the fifo wife

Husband is between contracts at the moment meaning he is home until another job comes along and despite being fairly savvy with our money we always go into tighten the belt survival mode..well I do he just continues on his merry way until the office calls with a job. He is a dream big stick your neck out and all that me I’m the other way hold it (money) tight and consider everything in between but between us we balance each other out and here we are.

Yet in the mean time until the office calls we keep that belt tightened furiously and here is my five tips to (plan) getting through some tight times.

1. Have a budget and stick to it. Really watch your money and treat yourself OCCASIONALLY so you don’t blow and splurge it just like you would when you’re on a diet. Just like healthy eating a budget is a lifestyle. Ideally you should be saving for times like this between 5-15% of your wage. Realistically we are 5% but as long as there is a little its better than none but at times like this its budget time not consider a Parisian holiday time. Need help creating a budget there a plenty of app’s available this is my favourite here.
2. Pay your bills on time {or even get in a little credit ie ahead not pay on credit; ditch the credit card} it will save you in late fees and if you’re going to be late call the provider to tell them and most often they will help work out a payment plan.
3. Watch your incidental spending ie really watch your budget. Every time my husband stops at the servo to fuel up he buys milk drinks and chips for the kids but it’s not just the husband I was for a while buying two magazines a week to satisfy my magazine compulsion. And as small buy it doesnt seem much but it can add up to be a lot. To see how much all those ‘little incidental purchases’ can add up to try this handy little tool here to see how much money you can save by kerbing your every day coffee, fashion fix , or beers at the pub.
4. Pool all your spare change at the end of the day. I throw mine into an old Milo tin {because I’m too cheap to buy a fancy money-box} and it pays for a good majority of Christmas but also comes in so handy to fuel up the car or buy some groceries when things are at a pinch.
5. Meal plan and really watch the grocery bill consider buying generic or read my previous blog about saving money with food.

Xx Deb

{image source with thanks to here}

I made this pulled beef after defrosting a roast and making a last-minute decision to head to the city to make it through the rest of the weekend. Weekends that we need to make it through are weekends when dad is at work because there is no other way to describe them we need to be treated gently on these weekends especially come Sunday. So after googling what I could do with a blade roast without actually being here I came up with this. The original recipe is here the only thing altered apart from how to cook it {essential I guess} was the meat cut also essential I suppose but brisket which is what they have used I have never seen here. So kids biting at my heels the cabin fever making me more frantic I threw it all in the slow cooker turned it on low and away we went.

We returned home that Sunday afternoon the kids exhausted {mission accomplished}  to a an aroma of food swirling around the house that only a slow cooker full of comfort food can bring I think. So whilst the kids completed the last of the orders of showers and pj’s I placed the slow cooker along with four bread rolls onto the table with some left over slaw and dinner was complete. My pulled beef my last minute throw together dinner was met with this is good stuff mum can I have it for lunch tomorrow to? Devine. We ate and talked about the day and what the next week would bring and so with that it finally brought the dreaded weekend to an end.

Pulled Beef.

What you will need:

1.3kg/3lb lean brisket joint (I used a blade roast because it was what I had)

Bread rolls.

How to: 

You could follow the original directions here or do as I did and that was to put it all in the slower cooker give it a stir/toss place on low for four/six hours and walk away {I did omit the oil as I literally put it in the slow cooker and walked away} although browning off in the pan, deglazing and adding to the slow cooker would add a further richness.

Once cooked pull the beef into strips with two forks.

Pile on to fresh bread with a coleslaw and enjoy.

xxDeb

{image and orginal text from here with thanks}

Its seems like for ever since I was here and it kind of is. With dad here I didn’t get a single chance to sit and write I wanted to but wanted to spend time with him also. A catch 22 and I’m afraid the bigger love won out for  just a minute.

He {dad} is still here visiting for another week with the husband who arrived home on Friday last week. Husband loves my dad and vice versa its the kind of situation where my husband never really had a dad and my dad sort of kind of lost the son he had {long story not fascinating but life} so to see them tinker and spend time together makes my heart happy.

So here we are the last week of May winter officially on its way and I can’t wait. Bring on roaring evening fires woollen coats, hot chocolates, comfort foods and legitimate excuses to wear gum boots. It’s so far been twelve hours in been a great start to the week.

So here are the few things running through my head this last week or Autumn.

1. Had a discussion with a girlfriend on how lonely life is when your working on your own {she a photographer me a writer of sorts} add that we are both FIFO wives and our social lives are near on catatonic yet what was the start of a depressing conversation ended in fits of laughter.

2. It was market weekend for me..sales I made not but being in the sunshine something we had not seen for 3 weeks warmed my soul and I saw many a friend who made the day so much more glorious.

3. Friends good ones are invaluable to the soul I don’t have many but the ones I have a gold.

4. Milky Ways don’t taste like they use to when I was a kid nor do twisties. It’s not right.

5. I got my haircut off its now a super swish bob however we are still learning the art of a straightening iron one small freaking burn at a time.

6. Sleeping Beauty was a favourite story of mine so I cant wait to see Jolie in the adaptation Malicifent here. Even as a black witch that women is beautiful.

7. Simon Cowl can be such a dumb ass can’t he? Here.

8. Some ideas for the back yard here.

9. Two ingredient cake and one is nutella..omg..here.

10. I felt the same way about the celebrity wedding held Saturday here.

The weekend was again wet; weather god who ever you may be I don’t mean to be ungrateful but we have had enough already please send your attentions elsewhere. My dad is here arriving last Friday very last-minute but a very welcome surprise. Just the very idea that you have your dad so close by is a relief its calming just the knowing makes a difference to us all and it’s the love you feel knowing they are here for you.

So I need the rain to stop just stop and be fine so my dad can see this place is truly awesome (the rain and cooler air takes the shine off) so he will move here. Bugger the fact he has been in the same place for near forty years has a life and friends in place where the only complaint is that its way too hot for six months or the year, crime is through the roof and the cost of living is well a little short of crazy but seriously I’m not asking a lot after all its me and the grand kids right?

Anyway here are the things running through my head the fourth week of May; we are almost half way through the year my friends if you haven’t already got somethings crossed off the list then you better get moving.

1. Had to revise my algebra over the weekend to help my teenage girl..second time around when you’re not worry about how ‘dumb’ you might look is so much easier…

2. Met a woman at Mac Donalds who called her kid a little a**hole to his face which is kind of not cool with me but I kept my mouth shut then he muttered she was a a**hole for calling him that..still I stayed silent. She then went on to dress him down for calling her names. I got up and left. Some people just cant see it can they and yet all you can do is hope for the best.

3. An update on big boy the cancer trial drug for those unaware my fourth dog Big Boy is par taking in a cancer drug trial that they hopefully will commence using on humans in two years. The cancer they are currently using it on in dogs is the Mast Cell Cancer. Big Boy has one smack bang in the middle of his eyes a location that means this drug is his only option as they can’t even cut it out. We are on our fourth attempt of the drug so an update. We are on our fourth attempt with some good and bad news..Big Boys pathology came back last week and it showed that this is the highest grade of mast cell cancer they have EVER seen in a dog in the drug trials history which is why they think its being so tough to treat. Normally one treatment will devour the tumor (the drug switches the immune system back on and the body literally eats the cancer) but we are on our fourth and its eating the tumour but is also moving the cancer. So good and bad. This is an aggressive cancer once at its highest grade so without it Big Boy would have had possibly 18 months but so far this is keeping it pretty much at bay with little pain so along with their fine tuning the drug that’s the good news..the bad its the fourth attempt and it seems to have gone deeper and moved slightly up..I still got hope.

4. The Imperfect Mum started following me on instagram..Im like a celebrity is following me dad…that is so damn cool. huh is all he could offer.

5. I have no number five for me that’s a good thing.

6. The difference between the French and the Americans here.

7. I have always liked Drew Barrymore here.

8. Dogs cans smell cancer; of course they can they are so much more than our best friend if only we all treated them better here.

9. Love this Perth couples wedding here.

10. How to get commercial finished hair..because we all have the time here.

incase you missed stuff last week

{Not being a single mum here}

{Anger makes you ugly here}

{Sticky date cup cakes here}

Have a great week sweets.

Deb

Have a great week sweets

I feel like a single mum she said to me. I looked at her baby on hip another playing at her feet. She didn’t ask about me so I just listened to her.

He is never home. Ever. He wants another baby but I don’t know if I could do another on my own again. I’m doing everything on my own. We just finished building our home and so I have to clean the rental we are in and clean the new one.

Hmm is all I said. I wanted to offer her some advice but often that it met with a look that has seen me learn to keep my opinions to myself and my blog.

I am a single mum she said looking at me waiting for my response.

Again I offered none.

But if I could say anything it would be this. FIFO and marriage is a team effort. There is no singledom when you marry none. None for the wife or the husband. No matter who leaves for work they don’t become single. When you have children there is nothing single in making them or raising them. When you make the choice to go FIFO it’s a decision that you make together. As a team. When your partner heads off to work he is doing his part of the work bargain he doesn’t stop being a parent or become a single man and you a single mother. It’s just that they have gone to work to do the part of the deal that you agreed on. If you didn’t agree to it than your in the wrong place with the wrong person.

It’s easy to say they think of themselves as single people while at work but I doubt that many a man or woman stops thinking about their partners or children merely because they have gone to work and if they do in a fashion I’m often told that it’s a coping mechanism to get through swing but if they behave in a single manner then your marriage is in big trouble and that’s before the factors of FIFO apply.

When I parent I parent as a team regardless of whether daddy is at home or at work. There is no I will there is we will. When we talk about family its daddy and us. When decions are made none are made without daddy. He is the other part of the team. He just works further away from us. I worded these things in my head.

That’s what I would say to her…that there is nothing about my marriage and FIFO that’s makes me single mother. Nothing.

It was then that awkward pause started so I said where does your husband work? I was expecting her to say 28:7 out of Weipa or 21:10 in Rabbit flat. Hard rosters for all involved.

She didn’t she said Chandlers on Main street.

Right is all I replied and allowed the akward pause to continue because really there was nothing else to say.

{image source with thanks from here}