Preparing for Winter V

juliettet

Hi Tori.k, will pinning the blanket on the actual duvet help?

tori.k

Never even gave something as simple as that a thought thank you Juliettet.

Eenymeeny

Similar suggestion here tori.k: I have safety-pinned a cheap ikea fleece to my side of the quilt before putting it into the cover during that in-between seasons time. Also if you put one under the sheet on your side it makes a big difference. I used to often wake up with leg cramps and find that it really helps.

babyblooz

Well I walked into Asda tonight and surprise surprise they had a 3 litre slow cooker (own brand) for £9 reduced down from £15 so it just jumped into my trolley! It even comes with a two year guarantee so for that price I can't complain. It is a round one so I won't be able to fit in a chicken but I may buy another bigger one if there is one in the sales around Christmas.

juliettet

I'm having to rethink my bedding for Winter. Having hot flushes (thankfully no sweating), I need to have the room much cooler. Last year I left the medium duvet on with a wool blanket over my arms so i didn't feel choked.Trouble was the room was freezing for getting up.

Wednesday2000

I had the heating on from yesterday and it did feel warmer in the house. Nice and cosy.:)

I got my husband to take down the washing line airer outside as we probably won't use it from now on and it frees up some space on our patio.

I washed the curtains upstairs and need to do the living room curtains tomorrow. The gutters are getting cleaned out later today.

The food cupboard is all stocked up with tins of beans and soup and I bought some sinus tablets and more ibuprofen the other day for the medicine drawer.

All in all, I feel very prepared for winter.:T

Primrose

Primrose wrote: »

Winter prepping the garden today hopefully. Putting the garden furniture away, closing off the garden tap and packing the hose reel away in the garage I dont t think we're going to be enjoying any more al fresco lunches on the patio under the sun umbrella!

A friend has just told me that packing everything away so early is going to make winter feel even longer! Normally we'd leave it out until mid/late October as often we have some fine Autumn weather but you have to do these things as and when you have time. We have a couple of folding picnic chairs we can use for any temporary fine weather.


Incidentally for those of you grabbing late sunshine for washing curtains, in the past I've done this, ironed them while still slightly damp and rehung them, leaving them in the closed position. I've found that especially for curtains hung over a window with a radiator which is switched on below them, they finish drying off very quickly and it saves having them hung around these house in all kinds of awkward places to finish off drying.

[Deleted User]

It's cold here today and the promised rain has just started, more or less on time too! Crazy gardens here, we have primroses in full bloom on the front lawn and yesterday on the bus on the way home from the Dentist I saw rhododendrons in bloom and....wisteria! nature is inside out and upside down. We had planned to pick the apples from the tree this afternoon and also to harvest some of the pumpkin crop on the allotment but as with the cricket.....rain stops play!!!

I have the first casserole of autumn simmering away quietly in the slow cooker and the kitchen smells wonderfully savoury, I'm going to make a minestrone soup this afternoon to use up some of an open pack of cooking bacon, the last really (over) ripe tomatoes from the greenhouse and the last few stragglers from the French beans, I have all the other ingredients I need in the fridge or store cupboard another Autumn/Winter standard in our house, seasons are definitely on the turn even in South Hants. We lit the woodstove for the first time last Sunday when I was feeling really poorly and I'm wondering if we'll do so again this evening, it's cold enough now at lunchtime and will only cool further as it gets dark and we have logs, kindling, paper logs ready to go in their baskets on the hearth so we'll see.....

Primrose

I have yet to make my first proper chunky minestrone soup of autumn although have made some for the freezer which was "zapped down" with a stick blender to be stored in plastic milk bottles. There is something very satisfying about a nice chunky soup. Similarly the first winter casserole has yet to come. I love this kind of "peasant" cooking and again it's a good way of using up all those home grown wrinkly tomatoes or misshapen ugly home grown veg which would otherwise get wasted.

They remind me of those "Hovel in the Hills" days, one of a number of books published by Elizabeth West writing about her experiences of trying to live the good life in rural Wales with very little money. . Sadly her books are out of print now but are still sometimes available on Amazon and are such a good read on a wild gale stricken day when the rain is lashing down in the window panes.

[Deleted User]

I have 'Hovel in the Hills' and 'Kitchen in the Hills' and love them both, I've been on the look out for 'Garden in the Hills' having had it to read from the library some years ago but sadly it has never been in the charity shops or at a boot fair, I'll keep on looking. I have a great admiration for the mind set that Elizabeth West displays of making the very best of what you have and the adaptability that makes a home and creates nourishing food from what is available. I loved her 'salad' recipe in Garden in the Hills where she says she wanders the garden and veg patches with a bowl and a pair of scissors and everything that is available be it grown, wild or 'invented' gets harvested including things like clover and strawberry leaves, chopped up and given a salad cream dressing to make sure they have some vitamins in the 'hungry gap' period. She even talks of digging down into the snow to get whatever is green from there too, a lady to be cherished and perhaps emulated?

I've just looked on EBay and they have copies of all 3 books at under £3 per item mostly free postage too. I'm ordering the Garden one today!