Myself and my little family of Moto GP fanatics are still heartbroken by the sad news that Marco 'Super Sic' Simoncelli has sadly been taken from this world in a motorbike accident.

Our thoughts and prayers are with you Marco. Ive no doubt in my heart that you were set to be our champion again and you will be sorely missed by all your fans. You were a true character in the paddock and stole all our hearts with a single smile.

A beautiful man, now a beautiful angel.

RIP Marco 'Super Sic' Simoncelli

x x x x x

God saw that you were hurting
And it was not meant to be,
So he put his arms around you
And whispered,''come to me''.
With tearful eyes we watched you
And saw you pass away,
Although we loved you dearly
We could not make you stay.
A golden heart stopped beating
Hard working hands at rest
God broke our hearts to prove to us
He only takes the best

almost extreme couponing....

I have really gotten into this programme. I find it fascinating that these (often) women dedicate so much time to finding, clipping, organising coupons and then looking at sales etc to best plan their use.

I have found a fantastic little group on facebook which has taken this idea on but in the UK and have had some good results so far. Its definitely turned me round to the idea of couponing better.

Myself and a friend, Denise, have both taken up this new challenge. We are both in similiar circumstances and our baby girls Holly and her daughter Lexi are two weeks apart in age.

We have both enjoyed the 'buzz' that getting to a till with a bundle of coupons to help for your shopping and seeing how little you pay can get you.

My first attempt I was very nervous. I had just discovered the group and they had pointed me in the direction of a Honey Shreddies £1 off voucher and then informed me it was on offer in Tesco for......you guessed it.........£1.

So I printed off 9 (we eat a lot of cereal and some for my newly single sister in law) and off I went with Ben in tow as my helper.

We grabbed our 9 boxes and made our way to the till.

The assistant couldnt believe it.

I was amazed.

I came away with several bargains that day and now dont shop with some unless I've checked my coupons, checked the site etc.

These were my bargains for the day

It includes

9 boxes of honey shreddies

4 x Dettol Surface Cleanser

2 boxes of Oats So Simple sachets

4 x 9 toilet rolls

4 x I cant believe its not butter

4 x pampers wipes

Costs should of been

9 Honey Shreddies ~ £9. I had them ALL FREE

4 Dettol ~ £4 (£1 each). I had a 50p off an item coupon so cost me £2

2 Oats so Simple ~ £3. (£1.50 each). I had 50p off an item so £2

Toilet Roll were £1.99 and scanned due to mispricing on BOGOF. So I had them for £3.98 but with a £3.50 Tesco coupon they cost me 48p.

Pampers should of been 99p each. I had 2 x £2 pampers vouchers so they made me 4p.

Total before coupons - £23.94

Total after coupons - £4.48

TOTAL SAVING - £19.46

Most definitely worth it.

x

Getting there slowly.......

Well it has been 2 and a half months since I was last on my blog. How very naughty of me........

well let me firstly apologise and secondly bring you up to speed a bit.

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The house is now finally becoming a home.

Holly's (who is now almost 15 months old) room is decorated. Its currently a Winnie The Pooh theme. The stickarounds, lampshade, curtains and carpet are from Benjamin's old bedroom, her cot bed is second hand from my sister and so are the chest of draws, also her basket with her toys in was a gift hamper I had when she was born.

Benjamins bedroom is almost finished bar a blind for him. His high rise sleeper was gifted to us by Owens parents (this is Josh's bed), Benjamins bed was gifted to us by Owens friend, the shelves were brought in Focus's closing down sale and we brought the border for his room. Everything else Benjamin already had.

The living room is also looking homely but I think it is missing a rug but so far I'm happy with it. Small but snug and bound to be nice and warm come winter. Only other issue I have is I need to get our curtains and curtain rail back up as the old raul plugs decided to give way so currently no curtains only a net there.

And lastly but not least is a before and after of my dining room.

It did look like this (shamefully!)

It now looks like this

Although fingers crossed most of underneath the white table clothed table is full of bike parts etc and behind the bagged clothes is a tool box. Once Owens shed is finished they will all be outside in the shed along with the pushbike to the right of the picture and Hollys trike. Also the blue box that is hidden behind the door (you can just see it) has moved and made way for............

a 171ltr chest freezer. It has taken 2 x £60 shops to fill it to the brim but Im hoping now its full we can live off that until at least the end of November and then do a big shop to see us through December and January in case the bad weather hits us. Also we do still have our fridge with the small box freezer which I have now filled with bread and inside the chest freezer is 6 x 4pts of milk so we are ok for these as well as an abundance of vegetables and meats etc.

So the house is coming together nicely.

Hello all!!

Well it feels like an eternity since I was last on my blog!!

Well so much has happened since May when I last posted.

Firstly, we've moved house!!!! We were finally awarded a council house and we now reside in a lovely 3 bedroomed house in our beautiful little welsh valley. We are also lucky that we have a lovely big garden so I have decided to set my growing skills to the test as well. Well sort of........

my last growing attempt whilst I lived in my flat was unsuccessful somewhat - all my spring onions were stolen and my neighbours dog ate my tomatos!

I have all this and this to play with!

This is the view down my garden, where you can see Owens workshop foundations are being laid,

the second is the small suntrap near my kitchen window and by my back door

which gets sun all morning and shade from about 12.30-1pm.

I have brought a nice six tiered greenhouse to go against the wall on the left.

I have brought a few seeds packets ready but have decided to research things to grow first and spend the rest of this year working on preparation for my growing instead of jumping straight in.

Should add on the picture down my garden behind the big bush! are a pot of rhubarb that I presumed dead but is now thriving which was 20p in the focus sale and have since discovered there is two crowns in one pot so will get him repotted asap into a giant tub i think.

Also next to him (again behind bush) are two strawberry plants that were 25p each from wilkinsons that were sunlight starved and dying - now have one strawberry that's going red on one of them.

In the suntrap picture the pot is a reviving blueberry bush - again from focus for 20p - it was originally a stick in a bucket so glad to see it with a bit of life again!

I am awaiting the arrival of a compost bin too that the council offered relatively cheap as a recycling scheme so that should arrive anyday too.

Fingers crossed I will be able to go ahead with my planting this coming year but can anyone else advise me on things I could be doing in preparation? I haven't really picked out a veg plot yet as im not too sure where to put it as I have two children (7 and 1) and I have a small terrier dog.

I cannot wait to start getting myself more self sufficient. Im hoping to also get a water butt asap too!

Oh and did I mention my new house has a lovely big kitchen diner for my to play in.

Inside the house pictures to follow soon!

x

This is not too far removed from what my cupboard looks like which is kind of scary!

Right, I have taken an itinerary of my fridge / freezer and cupboards. Their contents are as followed.

Fridge

• Mushrooms
• 3 x petite filous yogurts
• I Cant Believe Its Not Butter
• 3 Eggs
• 1 and a half bags of grated mature cheddar
• New Potatoes
• 1kg bag of carrots (reduced to 50p)
• 1/2 bottle of Milk (approx 2 pints)

Freezer

• 2 sausages
• small white tin loaf

Cupboard

• Fusili Pasta 3/4 of a 3kg bag
• 2 small spaghetti portions
• 1.5kg value white rice
• 1 packet of SMASH (instant potato)
• 1 home-pride pasta bake sauce
• 1 home-pride curry sauce
• Bisto Gravy Granules
• 23 Chicken Oxo cubes
• 3 packs of golden rice
• 1 pack of chicken flavored rice
• approx 20 T Bags (and one unopened BOGOF box containing 160)
• 500g sugar
• 1 tin of 8 hotdogs in brine
• 4 tins of Lentil Soup
• 1 tin of value spaghetti in sauce
• 1ltr bottle of strawberry ribena (was reduced down to 81p in work as discontinued line)
• dried apricots
• ice cream sprinkles
• peppermint flavoring
• vanilla flavoring
• icing sugar
• 2 trifle mixes (minus the sponge fingers - dont ask!)
• 1 dream topping mix
• 1 Jelly sachet
• Tub of Cadburys hot chocolate
• 1kg Tesco value oats
• 1.5kg plain flour
• 2kg self raising flour
• golden syrup

Other

• 1 and a half boxes of Ready Brek
• 10 weetabix
• 1/2 box of cornflakes
• 4 mini boxes of coco pops
• 1 mini box of cornflakes
• 2 hot cross buns
• 2 slices of bread
• 5 bananas
• 1/2 bottle of tesco blackcurrant and apple juice
• 4 bags of walkers crisps
• 4 satsumas

and that is what is currently edible in my humble abode!

I have £5 to last me until the 10th and today is currently the 2nd.

My little boy starts school tomorrow so I will have to take out and defrost the small loaf in the freezer to put with cheese for his sandwiches, along with a bag of crisps, some dried apricots, a banana and a yogurt!

Plus I think I will have a day cooking tomorrow and peel some of the new potatoes and some carrots and cook them up and blend them once cooled to make a basis for baby food for Holly. That way then I can either just warm it up and give it to her or add an oxo cube or a little bit of gravy to it for a change and freeze a few portions. Plus I will get making twinks* hobnobs too as an energy bar for my partner when hes training and as a snack for my sons lunch box.

Well looks like I'll be having a productive day tomorrow around the errands, cleaning, washing, looking after Holly and the school run!

x

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*Twinks - in case your wondering are hobnob style biscuits. The recipe was added to the MSE forum by a dear member who's username is 'Twink' therefore they have taken the name 'Twinks Hobnobs'. The recipe for those wanting to try them is

Hobnob Recipe

Ingredients

8oz sr flour

8oz sugar

8oz porridge oats

8oz margarine

1tbsp golden syrup

1tbsp hot water

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Instructions

Mix the flour, oats and sugar, melt marg, syrup and water in a pan. Stir in bic soda and add to dry mix.

Then mix well and make into smallish balls which you then put on a greased tray and flatten slightly with a fork. Put in the oven at 180 degrees C for 15 mins... and cool on the tray. The aim is to get them golden in the oven not brown.

"It pays to plan ahead. It wasn't raining when Noah built the Ark."

Unknown

I figured the above quote made a good point. With the climate as it is, none of us can ever be too prepared and I realise lately that I have fallen off the money saving/ Old style/ planning ahead band wagon and I desperately need to get back on it.

The future will hopefully see us getting a house and with that obviously we will have rent increases as I have mentioned in a previous entry and I don't simply mean it will increase by £10 , I mean it will increase by upwards of £60 a month and another £10 a month on our water rates and as me and my partner currently work we are not entitled to extra help with benefits.

Therefore I need to get our food spend under control and back in order. Some readers may remember back in January 2008 I wrote a post on MSE (http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=697339&highlight=100) about feeding my family for £100 a month. At that time my family consisted of myself, my partner, our son Benjamin was 3 and we had Bruno our Jack Russell.

Now my family consists of myself, my partner, Benjamin is now an active (almost) 7 year old, Our baby girl Holly is (almost 10 months), Our Jack Russell Bruno is now 8 years old and 2 terrapins called Randy and Toby.

So needless to say I have to look at increasing our food budget somewhat but I'm hoping I will be able to keep to £150 a month.

So I will take stock of fridge/freezer/cupboard contents etc and repost my plan of action.

x

Proud Mummy moment

I was sent a load of photographs the other day which really cheered me up from a local

community worker and fundraisers

I moved to Cwmafan roughly 7 years ago when I was pregnant with my son and despite being an employee in the local main shop ~ I am known by residents here. I was worried however that my son would maybe be treated as a bit of an outsider as we weren't from Cwmafan ourselves despite him being born down the road in Port Talbot Hospital and living in Cwmafan all his life.

However these photos have cheered me up and made me realise just how much he does for his little community so I thought I would share them with you.

He was planting daffodil bulbs with his school mates throughout th

e community to make the village prettier (he is on the far left holding the shovel)

He took part in the local fun run to raise funds for the his rugby team and community. Here he is below with his friends from L - R ~ Jack, Levi, Matthew and Benjamin

Here he is with all the other kids who took part (he's front row bottom left)

He is goalkeeper for the Cwmafan Under 7's football team although plays as Number 11 not number 1.

He also plays as Number 11 on the Cwmafan Under 7's Rugby team in which they play tag rugby and he was given the 'tagger of the match' award.

So all in all Im a very proud mummy. = ) I'm hoping that Holly will be as involved with the community as he is.

x