make do and mend for tougher times

Popperwell

There's something special about something made specially but for myself when the clothes only cost 99p just like the buying of the Everyday range I could not make things any cheaper or bake things for that matter...even though I have all the gadgets to hand and quite like having a go...

Before I lost Mum I had baked cakes, bread and much more but now, I won't say that I never will again but...I hope when Aldi opens its as good as I am told that it is but it is more choice on my town and Tesco's and Aldi's will be almost on each others door step...

prepareathome

Smilet - hope you are nice and relaxed for tomorrow and I would go with make-up only if you feel you want to wear it, as for your hair I agree about mentioning the charity haircut and leave it at that, then when you get the job and anyone says why is your hair still so short you can explain.......

Someone was going to view a flat today - or is it tomorrow, they posted around 3am and said tomorrow hope it went well or goes well...........

Bonnie keeping everything crossed for you

[IMG][/img] IMG-20120711-00959 by prepareathomeearth, on Flickr

Right I think that is the best photo of my goodies although there are another couple on there - its that one for around £300 that i feel I am not worthy of using and with not having anything much in way of wrinkles or problems am loathe to use to much on my face no matter how good, but how would I sell them, never sold anything before, I always just freegle anything, and on ebay only every bought and have about 20 points/stars whatever it is, and how would i work out postage, oh gosh so much trouble to do it all just not sure what to do..........no I will not be freegling any of this

Already have offered train tickets hubby bought for Friday to go to friends daughters funeral which is now cancelled - it would cost us £40 to change the date and tickets, return only cost £24 so seeing if anyone can use them via freegle so far no takers, I hope there will be rather than London Midland making money for nothing.......

Hugs, Love and Healing to all xxxxxxxxx

Ellie83

Popperwell wrote: »

I hope when Aldi opens its as good as I am told that it is but it is more choice on my town and Tesco's and Aldi's will be almost on each others door step...

Aldi is great and not just for food.

I remember buying a rather nice jacket doubled with fleece for my husband for £7. 2 years and many wash later, it's still as new.

smileyt_2

Just popping on quickly to say thank you for the good vibes and WOW at PAH's gift. I never knew face stuff could be so expensive and have never heard of those brands. $496 = £320 :eek: for the Olsen heatmask!! If you sold it for £120 on ebay someone would consider it a bargain. But if you want to use it, do - please don't feel unworthy! There's an ebay thread on MSE where other sellers can probably advise you.

Right, off to bed I go .....

Uniscots97

Morning All, how is everyone? Hoping I hear some good job news myself soon. Its starting to get me down and had row with OH about it last night, he's not seeing its worrying me and he's just moaning about how he feels. It doesn't seem to matter what I say.

GreyQueen

smileyt wrote: »

GQ glad you are not flooded.

Right, off to have some ryvita and jam (because I need something sweet to calm my nerves!) and a cup of decaffeinated tea. Ooh, I know how to live the high life!:rotfl:

Not as glad as I am, hun! But thank you. Fingers crossed for your successful interview today.

And GOOD LUCK to all interviewees.

bossymoo wrote: »

Hi all

I've got spuds too, I think they are second earlies, but I know the leaves have been munched. They a not quite dying back but aree drooping somewhat. Is it time to get them out? We only started our own spuds last year, and dh looked after them, he and DS dug them up but I think they were earlies, they did really quick, anyway.

How do I store them? There's only me and two little ones now so they won't get used up quick... They are the only things we've grown this year apart from some cress DS has grown last week on the kitchen windowsill...

Bi bossymoo, the natural progression of the tatties in their life cycle would be for them to finish growing, start to yellow slowly and droop, the tops to wither away to a few brown sticks and then you know all growth is ended. Commercially, the tater tops are sprayed off to kill them so that they won't get caught up in the harvester. It's been done like that for a long time. Dad was on the farms in the 1950s and they sprayed off the tater tops with sulphuric acid back then, don't know what they use these days.

Re storage, potatoes need to be in a material which excludes the light, or they go green and the green bit contains chemicals which will upset your digestion. They mustn't be in plastic or anything which would prevent moisture passing thru. I store mine in heavy-duty paper sacks which originally held animal feed as I have access to a supply of those. I have also stored an overflow of tatties in a huge plastic planter, lined with several thicknesses of newspaper and covered with several more. I think the planting holes and the fact that the lid and sides were paper gave sufficient ventiation.

Without getting too esoteric, you'd mostly be looking at keeping them in a shed or in a coolish corner of your home. You can store potatoes in clamps (outdoor earthed-up mounds) and there are gardening books which tell you how.

A few things to bear in mind; potatoes are at their most nutritious when freshly-harvested and will lose their Vit C steadily over the months. It's better to eat them in the 3 months after they're harvested than 6 months down the line. Another point is that commercially-stored potatoes are sprayed a lot of times during growth and then again several times in storage to stop them shooting. As a domestic grower, you will need to turf them out of their sack to check that a) none are going rotten and b) rub off any of the shoots. If you let the shoots grow, the goodness in the tuber will go into the shoots. They're particularly prone to shooting in autumn, before their storage gets cold, and again in spring.

Oh, and don't allow them to get frosted. I used to keep mine in my allotment shed until a succession of bitter frosts in 2010-11 frosted them despite them being wrapped in blankets. I have to say that a frostbitten tater rots into a suppurating mass which is quite the nastiest stinky mess that I have ever seen - yuck doesn't come into it.

PAH, wow, what a haul! You must be made-up.

bonnie_bumpkins wrote: »

GQ sorry about the tatties

Job news: Following the promotion of the current Assistant Manager, there is now officially a vacancy for Assistant Manager. I was 'watched whilst working' today and fared very well. However they have to advertise externally as well so I have to wait to see who else applies and if the powers that be think they are any good / better than me. Hopefully I should know one way or the other in 3 weeks or so if I have the job. In the meantime I will keep volunteering as I love what I do.

I am not a spring chicken. I like to think of myself as a late summer bird of quality :cool: .

:j OK, consider that phrase stolen! Love it!

I'm no spring chicken either, as the next big birthday is the 50th but I pass for considerably younger. Can't claim any credit for it as I'm beyond low-maintenance (soap and flannel) as it's genetics. Mum's nearly 70 and doesn't have a wrinkle to her name.

:T Sounds promising for the job, Bonnie. It may well be that advertising it outside is a formality they have to go through to satisfy the organisation's rules but that they want you for it anyway. I have seen this many a time in the RW. Best of luck and I hope that you'l lbe sharing good news with us soon.

Well, when I checked my email from BlightWatch (and how amused am I to be registered on such a thing, me with my 7.5 kg of seed spuds, all 11 rows of it ) they mailed me yesterday afternoon to say my postcode is in a Full Smith Period (2 consecutive days of the highest risk factors, weatherwise, for potato blight). Of course, by that stage I had already found the very first signs on the plants.

I looked at the "history" for July and all bar 3 days thus far have been Full Smith, whereas last year there were only 2 such days in July and they fell after the harvest. I'd have loved to seen the data for June 2007 which was when I last had blight on the lottie but their records stop at 2008 on the site.

Today is an absolutely-glorious sunny day, perfect blue sky, and I shall be back at the office after 2 days' leave in carp weather. I have been dotting my leave days around the months, trying to hit on some decent gardening weather. I have taken days off in May, June and July and the weather has been uniformly atrocious. No wonder the lottie is so shaggy.

Oh well, what happens, happens. Breakfast happens in a moment, then work, then a quick snack and gird my loins to tackle the potato patch............

Urrgh, have insufficient tea in system. Alert! Alert!! GQ at caffeine critical, sent reinforcements..........

ETA Oopps, nearly forgot: Evie74 re the usability of blighted tommies for chutney, I simply don't know. Blight starts on the leaves, both of tatties and tommies, and spreads onto the fruits and tubers. It moves very very quickly so if you think you have it, don't delay one hour longer than necessary to get the tommies off. You could try storing them in the green state for a few days as the blight will show itself as large brown patches on the skin and it travels thru to the flesh. Try googling for pictures (there are lots) to give you an idea what you might be seeing. HTH.

kitschy

Bonnie_bumpkins - I'm sure they won't find anyone as good as you! What a long time to wait though.

PAH - amazing haul! I agree - sell a couple, keep the rest and enjoy pampering yourself. You deserve it.

Smiley_t - fingers crossed for you x

GQ - hope the tatties are ok!

Well, the interview was not traumatic - very pleasant chap, I felt that I was able to answer all the questions, although I did waffle on a bit a couple of times! Should hear on Friday if I have got a second interview, that one I'll have to prepare a presentation for!

So so sad about Lennox. I get cross every time the bull breeds/rotts/dobies get bad press - all those I have known and loved have been wonderful, dopey babies who just want to be cuddled. It's the fact that they have front-loaded power that makes them attractive to thugs, not their nature. I am not in a position to have another poglet at the moment, but I have committed that when I am, it will be a rescue staffie. And I shall cuddle him silly.

Going to see a potential new flat today I think (friend was a bit woolly in his message). Good because I don't think I can put up with viewers traipsing around here all the time, plus the rent is cheaper and there is an extra bedroom! Just the location I am unsure about. Then off to Stratford this afternoon for rehearsal - hope it stays dry!

Possession

Phew! At the moment I'm feeling quite glad I'm not growing potatoes! I'm sure that will change come christmas when there's no potatoes in the shops for my roast dinner though.
I keep having the urge to go and gaze at my new garage store cupboard. It's a bit sad.
DH applied for 20 jobs yesterday, hope something comes of a couple. He is still waiting re. his interview last week. Apparently they really liked him and gave the recruitment agent excellent feedback, but he is too senior for the position really. However they haven't said no yet which ia a bit odd. Even the agent seems to think it's a bit odd. Heigh ho. DH is having this problem a lot. He is willing to accept less salary (quite a lot less) but he is just not being considered for roles which are considered too junior.
It will be quite odd when he eventually goes back to work. I've grown used to being around him most of the time for the last 2 yrs, although there's been times I couldn't wait for him to get out of the house!

Possession

kitschy wrote: »

Bonnie_bumpkins - I'm sure they won't find anyone as good as you! What a long time to wait though.

Well, the interview was not traumatic - very pleasant chap, I felt that I was able to answer all the questions, although I did waffle on a bit a couple of times! Should hear on Friday if I have got a second interview, that one I'll have to prepare a presentation for!

Going to see a potential new flat today I think (friend was a bit woolly in his message). Good because I don't think I can put up with viewers traipsing around here all the time, plus the rent is cheaper and there is an extra bedroom! Just the location I am unsure about. Then off to Stratford this afternoon for rehearsal - hope it stays dry!

glad the interview went well, and fingers crossed for a second one.
Is that Stratford East London? I used to live in Leytonstone.

kitschy

Possession wrote: »

glad the interview went well, and fingers crossed for a second one.
Is that Stratford East London? I used to live in Leytonstone.

Thanks Possession! Yes - at the new stadium. My East London geography isn't great as my clan are from West London, but it seems nice! So far on my Olympic travels I've been to Dagenham, West Ham, Canning Town, Star Lane and Stratford, so I'm getting better at knowing where I am!