of sewing name tags into DS's school clothes.  Nothing else planned and I will be sat here for a while resting, although I may do some surveys whilst I am sat around.

Lunch will be fish finger sandwiches and dinner is pizza and salad.  Pudding is strawberries and cream

QueenJess

Had a very mixed weekend. Friday night was horrific and DD point blank refused to sleep not on me and so I was up all night. Tried to get a bit of sleep in the day, but DS kept coming in every 20 mins. So the whole of Sat was a blur and I genuinely can't remember any of it
... I am hoping it was the effect of the second set of vaccinations on DD 🤞

Last night DD actually slept on her own for 2 hours, which was a miracle. Felt almost human today, although my skin is still a mess. Clearly having children doesn't agree with me! Assuming it's like last time, I will struggle until I stop bf and then my hormones will stop destroying my body.

Anyway, DH liked his handmade cards, his chocolate cars and his breakfast tea for father's Day. I made banana drop scones for breakfast with a dodgy looking banana, which everyone wolfed down. Still got a couple left to reheat for tomorrow too. Lunch was the last of the cheese and potato pie from the freezer and dinner was leftover chicken fajitas. Pudding was using up orange muffins and the banana and chocolate muffins from the freezer. Starting to get quite low in the freezer, so I will panic at the start of July and start filling it up again!

Also managed to change the beds, do the washing, sew the majority of DS's name tapes into his school clothes, tidy quite a bit, added another 5 things to the bay of e, pick half a bowl of redcurrants and 8 strawberries. Still got loads of things to sell as DD is into the next size of clothes. Really need to get on with it as she'll grow out of the next size soon. She is trying hard to crawl already and she's not even 3 months old yet! DS started crawling at early at 4.5 months (and we were unceremoniously thrown out of the local baby group because it is for babies who can't move around), so I have a feeling DD might be trying to do the same. No rest for me... 

Bought a few too many second hand cookbooks recently and they really don't fit between the box on the side and the top of a cupboard. I rearranged them across my sideboard and they look lovely. Now I have half a kitchen cupboard I can fill up with food. Just need to decide what I should put in there 🙂 I always need more space, so shouldn't be a problem to find something!

Shopping list is done for tomorrow and I don't like the length of it already.. I can't see how I will meet my end of month target for the joint account as there just isn't enough time left. Will see how close I can get though. 

As I have far too much time at night, I found a second hand well priced item that DS will love. Bought it for him for Xmas. Feels a bit crazy, but it was a good price and I figured it is much cheaper buying it now than nearer the time when I suspect the second hand market will be more popular. Something less to worry about nearer the time I guess!

Both children have been bathed and are asleep and I've preloaded the washing machine for tomorrow morning. Better go as this is my sleeping shift... Hope everyone had a nice weekend.

savingholmes

I remain in awe of your productivity despite sleep deprivation. Your kids sound like they will keep you on your toes

QueenJess

Had a plan to get a few bits done on Monday, but DD refused to sleep in the cot in the night and so I felt terrible in the morning and rested first thing. She didn't have reflux either and was just being naughty. When I picked her up she opened her eyes, gave me a cheeky grin and then snuggled up to me and closed her eyes again to sleep. Naughty monkey 🐵.

Somehow I rallied after dinner and did some online sales listings, tidying, did the energy meter reading, loaded up the food shopping card, packaged the three online sales I made and did some washing. As the cleaner is coming Monday, I am ignoring cleaning except for the bits I would do with the cleaner, but am trying really hard to completely tidy the house ready (all be it in tiny bits over the week).

Today I managed to make chocolate chip muffins in the morning and did the dusting. Hayfever is bad at the moment and the dust just made it worse, so I spent about an hour continually sneezing and using tissues. I now have a sore nose and look like I have a cold.. but at least the house isn't really dusty anymore! Got the washing done first thing, but ended up doing an extra load because DD decided to have a spectacular poo incident that went everywhere! Also did bits of tidying in the day and managed one online listing. 

I'm really hoping DD sleeps more in the cot tonight. I'm so tired it's ridiculous. I am struggling to use my brain at all or remember anything..

savingholmes

Hope DD sleeps and you too. I get my cleaner to tidy as well as clean.... Whistles ....

QueenJess

Not much been happening.   Been so tired I've not really been able to do anything apart from sit around trying to remember what I need to do.

Today though I checked the fridge/cupboards before the food shop tomorrow and did a bit of cooking to save a couple of things:

• Rescued an out of date yogurt that tasted fine and made it into garlic flatbreads.  Apparently DH *had* to eat a couple immediately, but the rest are in the freezer.
• Rescued a very dodgy looking orange and made it into orange and carrot spiced muffins, which are now in the freezer (minus one that DH *had* to eat)
• Made pesto pasta with peas and broccoli for lunch to use up the last of the pesto from the fridge.

Now just trying to survive the day and finish the rest of the tidying (or at least put it in piles out of the way) before the cleaner comes tomorrow.

Dinner will be chicken stir fry using the leftover roast chicken from yesterday.  Dessert is various muffins from the freezer or ice cream.  Need to make a new pudding at some point next week, but couldn't be bothered to do any more today.

QueenJess

Earlier I booked in a shower and hair wash with DH so I knew he was able to hold a baby (rock n roll 🤣). I thought it would be done nice time to myself so was going to take my time.

I was just rinsing my hair and thought I saw the door open out of the corner of my eye. I brushed the water away from my eyes and in that time DS had opened the door, stripped off and joined me in the shower 🤣. He said he wanted to play in the water and also requested to smell like strawberries (I have strawberry shower gel at the moment).

So if anyone is thinking of having kids, don't expect any time to yourself at all 😂 DS also has a habit of joining you in the toilet..

QueenJess

Last day of June today and also DS's sports day.  He did very well and it was a lot of fun (although none of the parents were socially distanced 😡).  It was also nice to see some parents I don't see much anymore as we switched from a full day to a school day last year.  DD loved it and she has such FOMO that she refused to sleep and was grinning at everyone and laughing.  She's now completely knackered and snoring away in the carrier strapped to me.

Trying to ignore irrational parent guilt about not sending DS to the same place as nursery for school (private school) as his two best friends are going.  He is going to the local school that we will be able to walk to, although DD will be going to the same nursery as the local one has no places.  Will be a nightmare to juggle the two I think, which is feeding into the guilt.  He's only 4 and it's not as though you keep the same friends forever from that age.  He is shy though, but I'm sure he'll be fine.

Yesterday I made blackberry crumble slices for dessert and they are really good!  It used up a bag of blackberries that had been hanging around in the freezer for a while and some out of date desiccated coconut.  I'm on my last bag of coconut now to get through!  I quite like the challenge of finding things to make to use things up/not waste anything.  That's another reason I like my veg box delivery, although I'm only doing a fruit one at the moment.  I just can't commit to cooking the dinners as it is chaos at that time with feeding and DD getting tired.  One day I will reinstate it and take over all the dinners again, but accept it is not within my ability right now.

Last day of the month, so a quick catch up on goals:
✅Joint debt £1,900 / £1,900 Goal
✅ NSDs 20/15 goal
✅ eBay/freecycle/Facebook listings 26/10 goal
✅ Charity donations 1/1 goal
✅ Tech fund £500/£500 goal (comes only from unused budget and extra income from eBay sales/surveys etc).

Achieved everything and even overachieved some items.  The joint debt reduction was really difficult as I had not planned to buy DS's uniform all this month and had to offset by juggling other pots around and funds achieved from selling our unused freezer.

So July goals:
- Joint debt £1,650
- NSD 15
- eBay/freecycle/Facebook listings 10 (still got to get through the pile of things, which has only increased due to DD growing out of her clothes recently)
- Charity donations 1
- Tech fund £750 (from unused budget/extra income only)

July will also be the last month I need to pay for nursery (we pay a month in advance) and so we should be able to use it to pay off our debt next month.  Then I'll redistribute my portion towards my ISA for project freedom

Must get back to watching some Wimbledon now before DD wakes up..

QueenJess

The house feels so much better now it is all clean.  Trying to keep on top of the small things everyday now so with that and thr cleaner coming every week, it is all under control.

This morning's food saves were two very dodgy looking bananas.  One was mashed up into my porridge for breakfast and the other was turned into two batches of banana drop scones which have been frozen for future breakfast treats.  I also made some wholemeal biscuits which I sandwiched together with some jam.  I ate one for a mid morning snack and they were yummy

Lunch was cream cheese and chive (from the garden) sandwiches with carrot sticks.  For some reason I really fancied it, even though it was basically a child meal!  Dinner is spag bol from a frozen batch and pudding is hm meringues, yogurt and fresh strawberries.

Washing is done and will make DH hang it out.  Also ordered a couple of things we needed so sitting down now for some Wimbledon viewing until DD wakes up for playtime.

Jessy103

Congrats on your June targets!
I honestly don't know how you do it all, I'm exhausted after reading everything you've done. You really are a supermum! ❤