OK lets do this.....24 payments to go

spendinglikemad

Yes first O/P went in OK - got a letter from bank to pay how much O/P we can make for the rest of the year. There are going to be lots of letters if they send us a letter every time we make an O/P, at the moment its set up to pay an extra £1000 each month until we work out what the house extension costs are going to be. I fear they will use the rest of our savings currently sat in premium bonds in the hope the numbers come up before we need to cash out!!!

So, bank holiday is coming up and we have next week booked off so thats 9 days of which we can get the house/garden/allotment sorted - puppy training is a lot of work and the heel work is proving the hardest as we are not enjoying our walks with her to the maximum yet. She wants to be everywhere and the constant distraction of other dogs, people, leaves blowing means she doesn't listen to a word when we are out of the house 90% of the time!!!

Sigh!! My mum is coming over and so I need to arrange stuff to do so that we are not sat drinking tea for 2 days and get something fruitful done (thinking take deck chairs to allotment and so she can chat to me whilst I do the essentials and get the allotment planted up, weeded, grass cut) - I find I am not getting time to go to the allotment but want to keep it going I just need to put in the right stuff that doesn't need tending as much (so far we have: raspberries, strawberries, gooseberries, plum and damson trees that take up half of the space, thinking to get sweetcorn (mini and standard in) as that doesn't need a lot of attention plus get the pumpkins in there (reminds me to get butternut squash seeds on ebay). Veg patch at home has berries, asparagus (recently moved) some spuds, carrots, onions and purple sprouting so will see what else I can get in (hopefully pak choi, kale and fennel will come through as well as beans, peas - hopefully having these in the garden will mean that we can pick daily as last years rasps were amazing - anyway thats the veggies, also growing some flowers from seed to avoid a big spend at the garden centre and get the borders looking nice, must learn how to take cuttings!!

Other jobs to really get done:
Ebay ebay ebay - say no more
Declutter utility of old shoes and old pots/pans that came with us when we moved and never used in over 1 year
Deep clean bathrooms (lower priority to be done on a cooler day!!)
Go to extra puppy training hour just for heel work £3 Sun morning probably a good idea!

Hubby was thinking about getting his parents over to help with some of garden jobs but it comes with extra work for me (getting a room ready (more cleaning....)) and then the endless cycle of meals which they are accustomed to, to be honest I would rather just get on with the list of stuff we have to do cos its not a rest for me, for example I wouldn't feel comfortable to wander down in my dressing gown after a bath/shower later and be able to chill and watch some TV or read/glass wine but maybe I should just do what I want ......

We had architect round this week to discuss his first draft drawings and made some changes, I am kind of enjoying the planning side at least in terms of what we want to do to part of the house downstairs layout although whether it will work out remains to be seen and maybe I am fooling myself looking at nice open flow kitchens and utility (mine is currently a dumping ground) I keep showing hubby what my walk in pantry is meant to look like but I don't think he really "gets" what I want so I need to keep re-iterating!!

SLM