Prosperous soul in the making

EchoB

Just had a massive catch up on your diary, your garden sounds wonderful and it seems you are making progress in it.
 

I love your writing style and it’s great you are all keeping busy. I made the error of doing lockdown baking-I’m going to have to stop as I can’t fit in my jeans, maybe I should focus on my garden instead!

PositiveBalance

MovingForwards said:

@PositiveBalance those of us in flats go stir-crazy!

Glad there was no lasting damage to your toes.

Keep plugging away, carefully, in the garden and you will soon be eating the fruits of your labour!

@MovingForwards Alas, much as I rather suspected! I hope this all blows over quickly so you can unstir, so to speak.

@jwil Don't get me started on those foods. Devil's food!

Honeysucklelou2

The garden sounds like it is coming on amazingly. Chicken manure pellets are always a good find!

savingholmes

Thanks all - lovely to come back to so many comments. Sorry it is so hard for those in flats. My brother has a balcony on his flat and seems to overlook greenery - he spotted a woodpecker in the tree opposite and got some fab photo and video evidence. One of my other sisters is in a flat but has some narrow outdoor space as they divided the garden in half when the property was split. Some are definitely luckier than others. Hopefully it will be better in your new place MF.

I did some sowing and planting yesterday and hope to do more later today. I've been doing most of the work on an outdoor table so its at the right height. I've got like an A1 size plastic planting area that's big enough to plant multiple smaller pots on - don't know how to describe it and that's sat on my table. I got my W1lk0 delivery today - so now have some hessian planting sacks for veg and some apparently really hard to put together obelisks judging from the grumpy noises coming from DH as he tries to assemble them. £7.99. He's put one up so far and it looks nice - I couldn't get garden canes so reasonable alternative... The sacks are my attempt at 'raised beds'. Just have to hope I have enough soil to fill them. I am hoping some seeds for bell and sweet peppers will come in the next couple of weeks. Time will tell at how successful I am at growing them. I think I will end up planting some things into bare soil - like peas or beans. 

I was wrong and don't have a delivery coming today - so sent DS to the chemist and shop yesterday. He was desperate to go out so a win:win. I paid him to wear a mask and gloves!! We now have a plentiful supply of all life essentials: beans, chopped tomatoes and loo rolls!!! I now have an HRT gel to try instead of tablets. 

I tried to do the diet yesterday but failed spectacularly around 7pm when I spotted a 6 pack of W@lk3rs cheese and onion.... 'nough said. I still lost weight will let you have an update of how much weight I lost on Thursday! DH's sugars have fallen from a high of a very scary 19!!! to a more respectable 7.1 after sticking to 800-1000 cals a day since last Thursday - and cutting out the obvious culprits. He too is losing weight. DS hasn't stuck to plan.... Hoping he gets back on track.

On Sunday night I made a gorgeous curry with chicken, onion, green and red peppers, a tin of mushrooms, cayenne pepper, cajun pepper, cajun pepper, turmeric, tin of mushy peas, 2 teaspoons mango sauce and 200ml coconut milk we'd bought as a milk substitute. I over-spiced it but the coconut milk made it delish - eaten with sweet potato. I cooked it on the hob - simmered for a while to make the chicken more tender. I divided it into 4 portions - had one yesterday - will have another today.

Have a good day y'all. It's a bright sun-shiney day - Think Lighthouse fam song.

savingholmes

The chicken dish (made with 330g of chicken breast / 4) came to around 325 calories including my portion of 120g of sweet potato

hugglemonster

Garden sounds lovely, I love this time of year when the seeds start their little lives my daughter laughs at me for tucking them away at night but they need looking after. So far the tomatoes, potatoes and the onions are doing well, I'll leave them a bit longer before I split them and repot. I forgot about Wilko for gardening supplies I'll have to have a look.

I hope the HRT gel works for you, well done hubby for going out.

Enjoy the lovely day, H x

[Deleted User]

Your garden sounds absolutely wonderful and congrats on the combined weight losses x

doingitanyway

Well done on the garden. I really want raised beds and have lots of soil so I might steal your idea if I can get the Wilko bags delivered. I've only ordered seeds that can go straight into the soil as I can't see myself faffing with germinating seed and I don't have a greenhouse.

Re the weight. I am having a 800 day tomorrow. I've decided to just concentrate on 2 800 days a week and keep the actual days flexible. I'm also going to calorie count and plan out the 800 days in advance and post my 'menu' on the fridge so I don't have to think about it.

Hope your day is going well.

savingholmes

hugglemonster said:

Garden sounds lovely, I love this time of year when the seeds start their little lives my daughter laughs at me for tucking them away at night but they need looking after. So far the tomatoes, potatoes and the onions are doing well, I'll leave them a bit longer before I split them and repot. I forgot about Wilko for gardening supplies I'll have to have a look.
I hope the HRT gel works for you, well done hubby for going out.
Enjoy the lovely day, H x

Thanks - I'm guessing it is going to be a couple of weeks before I see seedlings but that is probably weather dependent. I've planted some in my normal flowering pots - and others in pots to go on my kitchen windowsill. I swapped some seeds with a neighbour today - so I now have peppers sown in little pots too. On HSL's diary someone posted about radishes so I remembered I have a seed pack of them somewhere so need to look for them. I've also ordered some carrot seeds from Am****

SSDD23 said:

Your garden sounds absolutely wonderful and congrats on the combined weight losses x

Thanks the garden is getting the most TLC it's had in years! DH moved a second plastic storage bench as I realised it was placed where we actually get the most sun so he's moved it to a shaded area at the back of the garden. I now need to do a little cultivation of the soil - and add a thin layer of my bought compost so I can grow more there. It will also hopefully mean that I have a better view from the other plastic storage bench we moved yesterday. DH assembled the 4 obelisks for me today so I can use them for my peas and beans. I've placed one in direct view of the nicer bench and planted 7 pea plants in the hope at least some come up. I can always move some on later.  I have a big tub of pelleted chicken manure so when I've got everything where I want it I will also spread that. I also have various other fertilisers in the shed if needed.

doingitanyway said:

Well done on the garden. I really want raised beds and have lots of soil so I might steal your idea if I can get the Wilko bags delivered. I've only ordered seeds that can go straight into the soil as I can't see myself faffing with germinating seed and I don't have a greenhouse.
Re the weight. I am having a 800 day tomorrow. I've decided to just concentrate on 2 800 days a week and keep the actual days flexible. I'm also going to calorie count and plan out the 800 days in advance and post my 'menu' on the fridge so I don't have to think about it.

I like the idea of seeds that go direct in the soil however - part of my garden has landscape fabric down and some old decking style paths etc  and I don't want to necessarily undo that and create too much work for myself - and the rest has trees and shrubs in it. If I had more compost - I would do all my veg gardening in pots as it feels like it would be less work. I have white flowering astilbes currently that look beautiful in the shaded areas. My purple azalea is flowering. My delicate pink clematis is also flowering at upto 8ft high on a wall. The garden is coming into its own. 

Keep going with the 800 diet DIA it is definitely helping us even when we don't stick to it perfectly. I too plan my meals a day ahead. 

savingholmes

In financial news - I get paid tomorrow. Woohoo! I will get slightly more than normal as I didn't get around to buying holiday which seems a good call under the circumstances - however 10 days less holiday than normal isn't that appealing. I get a second chance to buy some if needed in September so will see how things are going then. 2 CCs went out today - one was expected at £150 and the second was £172 that I was expecting to be after payday. What that does mean is that our CC debt has dropped below £22K. Happy dance. Now £21,847. Expecting to clear another £300 or so this month.

If DS's accommodation costs get cancelled will have an extra £933 to put towards debt. If they don't plan to ask DS for at least half as we are picking up all his costs currently - we could then put that towards debt and might the be able to get closer to £21K by the end of the month.

I'm assuming our new chairs are delayed indefinitely - certainly would struggle to pay them outright this month if they were delivered as planned (unlikely). Focus for this month is to get food and other spend back under control. I've been quite lax recently.