Aim: Mortgage Free / Time For Me

postmenopause

beanielou said:

Good news on the £130 from FD.
Good news too on the holiday pay for your DH  xx

jennystarpepper said:

Lovely to see the Crocus,  I've noticed the evenings are getting lighter, saves me a few pennies putting the lights on later in the evening. 

Thanks @beanielou and yes @jennystarpepper every little bit helps doesn’t it 👏👏👏

postmenopause

Today’s quote:

“To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow”

Moneysaving / household saving:

• Today i made a salad ready for tonight to have with a homemade lasagne and homemade chips (using just my equivalent to ‘one cal spray’).  I only really had lettuce and tomato for the salad left this week so i had to pad it out a bit by grating a carrot into it and adding some of my pea shoots that i sowed in January.  I then remembered that in my greenhouse were some autumn onion sets which i had left over which i planted in a seed tray really close together so i could snip the tops off for salads….so this is what i did.  I’m hoping they will grow back so i can do this several times, but i’ll have to wait and see.
• 
  

• Today we have run out of white sliced bread which my dh eats ( he doesn’t like my wholemeal bread that i have in the freezer)…..so i made him some cobs to keep him going for a bit.  I made 16 cobs all in all….i put a couple in our bread bin ready for eating and then sliced the rest and froze them.  I used to always make our bread / cobs but this stopped when i was running after my parents and step-parents left right and centre….it felt so good to bake again ( even though i do use my bread maker to knead the dough for me).

• The lady from the ONS study (office of national statistics) came today to do our monthly PCR tests.  We were originally picked randomly to take part in the study  last year and as a thank you they send me and my dh a voucher each for £25 each time, which we can use at places like argos, m&s, tesco etc.  We will spend the vouchers this time at tesco to save some more of our food budget….which we will save towards our kitchen mortgage fund.

Allotment / garden:

• I finally finished sowing my seeds today, they will all stay in my kitchen for a while after they germinate, next to our french doors.  At the beginning of February i usually sow lots of flower seeds…..(I grow lots of flowers for my allotment as i grow organically and they encourage so many beneficial insects into my plot that eat the ‘nasty’ bugs).  I have sown french marigolds, begonias, antirrhinum’s, dahlia’s, rudbeckia, larkspur, statice, tegetes , coreopsis and strawflowers.  Hopefully they will make my allotment look beautiful.

• I also sowed some webbs wonderful lettuces to grow under cloches in a few weeks and some celeriac.  I made newspaper pots for my celeriac seeds as they dont like root disturbance….if more than one seedling emerges i will just ‘snip’ them off.

• I also sowed some more peashoots and cress and i then decided to sow some baby spinach to keep on my windowsill.  Finally i sowed some oriental salad leaves in a large pot so i can use them as ‘cut and come’ in a few weeks.

Wellbeing:

• Day six of my healthy diet, i’m doing well for me so far 👏👏👏

• Only one of my knees is hurting now when i walk but when i kneel down on it, it really hurts 😰😰😰

• I am actually feeling ok in myself at the moment….I’m convinced this diary is helping me so much.

Well thats it for today

XXX

beanielou

Enjoy your weekend  xx

postmenopause

beanielou said:

Enjoy your weekend  xx

You too @beanielou XXX

powerspowers

I’ve enjoyed reading your diary PM it’s really uplifting and loved hearing about your allotment. 

Hope your knee settles down soon, I think it can take a while to adjust to running and c25k can be a bit too intense 

postmenopause

powerspowers said:

I’ve enjoyed reading your diary PM it’s really uplifting and loved hearing about your allotment. 

thank you @powerspowers it means the world to me to hear you are enjoying it XXX

postmenopause

Today’s quote:

“If i cut you off it’s because you handed me the scissors”

Money / household saving:

• So with the dishwasher not working i am washing up lots more.  I am using the homemade washing up liquid i made using soap nuts and it is great.  I do have some ‘fairy’ for really greasy pots but i am hardly using it so that saves a bit of money.
• I washed my towels today using my homemade laundry liquid and they dried really quickly on the washing line again (so i didn’t have to use my tumble dryer again which is brill)

Allotment:

• The broad-beans and leeks i sowed last month are now growing well in my greenhouse and the potatoes on my wardrobe are starting to chit.  The seedlings in my kitchen are also growing well next to my french doors (though i do have to turn them daily as they lean towards the light)….so all is well so far.

Wellbeing (it’s a long one today, so if you read this you may need a cup of coffee first 🤣🤣🤣):

Tomorrow it is my step mums birthday ( she had dementia and passed away in a carehome during covid in August 2020) ….so last week i brought some artificial flowers from tesco (each flower was reduced to 25p each from £3 each so i brought 12, so they were a bargain).  I added some foliage from the garden and wrapped them up using some of a big roll of cellophane i have knocking about and i think they look lovely.  

I spent a lot of time looking after my step mum before she went into the carehome and i thought the world of her.  Her dementia came on very quickly after she fell over one day….apparently a bang to the head can accelerate dementia when it is hidden at the start.  After her dementia took hold I arranged all her care to help my narcissistic father, I looked after her regularly and took her out weekly to give him a break, but I never ever got any thanks from him ….but i dont regret any of it as i loved her to bits as she was the only person who ever helped me with my girls when they were little.  

When my step sister and i have talked about my dad we have realised how awful he was to her (i so wished we had realised how bad he was earlier so we could have stopped it somehow).  He always insisted he didnt want her to go into a care home but i now realise that is because he liked to look like the doting husband who was doing everything for his wife…..in reality i did a lot for her and so did the carers that i arranged to help her everyday…..dad just took the glory.

Unfortunately one evening his extra care unit ( the beautiful place i arranged for them to live in with meals and carers on sight) rang me to say i had to drive over.  Apparently there had been a complaint from his neighbours saying they could hear shouting coming from his flat and when a carer went to check it out she had heard him yelling at my step mum saying he was going to smother her with a pillow as he had had enough of her….the carer went in and my step mum was absolutely sobbing…..it turns out my step mum had dropped her soup on the floor next to the settee where she was sitting….she had dementia for goodness sake, why on earth he gave her soup to balance on her knees and try and eat I don’t know, and incidentally she needed help feeding herself at this stage anyway.  

The extra care unit manager obviously had to contact social services as she had a duty of care and my step mum was put into an emergency care home….but my dad got away with it, as the manager put it down to ‘carer stress’ even though i know it wasn’t as he had been physically abusive towards my mum and me when i was growing up.  I so wish i had told him she was going into a carehome ‘because of him’ but instead i held his hand and told him that the manager had said it was carer stress and it was time she needed ‘extra care’ that only a carehome could give ( because i know he would have kicked off if i hadnt have said that)…. To this day he doesn’t know i know about him yelling at my step mum ( he thinks only the carer on duty and the manager knows this and that they only told me that looking after her was too getting too much for him).  However since that day he blamed me for convincing him it was time for her to go into a care home and made me feel guilty over and over again.

Anyway back to my flowers…..i went today to put them on her plot as it would have been her birthday tomorrow but i know this will prompt a nasty letter to either me or my step sister as he hates anyone else putting flowers there ( it’s only ever me or my stepsister that goes to the plot other than him).  I think it is his narcissistic nature that makes him still think he owns my step mum even after she has passed away…..but the flowers are going there whether he likes it or not…..I am stronger now than i was.

Anyway thats it for now

XXX

Kantankrus_Mare

The flowers look lovely!! My word what a nasty nasty man! No wonder you have had so many ups and downs with your mental health. You sound much stronger though and I know you can deal with whatever is thrown your way!! Keep smiling. 

beanielou

Loving the flowers.

On your father I will make no other comment other than it is most certainly not like father, like daughter.
You are such a lovely caring person  xxx

powerspowers

The flowers are lovely xx