No T Words mentioned at all - a fresh start

[Deleted User]

Afternoon FTM - Poor Fern and Iris, teeth are tricksy no what age you're at!! Hope littlies tooth does seat back in, what a little trojan for behaving so well at the Dentists. They certainly deserved the ice creams.

Nell moved in to her new house on Wednesday last week, DH was up there for a few days putting up shelves and doing all the little DIY things that go with moving somewhere new. We're going to visit in the next few days as I haven't seen it yet. She's best pleased to have a garden of her own at long last and I think she's more excited at that than having the house. Very OS my kiddlers!

It's her birthday early in September so we'll take her out for a nice meal when we're up as she'll be back teaching on the day. I'll make sure she has a cake to have on her birthday though and send a card to arrive on that day too.

Garden had finally started to produce masses of crops so my freezer is groaning, I picked another 4lbs of blackberries yesterday afternoon and am getting about 1 lb of french beans every other day, and courgettes, well I find a girl can have too many!!!!!!!!

Hope the home schooling is going well and that you are all much happier than before. Look after yourselves Cheers Lyn xxx.

scottishminnie

MrsLW - even the blackberries up here are still not ready. We have lots of wild ones on the farm however it will be a few weeks off before they are close to being ripe.

We've had another week of deluges and lashing rain. I'm not sure if my newly sown grass seed stands much of a chance at all. I did plant winter lettuce and turnip at the weekend so fingers crossed something will come of it. I'm on a week of using up freezer food so I can defrost one of them soon so we are having lucky dip meals. I did find an unexpected rhubarb tart though so we will have a nice treat on Friday night. I also have lots of milk this week so may make custard to go along with it. It's that kind of comfort food weather:(

FTM - your appliqued curtains sound fantastic and your living room sounds really cosy. It was quite cool hear earlier tonight and we had the little gas heater on rather than the central heating. Sadly it feels quite autumnal already.

I'm heading south tomorrow so hopefully I will experience summer again -even if only for the day! That's once I've been thoroughly searched at airport security of course:D

flowertotmum

Hello all...life is sooo good at the moment..me and the tots are having great fun with our home schooling...we had a shop set up today in the dining room..and i priced tins and packets out of my stock cupboard with little cards(ridiculous prices) very small amounts and gave fern and iris the contents of my purse to shop with...they thought it was great fun ...ulterior motives on my behalf...
1,get them used to handling money
2,working out the prices
3,giving me the correct money for their items
4,getting fern to do her math without getting flustered
I seriously think she is getting it..maybe a bit slowly but she is getting there...i also printed off some little cards with the coin on it and then the matching amount in numbers..had a little game of that too..should mention iris too bless her..she was paying me and being very serious about it all...she has also learnt to write her name and the first few letters of the alphabet and can count up to 20 all on her own..
Got the day off tomorrow..and hubby has the next 3 days off..so we are going to the library en masse on monday...got to get some reading books for them and me..
I have got my appliques at the ready..just have got to find time to do it now...will do it one evening..and speaking of evenings wow it was chilly last night and this morning when i let the chickens out..a definite nip in the air..autumn is on its way...
right have to go its bathtime..and then a long night of chilling for me..
love to you all
ftm

[Deleted User]

Hello all, SM - I have just picked anothr 4lbs of blackberries this afternoon, I think they like where they are planted on the back fence where they get lots of sun. I took them round to my nice neighbour as she wanted to make a crumble and freeze some of them too. There are still loads ripening, they really are amazing this year.

FTM - did you get the poly up? I hope it all went smoothly, keep us tabbed about how the planting and growing goes, I hope you'll be as pleased with it as we are with ours. We have sweetcorn almost ready to harvest, the tomatoes and chillies are ripening well in the greenhouse and we now have 5 pumpkins set and growing. I took a hugh bunch of basil round to my other neighbour as her mum, who is 89 and totally lovely is Italian and missing home. I hope she enjoys it, the smell was Mmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!

Have a good weekend everyone Cheers Lyn xxx.

scottishminnie

Evening all. Welcome to the start of a new week. Must be my age but I swear each day gets shorter and Monday comes round faster each week!

MrsLW - bramble crumble sounds nice - would make a change from apple. I'm hoping that because they are behind up here there will still be some when I get back from hols at the start of October.

FTM - my grandmother used to let me "buy" things from her pantry. She had a huge walk in pantry and it was the days when things had price labels. She also used to make home made labels with prices on for my cousin and I to purchase - things like loose vegetables. We each would get a wicker shopping basket (cue much squabbling over who got which one as one of them had a gingham cover) to put our purchases in and we had to be dressed accordingly. If it was wet we wore jackets and if it was sunny we didn't. We had a little purse each and proper money. I remember my grandfather picking up an old fashioned cash register at a farm sale and bringing it back so she could "ring up" the purchases for us - we were absolutely thrilled (granny included!). Happy memories and it never seemed like anything other than play but of course it was great for our mathematical skills.

I had the first of my potatoes from the tubs yesterday and they were delicious - tiny but so tasty. Hopefully we will have lots more. I also picked some carrots, very odd shapes but again tasty and enjoyable. They will make nice additions to the random freezer offerings this week:)

I was thrilled to meet an unexpected visitor in my new garden yesterday. I was enjoying an early morning tea and toast outside when a little grey squirrel hopped through the fence from the neighbouring field. Unfortunately his visit coincided with one of the farm cat's strolls through my garden and said squirrel took evasive action. He shot up my telegraph pole, and to my amusement, used the foot pegs which are there for the engineers. Once up as far as he could get he was hanging over the top hissing down at the cat. When I went to look more closely the poor little thing looked terrified. He swished his tail but it seemed to unbalance him and there was much hissing and noise at this stage. The big ginger tom cat circled the pole a few times then looked up before wandering off. The little squirrel was up there for about an hour though before he finally disappeared. Hubby wasn't so enchanted as I was when I told him - the cables from the pole go in 2 directions - one cable to another pole and the other into the house. He is concerned that the squirrel may have followed the house route. I don't think so - I'm sure he just climbed back down the pole, using the foot pegs again and went on his merry way - or at least I like to think so:D I hope he returns - I've always loved squirrels and chipmunks and as Glasgow isn't natural chipmunk habitat I'll have to make do with the squirrels!

I'm having an early night tonight- for some reason I had a ridiculously late Sunday night and I have yawned all day so it's off to bed at a sensible time.

Speak to you all soon.

flowertotmum

Hello..hope your all well ..had a bit of an expensive start to my week..my huge fridge freezer in the kitchen went kaput and defrosted everything...so all my cakes,biscuits and some veggies have gone..not a happy mummy..got the engineer out and he can't fix it til next tuesday..thing is i cannot be without my fridge/freezer...sad i know..so we bought a lovely brand new one and had it delivered today..ooh its so shiny and lovely...i have moved my old one into the utility room and the engineer can fix it in there..so i will have 2..which sounds greedy but will help an awful lot with egg storage and christmas food storage too...all i can say is thank goodness we have been frugal and saving our money ..otherwise we would not be in the position we are in today being able to afford to buy it straight out and not worry about it...so grateful for this thread and others in helping me save money where i can.
The girls are doing great..SM..i love that idea of just opening up the cupboards..i have made little labels for just about tin and jar and packet i have..we are using a toy cash register at the moment..would love a real one though..so much fun..especially watching and listening to them..and what they are planning to make with what they buy...
MLW..the polytunnel is on hold at the moment..its here just not up..hubby is up to something with the garden and he is not telling at the moment...no doubt he will let me in on it sooner or later..
The weather here is lovely and sunny..got my laundry out...but there is a nip in the air...and it is getting dark earlier..have already dug out the thick blankets for bottoms of beds and aired them all...
Just a quickie today ..got to go wash fridge out with bicarb and then switch it on at 4...and tea to get ready...
love to you all
ftm

[Deleted User]

Hi FTM - Rotten luck about the fridge/freezer, all your hard work coming to nothing, thats so bleugh!!!!! I have to admit to having two freezers, one enormous chest freezer we have had for years because we've always had the allotment produce to freeze and a slightly smaller one in the garage that we got from freecycle to use while we defrosted the big one, but that is now full up with home grown veg too. Glad you have had the resources to get another one right away, and are able to have the broken one fixed. You'll fill it up all too soon as well!

We are filling the poly up with beetroot, winter cabbage, winter salad leaves and have just put in another stand of french beans, and some runners too. It's a bit of an experiment but, if they do take off I hope we'll have fresh beans well into the autumn.

Hope the home schooling is still going well for you all, the village is so much quieter with the schools back in now,is seems so unfair somehow that we have this super weather and the kids aren't around in the day to enjoy it!

Have a lovely evening and keep in touch Cheers Lyn xxx.

flowertotmum

Hi MLW..ooh your polytunnel sounds seriously good..i hope your french bean experiment works out as i love them..they are my fave..
Yes its very quiet here today..all the big kids have gone back to school now so no more skate boarding up and down the hill..i swear i will have heart failure one day watching them..just miss cars and other people..my heart almost stops..wouldn't wish any harm on them at all..just wish they would look before they do it...
The HS is going fine..iris has to learn pencil control..lol..bless her..the pencil seems to have a life of its very own..she has done well today..she can write her name by joining the dots i make on her little book..her alphabet is amazing..and she was counting out bricks and passing them to me yesterday..fern is doing well..her maths is slowly coming up..her confidence in giving the answer out loud is still awful..but i let her write it down and 9/10 she is correct..have decided to make it more fun..so today we made a sea out of a box bottom..they painted it blue and we made fishes with numbers 1-4 on them..rolled a dice and she had to add up the amounts on the fish..she was doing well..going to play it again tomorrow..we have hit the library and got lots of books..also spoke to a friend and found out my local church is having a proper Harvest Festival...so we are going to go and do a small topic on it...
Thats all for now am all talked out lol..
Hows your doggie doing..hows your dd liking her new house?
love ftm

[Deleted User]

Hi FTM - Docky is fine, much happier now his Dadi has come back from painting DD1s new home cream!!!! She has really fallen on her feet with this house, it's a 3 bed victorian semi with a lovely (well it will be with some work) garden. The best thing is it's in a no through road, and there is a real community there, very friendly neighbours and a couple of older folks that they all look out for - all this and a greyhound called Boris- what more could a girl ask for?

Your schooling methods sound inspired, I love the fish game, I'm disnumerate(is that the numbers version of dislexia?) I can do basics if I'm not flustered, but the complex stuff just goes grey inside my head, I don't understand why it all does what it does. I am sure that the girls will fly with all you are doing, it is so lovely that you are giving them the confidence they need to do so well.

The big kids here skateboard between the dotted white lines in the middle of the road!!!!!!!!! They have far more confidence in our ability to stop in an instant that I do !!!!!!!!!!!

Have a good one Cheers Lyn xxx.

scottishminnie

Evening all. I've just returned inside from picking up 6 huge apples from the base of my old tree so it looks like I will be making an apple pie tomorrow. One of my fledgling trees has three nice little apples - hopefully that is a sign of things to come.

I had a trip to Mr A today - it was one of those days when there were lots of :eek: prices though. Since when was it impossible to buy a tin of tuna chunks for less than £1.20????

I did have an impulse buy though. My elderly neighbour had asked me to get her a tin of fruit pie filling. I asked her roughly where it would be as it's not something I've ever seen so I had a trip to an aisle I wouldn't normally venture down (she also drew me a diagram from the front door of the store - bless her!). Anyway just as I spotted the fruit pie filling I also saw tubs of sweet pastry dough - 30p for 300g and about 8 mini foil tartlet cases. I've no idea what it will be like but figured for 30p it was worth a try - given that butter is over £1 a time I'm not sure I could make that much pastry for 30p.
I will report back on the results.

I'm still on the using freezer food challenge - tomorrow night may be a main course of starters if that makes sense. Hubby doesn't mind that - says it's variety!

I have a victoria sponge in the oven at the moment. My builder is coming tomorrow to lay paving stones around my new washing line and he tells everyone how much he loves my home baking and looks forward to working at our house! Hubby doesn't understand why I can't just have grass on the washing area however I don't want it to get muddy when it rains (which is daily up here) so I've asked for pavers round the outside. A friend gave us 40 for free, as long as we collected them so I like to think I'm recycling.
I also have some buttermilk to use up so there will be fresh scones for lunch too. I'm looking out right now and can't believe how dark it is and it's just after 8pm - summer is definitely a distant memory now:(

FTM - the fish game sounds really good fun. I dropped into see a friend last night and her 6 year old was starting construction of a miniature garden for a local flower show tomorrow. I was thrilled to see it as I remember making them years ago - in fact I'm contributing to this one as I helped to make the tinfoil "water" for the pond!
I may even go along to the flower show if I have time - haven't been to one in years!