Cheery's country living adventure

Cheery_Daff

 Thank you all. Loony Lou, hadn't realised there was an annual pass, interesting! I'm not sure whether we'll stick to it - personally I'd love the combination of fortnightly delivery and a veg box, but Mr Cheery does rather like a potter round the supermarket and it's a bit pointless paying for delivery if he's going anyway. But we'll see!

greenbee

Maybe you should train Mr Cheery to potter round the DIY stores instead?  

I've just had someone round to collect my sitting room and dining room curtains. She's going to remake them to fit the windows, and then use some spare fabric to make blinds for the other two windows. I'm really lucky that I've found someone who is happy to use old fabric rather than new as it's saving a lot of money (although it's not cheap getting someone else to do the work!) plus they are curtains I like. Once these are done, I just need new curtains made for my bedroom - and will need new fabric as I don't have anything suitable). 

As the kitchen is due for delivery next month I really do need to get on and get it cleared (so need to clear the garage in order to be able to move stuff in there) and decorated. As well as choosing all the missing bits... 

rtandon27

Cheery_Daff said:

 Thank you all. Loony Lou, hadn't realised there was an annual pass, interesting! I'm not sure whether we'll stick to it - personally I'd love the combination of fortnightly delivery and a veg box, but Mr Cheery does rather like a potter round the supermarket and it's a bit pointless paying for delivery if he's going anyway. But we'll see!

Cheery - that is exactly what we do a combo of the two...

By default our veg box is contactless...magically arriving weekly at the door & the old boxes whisked away...

Our supermarket shop is biweekly for all the non-veg bits...the drivers have been 95% really good  stepping away from the door to let me unpack before taking away the crates, but then we tend to get the same drivers all the time so they 'know' us and will happily chat from afar.

Only downside to not going to the store is the lack of yellow stickers!

Cheery_Daff

Oooh, exciting curtain and kitchen happenings greenbee! 

Our veg box actually comes in compostable bags, which I've been using in the compost caddy. I've stopped it temporarily - I was a fortnight behind in my potato consumption, and the kale in the garden was going to waste because I was trying to eat the stuff in the veg box. There's no choice with the one we had, you can't pick and choose what you get, so I'll start it up again once most of the stuff has gone out of the garden. 

Nowt much to report today. Working at home, it's raining, some friends of Mr Cheery's turned up at lunchtime for a cuppa which was nice (they're still here actually but I've got work to do so have escaped). Rusty chicken came in this morning looking rather poorly, but then a few minutes later laid a rather soft-shelled egg on the living room floor (!) and has been looking a bit brighter since. Although I did pop to the living room a few minutes ago and she seems to be in the house again, fast asleep on Mr Cheery's legs  

Cheery_Daff

Ooh, spotted over there ----->> in Martin's email that the Green Homes grant now has an eligibility checker. Pretty straightforward to start with, and it turns out it already has an EPC listed for us (of course - because you have it done as part of the house selling process). We're rated as G (the worst - average is D). It then asks a load of other questions about house construction etc which I *think* I got right and is recommending

* solid wall insulation (£9000) - not sure how practical this is with ancient stone walls
* connection to mains gas network - again, not sure how practical this is, I think nearest mains gas is 2 miles away
* new heating controls (£400) - pretty sure they're recommending that to everyone as they didn't ask about it
* new condensing boiler (£2600) - again, they just asked if I had one and I said yes, didn't ask when it was put in!
* solar thermal (£5000)

Hmm, not even going to bother listing the rest as they all seem pretty generic (upgrading double glazing, new outside doors etc) - does list heat pumps. 

Interesting, but not sure it's told me anything I didn't already know (other than that we are rated as a G, which I probably should have remembered, and in any case could have guessed - and that was before we made a massive hole in the kitchen ceiling!) Definitely could do some straightfoward things in relation to replacing the two or three single glazed windows, making the back door fit better, balancing the radiators properly so this end of the house isn't so freezing though - probably should sort that before considering big projects... 

And probably should actually finish working before considering any of it! 

Cheery_Daff

Sorry, I'm waffling on and on in here at the minute (mind you, I think I've been doing that for about 14 years so no change there then )

Had an email from LPG compare bloke - sadly potential new supplier can't guarantee a smaller tanker, so we can't use them. I have no idea what they'd do - turn up in an 18 tonne truck and just stare wistfully a third of a mile down the driveway?? Will do one last check with one other supplier, but then I think just stick with existing one. 

In better news, I actually remembered to provide a meter reading to the electricity company the other day, and it looks like we're £195 in credit, so that's nice! They recommend switching the DD from £53.10 to £42.60 so I'm going to do that, and add the extra £10.50 to the monthly mortgage payment

Cheery_Daff

Hmmm, other potential new LPG supplier isn't particularly cheap - their normal tariff is 39ppl, and is variable rather than fixed - they do have fixed tariffs but you have to ring up to find out and they're shut (although apparently they're going to ring me at some point anyway - I had to give them my number to get a quote). 

Interestingly, they do a bioLPG option - I'd never heard of that. Apparently it's a byproduct of biodiesel production. That contract would be 41ppl (again, variable not fixed). Will wait and see what the fixed options are, although (as usual) I'm now tiring of looking...

Remembered that the people are coming to dismantle the little garage on Friday, so I'll need to pay them £750. Fortunately that's sitting in the 'home maintenance' category in YNAB already - but it will need building back up over the coming months (which might influence the amount we stick into the mortgage straight away). VERY excited about having that garage gone though. We've never used it as a garage, it's proper rickety and we've only ever thrown cr*p in it while we're collecting for the tip It's asbestos, or we would have taken it down ourselves before now. 

Most importantly, it blocks part of the view across the valley from the living room and front garden, so it'll open up a lovely new view from my window seat, and from my swing seat in the garden

Cheery_Daff

Ok, progress towards goals today

HOME
* ordered wood oil for ceiling beams - delivery due on Friday
* started clearing giant pile of clothes/boxes/blankets etc from what will eventually be our new bedroom

GARDEN AND LAND
* friends delivered four unwanted pallets - Mr Cheery has commandeered them for a new windbreak for the shelter

MONEY
* 50p Prolific survey at lunchtime
* reduced electric bill by £10.50 a month - and made a note to add that amount to monthly mortgage figure
* shopped around for wood oil, and even with delivery we got it for less than half of what we would have paid at the local (big chain) DIY shop 
* leftover risotto for tea, made enough frittata at lunchtime to feed me tomorrow, and feed friends who came round at short notice today
* used our own home grown eggs, turnips, kale and chard from the garden
* apparently the farmers mislaid a cow they were trying to move this morning - there's a large cowpat on the lawn by the chicken run and they'd shut the gate to the meadow that I usually leave open When it's not quite so soggy, I'll scoop it up for the compost pile - free manure! (that's how I'm trying to see the chicken droppings that they seem to insist on leaving on the path to the back door...)

Little steps forward, for which I'm very grateful

Cheery_Daff

OOh, and a random bit of MB-ing while I was waiting for something else to happen led to £35.44! Excellent - that covers both MB subscriptions for the month which is my main goal with MB for the minute! 

themadvix

Ooh, Cheery, lots going on!

How annoying about the LPG company not being able to deliver after all your complicated maths! 

Your discoveries from the Green Energy grant thing are interesting - as you say, it doesn't really sound like they've asked the right (or enough) questions.

Loads of progress on stuff though, which is good. Love the free manure! And the new view you'll get will be great value at £750 I reckon!