Settling in for the long haul

DancingInTheRain

Awful service but I can appreciate not having the energy to take it further.

Pleased the part went well, hope eldests day has also gone well x

Dakota_Rose

That was far too much of a weekend for us, in fact there’s no weekend left just to weekend! That makes sense in my head 😂. Weekends for us are a time to rest and reset and there’s not really been enough time to do either of those things properly.

Twice today littlest was ready to finally give in to tiredness and relax, first thing this morning and falling asleep on the drive back from picking eldest up. Both things were cut short and so we’re dealing with over-tiredness again now. I’m really hoping for a swift bedtime in a moment.

Eldest has done himself and us proud and completed his day to the best of his ability. We’ll find out in a couple of days if he’s got through or not. Either way, we’re chuffed with him.

All homework has been done, baths and hair washes mostly done and Mr D and I are really hoping for an hour or two to ourselves before the weekend comes to an end.

Here’s to a new week. Let’s hope it’s a positive one. Payday Wednesday so that’s something to look forward to at least 😊.

Sun_Addict

And breathe 🧘

Dakota_Rose

And so a new week begins. I’ve got a long day at work today but hope that some positives will come out of it. I can feel my anxiety starting to build again on a morning before work so I’m trying to pay attention to that (in case it’s hormone-related and there’s a pattern) but then leave it behind. Not entirely working but it’s worth a try.

Have sold a few items on e-bay this weekend that have helped chip away at the £35 overspend. I’m still waiting for the village hall deposit to be refunded, so that will cover most of it, but already chipped £13.50 off that amount in sales.

Dakota_Rose

I’m feeling a bit rundown/worn out this week. Think I’m holding off a bit of a head cold and started with a temperature at work that made concentrating hard today. Also feeling due on, so I’m a bundle of fun all round!

I’ve been feeling very skint this month due to excess of birthdays and preparing for the kids to go back to school, start secondary school and college. There’s been a lot going on. Can’t wait for payday tomorrow and to see some funds back in the pots again.

The best news of the day is that eldest has had some great feedback and has been offered the job he auditioned for. Such an amazing achievement for him, and although the hours will be tough short term, it’ll be his first taste of earning money so has to be a good thing. We’re all really proud of him.

My current state of mind is a battle between feeling I could have another career in me before retirement and knowing that no matter what else I do, I would be unlikely to match my current salary. I love the idea of having my own business and the sensible thing would be to keep the stability of my current job while making a bit of time to pursue something new. Well, the most sensible thing to do would be to put that out of my mind and keep working in my current profession. I’m good at it, have tonnes of experience, it has significant benefits and not least, it pays well.

I’ve been thinking out loud about potentially dropping some work hours in the future to work on something new from home. A thought that Mr D was very supportive of at first mention, but I think doesn’t feel comfortable having a more serious conversation about. He’s being sensible and I’m really not. I think I’m either having some sort of midlife crisis (perimenopause anyone?) or the stress of my job is getting to me. When I’m at work, there are projects and developments I feel really optimistic about. There’s so much more I’d like to achieve before leaving. But there’s another part of me that just feels like I’m done. Hitting the milestone of 20 years is perhaps a trigger for that.

Well that became a deeper post than I intended! A girl can dream can’t she. Perhaps with all my talk of changing jobs, Mr D may see my campervan midlife crisis as the one to support wholeheartedly 😂.

FootyFanDan

Congratulations to the eldest on the successful auction, it is always nice when the hard work pays off. The flip side is trying to keep them upbeat when it doesn't quite go there way. He must be so excited.

I am with you on the career thing, I often think back to been on way less money than I am now and been okay with it but the decision to walk away from a big salary, even for the right reasons is tough. We often find ourselves just putting up with it, although it sounds like Mr D is a lot more sensible than my partner who's whole mantra is " ah just quit, it will be fine"…haha oh boy to have that mindset would be nice 🤣. I do hope though that you can find ways to find peace with it as I know dreading work, no matter how good you are at the job can totally suck! If you have been there a long time maybe it's just lost its challenge and become stale or you have just put up with the stress and BS for so long you have finally had enough lol

Dakota_Rose

You’ve totally hit the nail on the head there @FootyFanDan. Rough patch I’m going to have to ride out I think. Work isn’t particularly awful at the moment but I’m still carrying lots of stress from a bad year last year. I ended it feeling pretty battered so it’s likely that.

Payday today, so the money shuffle has been done. Feel like I can breathe out again now my pots have some funds in them 😮‍💨.

Christmas pot money has been sent to PBs again. I’ll likely need to withdraw some of it before long as I start Christmas shopping early but it’s safer in there in the short term. Never know, it may just win a prize and life will be sorted!

Dakota_Rose

I felt quite a bit better this morning but by mid-afternoon could feel my temperature going back up again and was flushed (possibly with a rash) on my face and neck. Paracetamol didn’t help greatly and I’ve just slumped on the sofa since coming home from work.

Mr D has been hard at work in the garden and has laid the old patio slabs in what will be their new position temporarily. Even though roughly done, I can see what a lovely improvement it will make once finished. Quite excited! The old patio area has been dug out and turned over with the pebbles sifted away. We’ve got lawn seed for this space to extend our lawn down to the new patio space. It will look really good when done, so I just hope he sees it through to the end before the weather turns against us.

It’s Mum’s birthday on Friday so we’ve planned for a girls’ day on Sunday. I’ll take her to her favourite couple of shops and a cafe for lunch. Gift cards for said shops will be her main gift this year. Little Miss won’t want to be left behind so will join us I’m sure.

A tiny Vinted sale of £3 cleared today so I’ve popped that in the home improvements pot which got wiped out last month. Our next item on the home list is a nice new laundry basket for the bathroom.

Humpday is done - all downhill to the weekend now hopefully!

FootyFanDan

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82153322#Comment_82153322

I get this totally, I applaud you for trying to persevere with it, just hopefully not at the cost off your own sanity

ohdearhowdidthathappen

Just catching up… that’s 💩 customer service from the cake, I hope you left an equally 💩 review. They should have fully refunded cake and postage.

I finished ACOTAR book 5 too, so good! Agree with the 10/10.

The career thing is so hard, we back ourselves into a corner with income levels. Especially with children and a house as income creep is difficult to reverse, we’re the same 😞. I think back to our 20s and we were on a third of the income we are now and yet monthly we don’t feel it 🫠