A Haircut and Monster Carrots

Well my hair was cut yesterday by my daughter's friend for just £14 instead of the £26 charged in the village.  After all the lovely comments on my blog regarding hair colour I decided to go for purple...she had run out! I  felt cheated!  Nonetheless, I am pleased with the cut and it will certainly last 6 weeks until my next appointment.  I had a lovely cup pf tea and a chat afterwards with DD and the GC before setting off home to see what G had been up to on the allotment.

He had pulled some carrots for tea.  We have not been successful with carrots at all and G puts it down to not having enough time to prepare the soil properly.  If you look to the left (on G's hand) you can see a tiny carrot, which is the size I like.  I bet the big ones are totally inedible :/

We have been unsuccessful with radishes too.  The first few were lovely but the subsequent ones were tough or eaten away .  However, we have eaten some lovely lettuces and potatoes and the tubs in the garden have produced lots of delicious strawberries.

In our mission to sell or donate stuff we don't need I went to offer a ceramic pot of Calla lilies to our neighbour, as he had admired them, and shut my blooming finger in the metal gate catch. Cor, it came sharp....

A big welcome to Terra, my new follower. Welcome aboard!

The craft fair on Saturday was dismal.  It rained and footfall was poor.  I took £5 which was the cost of the table :(  No one took more than about £20 so I have decided that I will do no more.  I can sell more on the internet than at the fair and can do it from home too, so that's my decision made.  I made a sale of £12 last night whilst watching TV with my feet up!

It's raining at the moment and thunderstorms are forecast for this afternoon so I will pop out to post my sale item before lunch....

Stay safe everyone and thanks so much for popping in x

Book Treasure Hunt

I have just found out about a lovely thing going on in our village.  Someone is wrapping books and hiding them around the village for people to find!  They are both for children and adults too.  What a lovely generous thing to do.  I might try to find out more so that I can do a bit of hiding of my own :)
Has anyone come across this before?

We had a bit of good news today too.  Our new home is, at last, up to roof level and we might even have completion by the end of November if the weather holds.  I do hope so :) We are going to see the site agent a week on Thursday to finalise our option choices so exchange might not be too far away after that.  It means that we will have to ratchet up the eBay selling and  decluttering but we are making serious inroads into turning our surplus stuff into cash anyway.  Today I took a carrier bag full of nice stuff into the local Happy Staffy CS.  I'm trying to share out the spoils amongst several charities in the area to make it fair :)

I'm off to have my 6 weekly haircut tomorrow so I can combine that with a lovely visit to DD and the GC.  Now the question is.....do I have purple styling mousse or boring colourless….hmmm....lol...I'll let you know!

Stay safe everyone wherever you happen to be and thanks so much for popping in x

Not So Fantastic Plastic

Where has the week gone?  It has flown by in a rush of entertaining grandchildren, gardening, and alternately wilting from the heat and sheltering from the squally showers.  At the moment it is pouring down.  Luckily I managed to load the car with my craft fair stuff (yes, it's this afternoon) just before the downpour began.  I have an hour before I have to set off so I hope the sun will show it's face by then, otherwise footfall at the fair will be abysmal :(

I want to thank everyone who commented on my last post with sympathy and concern.  I appreciate every single one of you who took the time to respond.  It seems I am not alone with occasional sleepless nights brought on by worry either.  It's such a useless exercise in the middle of the night too.

Changing the subject completely....there has been so much talk about plastic recently and how we all depend on it and use far too much, only to fill the oceans with it or send it to Malaysia.  It's horrifying really.  I always thought that I used plastic responsibly and recycled everything in just the right way.  Now I am not so sure.  I have taken another look at our use of it in the home. Years ago I used bar soap but ditched it in favour of  liquid soap dispensers because of the soap scum the bar left on the sinks and bath.  I have now bought a soap dish and a bar of Pears soap in order to make a fresh start on buying less plastic.   The dish cost £4 and the soap 59p.....

Can anyone recommend a soap bar that is PH balanced and which smells fantastic?

I think I am going to struggle with changing other things though.  For a start, I haven't found anywhere which sells refills for washing up liquid etc  The one I use has a totally recyclable bottle and cap but how can I be sure the council will do the right thing with it? Washing powder is ok because it comes in a recyclable cardboard box but what about fabric softener?  I have discovered that most bread wrappers can be recycled with carrier bags in the bigger supermarkets...yay!

What else can I change to ditch plastic?  Suggestions gratefully accepted :)

Stay safe everyone wherever you happen to be x

What a Silly Thing

I had a terrible night's sleep last night.  It was not for want of being tired either.  I'd had a busy day shopping, cleaning, tidying whilst G was at work until 8pm but as soon as my head touched the pillow I just couldn't clear my head.  I was a bit warm too, although the window was open to let in some air, and I tossed and turned from 10.30pm until 2am when I gave in, quietly turned on the light and read my book for half an hour.  I finally dozed off around 3am only to wake at 7.20am feeling disorientated and a bit sick.  I know it's silly but I lay there worrying about the future ie will G get worse? Are we sure we can really afford to spend all our savings on the new house? Will G have to give up work and put us on the breadline? How on earth will we manage the move as neither of us will be on the right side of 70 years old etc, etc  We have been through all of this in our discussions and I've done the sums over and over again but everything seems so much worse in the dark, don't you think?  I haven't told G I was worrying all night it might set him off.  I'm usually the rational one...lol.

Since we decided to move we have been watching our spending.  We won't have to pay our site fees in December this year so today I've been able to move some of the money saved for that to the savings account for the new house.  My Daughter recommended her friend , who is a hairdresser working from home, to cut my hair.  I was a bit nervous at first but she's fine and charges just £14 for a cut and blow dry instead of the £26 charged in the village, a potential saving of £108 per year based on 9 appointments  AND I get to see DD for a coffee on the day I go (every 6 weeks) :)

I think we might ditch the expensive broadband when we move too.  We are locked into a contract until mid December and pay over £51 per month which seems like A LOT.  The TV is Freesat. We are toying with the idea of ditching a landline and using our mobiles too. G is on a cheap contract and I'm with Tesco PAYG who triple £10 a month top up to £30 which is more than enough.

Has anyone else ditched the landline? Or is it risky?

Whilst sorting out the cupboard I came across an opened packet of sultanas with a best before date of end of August 2019.  Oooh a soak in some strong tea then made into a quick teabread while the oven was on for something else, waste not want not, as my mum used to say :)

Anyway, the slow cooker is on with a lovely beef stew for G today so I can just relax and enjoy Poldark this evening.

Here's to a better sleep tonight!
Stay safe everyone wherever you happen to be x