Buying a little piece of Middle England; Manifesting my way to mortgage free.

debtfreewannabe321

Shopping was a mission and a half. Trying to find things on the recipe/ shopping list that the ai chat came up with 😆. Did substitute a lot for what I already had and had to g00gle where things might be found in the shop 🤣 (turned out to be the Japanese aisle). And considering I haven't done a food shop for over a week now I did alright. Kept it to around £160 and that was with the weird and wonderful things going in that we don't usually have. DD was a wonderful good angel on my shoulder. As I picked up things, 'you don't need that'...and I'd put It back (mostly). 😆

Spent another £20 in d^nelm though as needed a new hand blender. Decided against a big bulky soup maker and just got a blender instead as last one broke years ago. That was £16 and spent a few quid on a plate to sit under a plant pot. It's the wrong size though so needs to go back. 

Dinner tonight is leftover ratatouille blended into a sauce. With pasta and leftover salad and hummus from the fridge. I could have put off food shopping until tomorrow but am seeing my friend so didn't want to have to be rushing from one to the other.

I've cleaned and cleared and moved around little bits all morning downstairs and the front room is looking nice (we shall ignore the awful carpet which even after a clean looks bad because of coal burns all over it). The dining table however is piled high. All the bits I couldn't find homes for got put there and from there I will either find it a home or it's going into recycling/ bin/ charity/ sale pile. 

Quite pleased with how much I got done. I didn't take those tablets this morning and the headache I woke up with has faded away. I'm still really tired though. But honestly I think this is gluten overload. I've been really good. Then really bad. Then really good. And then really bad with it. Ugh. 
So back on it and I expect it to take at least a week before I'm feeling better with the tiredness. I don't have a massive allergy to it I don't really bloat out any more it's the tired hangover feel I get from it that makes me keep cutting it out then being naughty again 😆🫣. I've also been avoiding potatoes a lot too, I've noticed them bloating me out and giving me awful wind 😆. I've put sweet potatoes in the trolley instead. 
You see when you have a family you end up making so many sacrifices to what you like because you cannot be bothered to cook two meals every night. I have always preferred sweet potatoes but the kids turn their noses up. I've always preferred broccoli but the kids moan so I swap it for something child friendly like green beans. I like cauliflower curry but the kids moan again and I cook chickpeas or potatoes in the curry instead. And so on, and so forth. And well, I'm just about coming to the end of my tether with it especially when those changes result in kids wasting just as much food when they supposedly like it to when they do not. So I expect I'll be on here a lot moaning about how the kids are hating everything I'm cooking in the next week (and to be fair to me I showed them the meal plan and they wanted to try it for the most part too!) 

DD said my front room is looking like an exotic jungle right now, I've got all my re-potted plants in here, ferns and velvet calathea, fatsia japonica and money trees and spider plants and peace lilies and some sort of cacti 😆 it's quite peaceful and pretty and detracts wonderfully from the coal burned carpet 🤣. I'm going to enjoy my drink in here in peace and then go sort everyone's dinner out I guess. 

Watty1

Love the sound of an exotic jungle and you having a quiet drink in there. I do hope you are wearing a silk dressing gown and being very 1930s

debtfreewannabe321

Watty1 said:

Love the sound of an exotic jungle and you having a quiet drink in there. I do hope you are wearing a silk dressing gown and being very 1930s

🤣 How did you know? Do you have a camera spying on me 😉 

debtfreewannabe321

Morning all, well yesterday's dinner went down amazingly well considering it was ratatouille blended up into a sauce. DD declared to me, 'oh yes this looks good' as she picked up her plate to eat the dinner. 🤨
Empty plate brought back down... Grr. I knew she liked the taste of it it's the 'slimeyness' that she doesn't like of the aubergine and courgette. 
Anyway, I made a pudding suggested on the recipes 🤣 what a messy disaster. I'm sure a toddler may have liked it but I viewed it as a  waste of four bananas. So slice your banana and put some sort of nut butter on one bit then sandwich it with another. Put them on a baking tray or something else...then repeat until all bananas are sandwiched with nut butter 🤣 freeze for an hour. Eat. Hmmm no. Won't do that again. Although I'm always up for trying weird and wonderful new things because sometimes the weirdest things turn out to be the best surprises. 
Not that one though.

Today I'm going to go down and eat my overnight oats I made for myself. Not sure I will like it but I will try it. Then I'll do some cleaning before going out to see a friend at her house. She wants my garden expertise 🤨 to which I told her my success rate of outdoor growing is probably around 60% I'm not sure that is considered expert 🤣 she thought it was better odds than hers though so okay...she has apparently all patio gardens so not sure what she can do with them with two dogs ...? 
Then we will go for some lunch at a nice pub close to my old house. And I will then head back and try another recipe on the list with hopefully better luck this time 🤣.

I need to go online and sort out the Isa still so it gets transferred to my bank account. I have a few days left to do it. I was hoping to get my hair cut this holiday but I've left it to the last minute really to get an appointment so I might just book one for my next available day off when I'm back at work. It's too long again and I find myself just pulling it up into a bun every day. I at least made a small effort when it was shorter. 

Anyone see the martin lewis update on FB about min. "1. A full time worker doing 40hrs a week on the new increased £12.21/hr minimum wage would earn just over £25,000.

2. The Plan 5 student loan repayment threshold (ie English students who started uni since 2023) is £25,000 and is frozen until 2027

So in the April after those graduates leave uni, even on min wage jobs, they'll now often need to start repaying (a little) bit of their student loans"

I think I'd really like to steer my children away from uni if possible. My eldest refused to go and is earning close to what DP earns now at 26....I don't want them saddled with student debt ☹️🤔 my DDIL will come out with close to £60k debt after this last degree she's doing....that's more than my first mortgage!

Right anyway, best get up, won't be a NSD I doubt as paying for lunch. But won't be too expensive either hopefully less than £20. Will report back with costs later!

beanielou

Absolutely not a debt. It’s a graduate tax. 

debtfreewannabe321

NSD after all. Friend wanted to pay. I argued with her over it but she was insisting because I'd paid last time. We had a nice few hours together and walked the dogs too. But I had to say to her in the end the big one was scaring me a little he kept jumping up on me, and aside from being allergic I don't like big dogs when their paws reach over my shoulders when they continually jump up -and I had thin trousers on which he kept snagging with paws 🙈. 

 I ended up with a ratatouille for lunch - yes that's three days in a row for it. They were out of one option and I didn't want the standard obligatory vegan burger they always have (and not gf I don't think) so ended up with that as basically was the only thing left. Felt a little deflated over that as had been looking forward to it. Literally over fifty things on the menu. Only three or four choices for me and only two actually available ☹️. Still I thanked friend as it was nice and good to sit in the warmth as it was very windy today. We had a good old chat too. 

I've booked a hairdresser appointment for tomorrow not my usual one but a new one (to me) and it's £15 cheaper as it's not on the expensive strait I usually frequent (and I only used to go there as it was next to the kids school so easy to get to before school runs). Hopefully they do a decent job and I can swap permanently to that one. 

My friend wanted some advice on decorating and gardening and I was trying to not be offensive as I said - I find it always helps me if I declutter first so that I can see the furniture/ belongings that I love and then decorate the room to show them off. Hopefully it didn't come across as rude as that is what I like to do. Her house was lovely and when she'd described it to me I'd pictured it very differently. It's a bungalow and has really good 'bones' great sized rooms and just needed organising. I gave her lots of ideas but not sure if she took any on board. But I can see why she's hung on to so much stuff, her DH passed away only six months after moving in. So they hadn't even properly unpacked. I said I'd happily go back and help organise if she wanted to. In fact I'd love a job as advisor of decorating and decluttering 😉 shame I can't find a paid position to do this lol. 

Right I'm going to attempt to take back dinner plate I bought yesterday to swap for bigger one. We've lost the receipt so no idea if they will let me swap it. But still has labels on so hopefully will be ok. I'll be paying more for it anyway no doubt as need slightly bigger one..I won't declare my NSD just yet actually in case I do manage to swap it! 

Not sure what's for dinner tonight will have a look in a mo and see what we fancy. 

debtfreewannabe321

Not quite the NSD. Spent £1 🤣

Also potted up my grandma spider plant into her new home. With dinner plate underneath the pot that matches perfectly! Way cheaper than the ones in the garden centre. 


Fruit behind it for reference on how big she is 🤣. 

slm6002

Perfect fit on the plate, but that plant is huge.  Looks great though

~FlowerPot~

Gorgeous looking spidey plant and pot is lovely too. 

debtfreewannabe321

Thanks both, it's too big to put in my small front room though so will have to stay where it is for now 🤣 ...think it will take centre stage In the new space being built. 

I ordered some supplements last night and have a detox plan drawn up with my AI chat to try. I think I know what the problem is with my body and why I am continually getting 'allergic' to everything I'm eating and drinking. So need to detox and build immunity back up. 

This overnight oats I've made - well DD and DS wanted to try it! DD loved it! DS I'm not sure as I left to go out as he was eating it yesterday but I think it was eaten. Me, meh, oats not really my thing but I will keep persevering with it because it's healthy and filling for a work day. I'm also cutting down to one cup of tea a day for the foreseeable to limit caffeine intake. I might eventually try for cutting them all out. I've been good with diet the last few days and already feeling better with energy. 

I've nearly tapered off those tablets completely now and headaches are minimal compared to last week. Not going back on them so I better be given something better. 

Can you believe my Dr appointment is at the same time as DD appointment next week. With this brain fog/ memory problems I'm having I didn't even think...I sat down yesterday and wrote ALL appointment, holidays and anything else into the calendar for the wall and realised I needed to be in two places fifty minutes drive from one another at the same time 🫣 so DP has offered to do DD appointment so I don't need to cancel the Dr appointment I've waited weeks for. I'm a bit annoyed at myself though...

Child benefit was paid early because of bank hols. I've got my hairdresser appointment today so that was handy. I'm going to finish decluttering the dining table where I've been throwing things all week that have no home. And then give the house a quick run through with the hoover and mop. Need to do a wash today too as the sun is actually out again!

We've been having a problem with not sleeping well since the mornings have been brighter because we have a skylight in our bedroom. It also casts a glow during the night because of streetlights. I made a cheap curtain (finally bought the old duvet weeks ago now!) and DP put It up and we've both been sleeping better the last couple of days. Best £6 spent in a while (£4 for the duvet and £2 for the hooks and wire!)

DS has been using the gym as his dad has given him a card meaning he can get into the local one. I'm happy as it means he's doing his running miles on a treadmill in safety. Last night he said to me, do you want me to shower there? I wasn't really bothered and then I thought about how long he takes in the shower and so was like, umm yes please 😁. 

Right going to get moving a bit earlier this morning and get some work done and out the way 😊. Hope everyone has a good day.