Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Evening m'dears,
A quick one from me tonight. A no-spend day here. I've planted out the 2nd sowing of beans, tied in the first ones again, picked lettuce, spring onions & strawberries, de-gunked the pond & had a lovely hot bath & hairwash. Mr F has fed all the veg, mowed the lawn & continued clearing buried rubbish round the back of the shed, left by various past owners of our house. I've also baked bread & topped up the bird feeders. Starlings squabbling over the new seed & suet block treat. I want to continue moving a few things forward over the coming week so am aiming for a nice early start tomorrow morning.
F x

Pixiehouse55

WoW Foxgloves what a full filling day you've had😁 I got all my ironing finished and sat and done my knitting as my back was playing up.. Fingers crossed tomorrow we will have a definite date of 21st July. To do the lounge floor and Wait to hear if our furniture has to go into storage or not.
Asd6 tomorrow to get a few birthday cards a couple of hand towels and digestive biscuits for the cheesecake. Lid6 for Lentil crisps for me and my lactose free milk. Floors to be hoovered/Washed . Sweet n sour pork left overs from roast dinner tomorrow with Hackleback potatoes sweetcorn and broad beans.
Keep safe everyone and take care .

foxgloves

Oooh, I love broad beans, Pixiehouse55. I must think about getting them back on my growing list for next year.
F x

foxgloves

Just seen the weather forecast for this afternoon so that has spurred me into action. Am on my 2nd cup of coffee, then I'd better get outside to do a few garden jobs as it looks as though rain will very much stop play this afternoon. I didn't do my usual daily diary round-up yesterday. I did achieve a few useful things, such as Monday morning's regular budget & banking update & lots of laundry dried for free on the line. But then my s-in-law popped round for a cup of coffee out in the garden & before we knew it, we'd spent 2 hours yakking! Really nice to have a catch-up though & we agreed we'd have a socially distanced BBQ when we know there's a nice sunny weekend coming.
Ok, I must get a shift on..... am skyping my sis at 10.45 & I want all my gardening jobs done by then.
Back later, 
F x

foxgloves

Greetings diary readers,
Well, I am sitting in the conservatory & it is absolutely plibbing down with rain. Thankfully I managed to get my gardening tasks done this morning. I had 3 tasks which needed doing as a priority. I cut back some big clumps of hardy geraniums which had flopped over onto the lawn - those should now put out some nice fresh green growth & will almost certainly flower again next month. I weeded the celeriac bed......growing celeriac is a new thing for me, but one thing the books are all clear about is that it likes loads of water, so no point letting weeds grow as they will be competing for moisture. It didn't take long to do & I picked up more little immature 'June drop' apples as I went along. Then into the greenhouse to stake & tie in all the chilli plants. I'm mostly growing 'Lemon drop', a fruity variety new to me, but I bought a jar of lemon chilli jam from a food fair last autumn & it was proper yum! Instantly researched the chilli variety in the hope of a sufficiently good harvest to make my own lovely yellow jam. I've also got 2 'Ring o' Fire' chilli plants, as it is always worth growing a few of the long hot cayenne types if you like cooking & it means I can top up our freezer stores of chillies & also dry some too. Finally, I have a single jalapeno plant, which I grew from seed last year, but managed to overwinter on a warm bedroom windowsill. It grumped a bit at first, but is now forming chillies. They are my favourite for pizzas & fajhiltas, as well as for making guacomole. The greenhouse veg all looked ok, so no watering needed tonight at all, as the outside stuff is filling its boots with this afternoon's persistent rain.
I haven't got a huge amount to do today. I've defrosted a garlic flat bread as the basis for tomorrow's packed lunch & will be making mushroom stroganoff (from the old Cranks cookbook....still haven't ordered a new copy, I picked mine up & the whole of the insides splurged out all over the floor. It has fallen to bits to the point where I just can't stick it together any more) for tonight. Just deciding whether to run down to the veggie garden to pick some courgettes to saute to have with it, as we both like those when they are in season. Then I shall knit. I have been knitting this big challenging purple jumper since before Christmas & the end is soooo in sight now - just 22 rounds of stocking stitch to knit, with a few decreases, then 5 cms of rib for the cuff. Then finished! I will then be revisiting my stash to see what else I can knit without buying new yarn, which is always so very tempting. I brought a nice painted chest of drawers back with me when we were clearing Mum's house. She kept all her yarn in it & I thought it would be nice to use it for my own yarn. The idea, however, was that all my yarn would fit in these drawers & not also be stored in various bags hanging from my craft shelves. I also have a project which Mum was knitting when she was taken into hospital (she never recovered) which would have made me too sad to complete last year, but I am actually wanting to crack on with it now, as it is a nice little Christmas decoration pattern which she designed herself. I also have some pretty blanket squares which I started knitting ages ago which I may finish to make a blanket to match our bedroom as part of its makeover. I'll see which I fancy doing......oh & I have some very vibrant sock yarn to knit a pair of funky socks to go in with Mr F's birthday or Christmas gifts. So plenty to do. Hope I can avoid new yarn purchases for a little while longer at least!
OK, I don't think this rain is going to let up at all, so I shall pop my dotty waterproof on & nip out for those courgettes.
Take care, m'dears.
F x
Forgot to say, have shopped stuff from home to make a new ornament. Will try & remember to tell you about that tomorrow :-)

foxgloves

Hello readers, 
Have spent this morning knitting the final cuff on my big purple jumper, sewing in the ends & am pleased to say after many months (I've knitted smaller projects in between), it is now blocking on the dining table. I intend to look through my yarn stash & patterns later to see what I fancy knitting next.
It felt good to make a new ornament from 3 entirely shopped from home items. I have had an attractive, quite modern decanter for years with embossed glass spirals on it. It occasionally comes out of the cupboard for use as a vase, but isn't much use as a decanter as it doesn't hold enough 🍷. I also had (hanging around) some sea glass, mostly in shades of green, which I collected in a rocky cove in Cornwall & the set of tiny battery-powered fairy lights which were previously piled around an over-mantel mirror (prior to new fireplace). I put all the sea glass in the decanter then squashed the string of lights in. Couldn't really tell in daylight if it would look any good, but as dusk fell & the timer came on, they looked so pretty! I'd have been pleased with the effect if I'd spent money on it, but it is more satisfying to re-purpose things & I really enjoy that now. The batteries are rechargable too.
I just off to fire up the coffee machine, then get on with my afternoon. 
Hope everyone still keeping well, 
F x

Onebrokelady

Well well done on finishing your jumper, the light sounds lovely 

foxgloves

Thanks, OBL. It is just nice that even when doing a pretty big home improvements project, there are smaller things which can be shopped from home to create a new look. I don't need to be running off to shops & garden centres to buy expensive candles, baskets, cushions, thows etc just because I fancy a bit of a change - something which was a significant leaker of money in my pre-LBM days.
F x

foxgloves

Well m'dears, I've just squidged down to the bottom of our garden to empty the compost bin & stopped to pick some coriander & a bunch of spring onions on the way back. No gardening today, as there has barely been a pause in the relentless drizzle. I've done a few jobs, including an email I intended to send a month ago & I've got a crusty sourdough baking in the oven, but mostly I've had a day of leisure. I caught up with the final couple of episodes of 'The A-word' & progressed my new knitting project. I decided on mittens in the end. I don't need any myself but they will do for the present box or I'm sure local charity shops will be happy to sell them if I put nice Christmassy labels on them. I'll see. They are a good use of my yarn stash. I can ALMOST get all of my yarn into that chest of drawers, so it will be tidier in my little HQ room without overflow yarn bags knocking around.
Well, I'd better get the bread out of the oven & await the shopping. Mr F has definitely earned a snog today as he's been into work & decided to stop off in town to get the grocery shopping in on his way home. I'm making fajhitas tonight.... huge peppers so have chopped & frozen some ready for next time I make a pizza.
Love to all..... 
F x

foxgloves

Well what a soggy day. Another one. I managed ten mins out on the courtyard with my coffee this morning, but that was it as there was a massive rainstorm this afternoon with a bit of thunder. Local dog walkers who'd got caught in it racing down our street to get home looking like drowned rats. A productive but deeply unexciting day in which I cleaned the entire house, emptied all the bins, did 2 loads of laundry, baked a batch of rolls to go with our BBQ tomorrow (first time we've invited people over for food since before Lockdown, so we are really looking forward to that), finished blocking my new jumper, finished knitting first mitten, found out Gas Safe information & wrote a list for our trip into town first thing tomorrow.
I've bored myself just typing that! But at least I can say that not a penny has left my purse.
I've definitely earned a soak in the bath & a bit of a facial tonight after all that cleaning, so I'm off to find some bubbles. 
Peace & Love,
F x