Moving on

Cherryfudge

The hospital has moved my appointment to next week due to staff sickness, so we have the afternoon free. Although there was nothing to worry about at the appointment, I'm still glad I can put it off!

DH has taken his first dose of the inhaler and feels it made a positive difference. He's certainly not coughing as he was. We've put our loo roll delivery up in the loft: turns out we still had 23 rolls left from the last lot, so we won't need to order more for a long time! I've sorted through a few papers and found 20 for the recycling.

Money-wise, I've paid off my CC up to date and seen another payment pending that I can't pay yet. Double checked on some of the increases and found I need more figures but had the wrong current payment in mind when I thought the CT increase was big. It's £10 a month more which I think means we have it easier than others. I know the Council is constantly restructuring one department after another to make cuts but in our case it has to pay heavily for social care and SEN along with keeping the roads driveable and stuff like that.

DH got some shopping and is now wise to how expensive pine nuts are! Cheapest at Asd* right now but ours has none in. Our main meal today was chicken and chorizo pasta and I defrosted too much chorizo, so I'll make a batch of lentil and chorizo soup for some future meal. A small amount of sorting revealed a wrapped chocolate biscuit (which was easily demolished) and various items of mending, of which I've fixed a pair of socks. I'm seeing that my habit of gathering recent projects in a pile (or two), combined with DH's need to live in a more ordered space, is creating a pattern, and not a good one. Too many things have already come to light that I should and could have dealt with already. I don't have any grand plans to sort out everything, despite being more wakeful than recently. I'll just keep chipping away, and making the most of DH being at home to discuss odd bits of things and perhaps make a few decisions.

Cherryfudge

A few bits and bobs achieved today, most notably I didn't need an afternoon sleep! I was tired by the time I finished work, though (3 hours). I've called off going to the Tuesday group tomorrow as DH and I looking after the grand children during the day and I think the two combined is probably ill-advised.

I'm supposed to be meeting a new client on Wednesday so I've had a look through the files and am not enormously wiser. I think a text to my manager might clarify the situation.

Some of the afternoon was spent working on the rota and I think I have most of the leaders in place till the summer break. Now I just have to spread the helpers out among them - not too thinly and not too often, which will be where it could get tricky. We are one helper fewer and now that a couple of them are also leaders and the older children's team leader will be out of the picture till mid summer, I've taken the new step of inviting leaders to be helpers should they wish.

DH got bargain bread and pastries at Sains this evening: £10.55 spent on housekeeping in all. 

Cherryfudge

What a beautiful, sunny day! We had a couple of degrees of frost first thing but by the afternoon DH was actually sunbathing!

DH took the children for the first part of the day while I got various things done: hair wash, load of laundry, made soup, sent an appeal for cover for some Sunday sessions, and cleaning. This last was urgent as the mouse (mice?) is back. It doesn't seem to have attacked the bin this time but I've been bleaching surfaces where there was 'evidence' and took the opportunity for a small declutter. Now I can't find the mouse trap. I wonder where I stashed it as it's not where I thought it was.

The hurrying about made me rather light headed but most of the day I've felt fine. Definite improvement, and DH says the inhaler is really helping him. Interestingly A has what sounds like a very similar cough. I wonder if he got it from baby F? That's where I'm fairly sure ours came from!

DH took the children home after toddler group and I met them there. I was glad I'd prepped my lunch and similar for the older child, as I could just give DH instructions and save him the hassle of making lunch. I picked up dairy-free yogurt for the little one and she slept till I got there.

We all spent the afternoon playing in the garden, which was wonderful. I don't know if the fresh air helped but I felt healthy and had no issues. I'm sure the sunshine did us all good, and it was gentle exercise with unlimited (pretend) ice cream, cake and coffees from DGD's play shop on the patio.  

Dinner tonight was lentil and chorizo soup, so the chorizo is used up and there's a spare portion for the freezer or my supper while DH is away. I also did the ironing so that's now just airing and can be put away tomorrow.

I went to a couple of shops and I know DH will have put £1 in for each of the children at toddler club.

Expenditure:
Entertainment £2
Housekeeping £10.06

Cherryfudge

I woke up a bit early and got onto the computer to check the client files and make a couple of notes of things to ask my manager, then the client rang to cancel. There were only two of us in the 'office' today (the actual office is being replastered following storm damage months ago so we are in a temporary place) so it was quite informal and chatty. I did manage to get in contact with my new person and dropped in an idea for them to dwell on, but as with so many people, the complexities of their situation lead me to feel there will be a number of steps before anything happens. I did, however, remember the glue and cushioning pads for the chair feet so I'm hoping the laminate will no longer be a mass of scratches!

I've been talking with half a voice all day as a result of the raised dose of aspirin. I hope in the longer term I can find a way to deal with this that doesn't involve more omeprazole, but at least it's peaceful for other people!

Afterwards DH and I met up to spend our restaurant vouchers, but I had been lugging my laptop around and got a headache which has been recurring on and off since. The meal was really good (local Italian place) but we only had mains: they're very filling. That spent one voucher, then we added some of our own money to top it up, meaning we have all the other voucher to spend. The plan is that that will be on Saturday after DH gets back from Auntie's.

This afternoon I drifted off to sleep for an hour then read my book in the sunniest bedroom. Nice! The headache came back, though, and paracetamol isn't doing much, but eventually it faded anyway. Could be eyestrain, carrying the laptop, something post viral... I don't know. In the evening we both had our church groups and I'm glad I went, though I need to rest now. In truth, I'm a bit concerned that I should be resting more to get past this whatever-it-is, but the next week there's at least one thing every day.

Expenditure:
Entertainment £9
Phones £20.99 (phone shop for DH's phone and 99p for storage)
Household £4.50

Also an odd thing on the banking app:  NYX* followed by a supermarket name, 99p pending. Underneath it says 'possible card check' so I have no idea what that's about. I hope it clarifies tomorrow.

in_need_of_direction

I would contact the credit card company 

Sun_Addict

I would wait to see if it clears off first before querying. I often get this happen to me when I order my Mr M online delivery. I've just had a new credit card as the old one expired and when I changed it online it said it would send a test amount of £1 which would show in pending but not clear. I often get this with companies I haven't used before online. Also on the rare occasion I catch the bus and pay by card there's always a pending amount of £0.10 showing until the actual amount comes through then the 10p pending disappears. I wonder if your DH has paid for something via contactless and it was the random card check they do where you have to use chip and pin?

There is a little information here.

badmemory

Just try getting petrol & paying at the pump.  Testing payment £120.  That is why I never pay at pump.  It can be a disaster for some if they are near their limit.

Cherryfudge

Thank you @in_need_of_direction, @Sun_Addict and @badmemory, you have jogged my memory. When we paid for Tube journeys by card, there was  pending payment which I think was 10p, and I suspect this is similar in which case it will be assimilated into the massive £2.97 spent by DH at that shop on that date.

I checked again but it was before opening time so nothing had moved.

We have a lovely, warm day here today and DH has just set off for a couple of nights with Auntie. I spent the morning with the Toddler group which was very busy with the regulars and also a visiting group from America who are doing a week of activities with the churches of the town. So we were busy! I had a chat with one them afterwards about how sign language in the UK is not the same as sign language in America (she had used some signing in songs she led). I explained about BSL and Makaton but we found we all share the same sign for 'Jesus'. I think today's toddlers, many of whom watch a particular American program featuring ASL, might accidentally grow up trilingual in signing.  

So anyway, that was interesting.

When I got home I used the time with both of us about to do a bit more chain-sawing logs, and DH has done lots of housework for me. I had a couple of lightheaded patches this morning so I know I will need to have some decent rests but I wanted the house half way decent as my mentor is coming tomorrow and on Sunday the family descends for my post-birthday birthday celebration.

The plan for this afternoon is to spend a bit of time on my course notes and homework ready for tomorrow and to have a go at mowing the grass if I can do it without it being too strenuous. Then there's work at five. I've had a decent lunch, finishing off the chicken pasta and made a beginning of shopping for Sunday.

Cherryfudge

I have achieved quite a bit this afternoon down the side tracks that invited themselves to be cleared. It was messy outside the back door so I started to stack the twigs and logs, which turned into uprooting a tiny bit of the ground elder. Then I took the compost bucket to empty into the compost bin that I've set in the back lane. Near the bin was the world's largest fat pigeon, very recently deceased, so I dug it a grave then and there in the lane and dragged a branch over so that I wouldn't find some four legged creature had dug it up. That involved pulling out some ivy and finding a saucer that we'd had many years ago between the crumbling back fence and a big tree. Rescued that, and disposed of a former hedgehog and mouse. The great outdoors, red in tooth and claw.

Then I tidied up some more logs and so far have one side of the grass cut, but decided on a rest before work, and that I'd have to call the exertion 'getting back to fitness'.

Cherryfudge

I am very thankful to report I'm not exhausted. I finished the grass and I'm pleased with progress in the garden. 

Work was two and a half hours, then I went to the supermarket where I bought some pretty plastic plates for the girls (impulse buy: I think they may go in Christmas stockings), some bird food, biscuits for the Sunday children and various housekeeping things including biscuits for tomorrow's guest and little oranges towards the healthy nibbles for Sunday tea. I also got a couple of tiny glass bottles of cream as they were being discounted and the bottles are really cute. I'll decant the cream (could even try making ice cream now I have a bit of freezer space), tie a bit of ribbon on the neck of the bottles, add some daffodils and put one in each reception room for Sunday's guests. To think I paid for a very similar bottle for a gift one Christmas! Of course, I've paid for these too, but about 70p each instead of £6! (*Thinks* even if I paid full price for them, the bottles would be great with sweets in or something).

Expenditure:
Gifts £6
Pets £1.50
Housekeeping £16.46

What I've not done, of course, is prep for tomorrow afternoon so I will at least need to glance over that before bed so my brain can start mulling it over. I have cleaning in the morning so not all that much time.