Make do, Mend and Minimise in 2015

camelot1001 · 13 April 2015 at 3:04PM

Cheerfulness, if you have an outside space take the furniture outside and give it a sand/wash down. Remember if you don't like what you have painted you can always do it again, especially if you use chalk paint, it dries really quickly.

I have painted a few things that haven't turned out as I wanted but have persevered and got the look I am after. Good luck!

vhalla1478 · 13 April 2015 at 7:13PM

Evening, Everyone,

In spite of looking after the grandchildren today - they were as good as gold - I managed to garden for a couple of hours and also wash most of the windows outside, so am crossing my fingers that it doesn't rain tonight.

Here's a really sinful recipe which I love - no point eating anything otherwise.

Sticky Toffee Pudding - serves 6

115 grams walnuts, 175 grams butter, 4 tbsp. double cream, 2 tbsp. lemon juice, 2 eggs beaten, 175 grams light muscovado sugar, 115 grams self raising flour.

Grease a 900 ml/one and a half pint heatproof bowl and put half the nuts in the bottom. Heat 50 grams butter with 50 grams sugar, the cream and 15ml/tbsp. lemon juice in a small pan, stirring until smooth. Pour half into the heatprioof bowl, then swirl to coat it a little way up the sides.

Beat the remaining butter and sugar until fluffy, then beat in the eggs. fold in the flour, remaining nuts and lemon juice and spoon into the basin. Cover the bowl with greaseproof paper with a pleat folded in the centre, then tie securely with string - or use a thick elastic band. Steam the pudding for about one and a quarter hours, until a skewer inserted in the centre comes out clean.

Just before serving gently warm the remaining sauce. Unmould the pudding onto a warm plate and pour over the sauce. Enjoy without guilt.;)

Viv xx

mrssnowy_2 · 13 April 2015 at 8:36PM

[QUOTE=GreyQueen;_for_mrsnowy; have you thought about having a steel washing line? We've gone over to them in our family en masse after one-too-many snapped nylon-and-plastic lines and they're brilliant.
GQ xx[/QUOTE]

GQ,thanks for that I will look into it but have been using the plastic coated steel lines as there are 3 fixed points and a pulley that it has to criss cross! I get in a muddle each time with the starting finishing points....... oh well, it does tax my ingenuity!!!

love this thread
mrss

mrssnowy_2 · 13 April 2015 at 8:47PM

sammy_kaye18 wrote: »

MsSnowy - where in Wales?? Im port talbot :-)

Hi sammy,near the Elan Valley,the reservoirs send water to Birmingham(-not by post!) gravity fed pipes with no pumps.

mrssnowy

DollyDabbler · 13 April 2015 at 9:49PM

Good Advice, can I ask how you minimised your photos? We have just dug all of our from the loft, there's boxes of them.

misstara · 13 April 2015 at 10:26PM

Mmm yum love sticky toffee pudding, thank Viv, will definitely be adding that to my list of recipes to try.

I went food shopping earlier and spent £16.98 which I was pleased with, I'm in awe of everyone here who manages to be super frugal with their food budget. I'm definitely getting better at planning meals, using leftovers, etc but there's always room for improvement

I've done a bit more knitting this evening. I can now cast on and do plain stitch (very slowly) so my colleague said next time she will show me how to do purl stitch.

sammy_kaye18 · 13 April 2015 at 11:29PM

Well kiddies were back in school today and my house phone has broken so I couldnt spend all day talking to my sister like I usually do.
I got a fair bit of cleaning anf washing done then realised I ran out of washing powder so scouted around and found Tesco had persil non bio 3kgbox for £11 and morrisons had it for £6 so nipped over there on the motorbike with my hubby.
Also discovered today little girlie (whos now 4 for those who remember her birth!) has developed a liking of cherry tomatoes so I need to get planting asap!
my son on the other hand is really not eating a lot and its starting to concern me :-/ so ive told him he can pick his own lunchboxes from now on.

I have washing on now, most the dishes are done and I have bedding in the basket ready to be hung out tomorrow morning.

Tomorrow will be spent sorting out the clothes upstairs and seeing what I have to use with the sewing machine and im hoping to make some clothes for my little girl Holly and a matching outfit for her dolls.
I also have my sons old cub jumper to remove badges from and I have told my neighbour/friend who is also a cub scout leader I would donate it to a struggling single mum whos little boy has just joined the pack and hasnt gotten his uniform yet. Im a parent helper for the pack so I think she might be more accepting as her little one knows me.

janb5 · 13 April 2015 at 11:44PM

Just to report that there were no adverse comments about the ginger cheesecake `variations`. Wow who knew that would be ok!

Still playing safe today and bought 4 jars of stem ginger so have more than enough to keep me going! Not very MSE but in the interests of my sanity I need to have enough stocks of regularly used produce. A friend from Waitrose gave me 3 bags of SR flour as I had given her two pairs of treggings.

Also discovered today that my local hospital have `mislaid` my notes. Massive administrative changes have affected everything. I turned up at the hospital to find out that the staff had tried to phone me on my mobile ( which is being repaired as I got water in it!) but the consultant remembered me and wanted to see me anyway. I am an odd bod as it was discovered after a gynae op that my spleen was in my pelvis! Probably there all my life. Cant even organize my body to have organs in the right place.............!

sammy_kaye18 · 13 April 2015 at 11:59PM

Well kiddies were back in school today and my house phone has broken so I couldnt spend all day talking to my sister like I usually do.
I got a fair bit of cleaning anf washing done then realised I ran out of washing powder so scouted around and found Tesco had persil non bio 3kgbox for £11 and morrisons had it for £6 so nipped over there on the motorbike with my hubby.
Also discovered today little girlie (whos now 4 for those who remember her birth!) has developed a liking of cherry tomatoes so I need to get planting asap!
my son on the other hand is really not eating a lot and its starting to concern me :-/ so ive told him he can pick his own lunchboxes from now on.

I have washing on now, most the dishes are done and I have bedding in the basket ready to be hung out tomorrow morning.

Tomorrow will be spent sorting out the clothes upstairs and seeing what I have to use with the sewing machine and im hoping to make some clothes for my little girl Holly and a matching outfit for her dolls.
I also have my sons old cub jumper to remove badges from and I have told my neighbour/friend who is also a cub scout leader I would donate it to a struggling single mum whos little boy has just joined the pack and hasnt gotten his uniform yet. Im a parent helper for the pack so I think she might be more accepting as her little one knows me.

Right off to try and find a girlie lunchbox now since the dog took a liking to Hollys whilst we were out earlier --- gggrrrr.......

janb5 · 14 April 2015 at 12:15AM

Sammy- what about using a plain lunch box and asking your daughter to decorate the front and sticking it on the top?xx

PLEASE READ BEFORE POSTING

Make do, Mend and Minimise in 2015

Comments

Confirm your email address to Create Threads and Reply

🚀 Getting Started

Categories

Is this how you want to be seen?

Get our FREE Weekly email full of deals & guides - and it’s spam-free