Forever Starts Now

starnac

Happy New Year's Eve. I'm not sure if I'm looking forward to a new year or not to be honest. Not that it matters, it's coming whether I like it or not lol!

I'd like to think 2023 will be a better year but looking at the past few years, I won't be holding my breath!

I've had quite a productive day today. I sent in my invoice for some work I did for a friend in December and gently reminded her of the work I did in November for her too. She was a trooper and paid it all within half an hour. I didn't mind waiting for the money as she has been so busy she hasn't stopped, hence why she asked me to do some hours for her. I was planning on waiting for the new year when everyone goes back to work to send the invoices to make sure she got a break but she messaged me saying she was organising her accounts while the business was quiet. So invoices sent and paid. Woohoo!

I've just used some of that money at the local garden centre. I sat down this morning and thought about what I wanted to plant in the garden this year, what I needed and what I already had. DH bought me a plantable calendar for Christmas so that's handy. 

I did spend £41 at the garden centre so not a good start to being frugal but what's done is done. I got pretty much everything I needed so that's a positive. I drew my plans for a potting bench and veg plots for DH who will build them for me. He's currently downstairs in the garage/workshop sorting through his materials to see what he has already. 

This evening will be a quiet one. We are having home made lasagne for tea, then making our family and individual goals for 2023. This is something we've always done since the kids were little but they both complained about doing it last year so I wasn't planning on including them this year. Just me and DH discussing what we want to accomplish this coming year. But then both kids asked me when we were planning on doing it as they had already been thinking about their goals! So that was nice. 

What plans do you all have for this evening? Will you stay up for midnight?

Cheery_Daff

That's nice that the kids wanted to join in with goal making 😊 what a lovely family activity for the evening. 

And great to have your invoices paid too, hooray! 

We're both full of cold so not much activity here - in fact we'll probably spend the evening in separate rooms with separate boxes of tissues, then I'll go to bed early and he'll sit mindlessly front of the TV then go to bed in a separate room - same as every night since before Christmas 🙄😂

Still, I have already been pottering about plotting and scheming for next year, and plan to do some more of that this evening 😊 Hope you have a good one!

starnac

We actually stayed up til midnight. That hardly ever happens but both kids wanted to. I was probably in bed about 12.10am!!   

Had a quiet day. I cleaned out the chickens, fresh new bedding for them, went to my mum's for lunch, came home, ran a mile on the treadmill for Day 1 of RED January and now I'm making a plan for tomorrow.

It's supposed to be dry here tomorrow so my plan is to do the following:

• prune pear trees x2
• prune apple tree
• plant lettuce in long tub
• plant chillies in smaller pots
• clean bird feeders
• move the pot with the strawberries inside
• Help DH make fire lighters
• DS is planning to make cookies
• washing

that should keep me busy. 

Cheery_Daff

Ooh, that's a very productive list! 

starnac

Cheery_Daff said:

Ooh, that's a very productive list! 

Thanks Cheery. I'm trying to make use of the dry weather today. It's back to rain for the rest of the week! 

starnac

starnac said:

We actually stayed up til midnight. That hardly ever happens but both kids wanted to. I was probably in bed about 12.10am!!   

Had a quiet day. I cleaned out the chickens, fresh new bedding for them, went to my mum's for lunch, came home, ran a mile on the treadmill for Day 1 of RED January and now I'm making a plan for tomorrow.

It's supposed to be dry here tomorrow so my plan is to do the following:

• prune pear trees x2
• prune apple tree
• plant lettuce in long tub
• plant chillies in smaller pots
• clean bird feeders
• move the pot with the strawberries inside
• Help DH make fire lighters
• DS is planning to make cookies
• washing

that should keep me busy. 

Well it doesn't look like I was very productive but like always, one job turns into another and I wanted to make the most of the dry weather and work outside. 

DH built me a workbench/potting bench in the downstairs conservatory so I can get the potting done tomorrow. 

The main thing was pruning the fruit trees. I looked up "things to do in the garden in January" and made a list of all the things that were relevant to us. Pruning the fruit trees came top. We have two mature pear trees and a mature apple tree currently in the garden so I pruned both of those. DH took down some big branches of other trees that were overhanging our fence (our trees, hanging over into the lane) and took out a tree that was dead. 

He shifted some wood around, so the ones that are dry came into the indoor woodstore downstairs and the ones that need drying were stacked either in the shed or the outside woodstore. Judging by the amount we have used in the year we have been here, we should have about 2 years worth of wood. 

The inside jobs are now top of the list for tomorrow as apparently it's back to rain again. 

Karmacat

You've both done loads, you've been *extremely* productive, well done you.

starnac

Karmacat said:

You've both done loads, you've been *extremely* productive, well done you.

Thanks KC. I'm being inspired by all the other productive people on MSE at the moment. Yourself included

starnac

Doing outside things yesterday was definitely the best idea. It is bucketing down here today! 

Today I need to:

• Plant chilli seeds
• Plant lettuce
  
• Take DS Welly shopping (for a school residential - his are too small so he's been wearing his sister's old ones but he understandably doesn't want to take pink flowery wellies with him on the residential)
  
• Make firelighters
  
• RED January - probably treadmill looking at the weather! 
  
• Book dental hygienist for DD I tried but they won't book her as they haven't had a request from the orthodontist despite him telling me to book it 

That should do

starnac

Well I still haven't got round to planting my seeds!

DH managed to spill all the chicken feed over the floor, shopping with DS took longer than I thought, then we went to pick up some scaffolding boards from a guy about half an hour away for the veg beds. 

Trying to get a dental appointment for DD was also a nightmare. We've got to go back to the orthodontist and ask them to contact her regular dentist to request a clean. It's not even a major thing. She's just struggling to reach one part of her mouth now she has both a top and bottom brace. The dentist also commented that she hadn't been seen by them since 2019. I said no. I've been waiting for you to contact us to tell us you were back seeing patients after covid. "oh yes that's right" she said as though she'd forgotten they cancelled our appointments in 2020 and told us to wait for them to contact us!