Simple living in the country - back to basics

CathT

Glad it was only a brief power cut. We've had hailstones here this morning, hopefully the last frosts aren't too far away. 

Cheery_Daff

Fingers crossed Cath.we've had hail here too. Our last snow was about 6th May last year so I'm not holding my breath! 😂

Happy wheel done - there's more I COULD do of course, but I've done the straightforward stuff for today. I'm trying to spend roughly 30-60 mins a day this month. Today didn't really pay for itself as I've only made 48p 😂😂 but plus rather than minus so that's a start! 

Total extra dosh for the month is now £100.86
Plus Prolific is standing at £6.33 with £1.33 pending (I'll cash out at £10)

Off to make a hot chocolate and have another wrangle with Qmee... then I might see if I can bring myself to wrap up and potter in the garden for half an hour if the sun stays out...

Cheery_Daff

Another 42p on Qmee, up to £2.63 now. I've finished filling in my profile so hopefully that will send some more my way. 

I've done some more batch cooking - a green lentil and leek mix which will go in the freezer to go with some of the cooked quinoa I froze last week. A red lentil and mushroom gratin thing, which I heard someone somewhere on MSE mention, but I've not made one before, and think this one could do with being a bit drier, but it's still tasty, so that will go in the freezer too. And some bit-too-wholesome-for-their-own-good flapjacks - oats, stewed apple, flax seed, sultanas, bit of oil (and I did dollop some syrup in because the mix just tasted TOO wholesome...). Meant to have cinnamon in but I couldn't find it, so they've got ground ginger and nutmeg instead. 

Hopefully they'll fulfil my need for something sweet with a cuppa in the afternoon at work (and so make me avoid the vending machine) but won't be so nice that I want to eat them all today 😂😂

Nothing much else to report. Got some Sainsbugs vouchers in the post - £4.50 off a £30 spend each week til the end of May. We only have a tiny Sainsbugs here though, and mostly just use for milk and the odd bit of fruit - certainly not worth doing a full shop. Could go to the massive one in another town - but even with the discount it won't be cheaper than @ldi I wouldn't think, so they probably won't get used. Hey ho.

Right. I've felt slightly better this afternoon (possibly the cold & flu tablets...) so I'm going to do a gentle exercise video in a bit (oo, or maybe go for a little stroll in the last of the sunshine), then get the epilator out 🙄 And then some serious loafing 😁

Baileys_Babe

Flapjacks sound tasty, I would happily eat one just now.

Sainsbury's also sent me some money off vouchers, £9 off an £80 spend 🤣 no way will they be being used. I would have liked £4.50 off a £30 spend at least one voucher would have been used to buy my children and the nieces and nephews Easter eggs plus a few other bits to get to the minimum spend.

For now I will be sticking with Aldi.

themadvix

Don’t worry about the seeds Cheery, I’ve not done much planting yet (and am only just seeing one leek germinate!) - I think a lot of the people online are a bit enthusiastic/have heat. Mine have to go in unheated greenhouse as there’s not enough cat-free space in the house, so I’m not rushing. I did plant some peas yesterday and hope to do some more today.

Cheery_Daff

Glad it's not just me yet with the seeds! I did at least buy some compost yesterday - pleased to see B&Q own is now peat free. £16 for 3 bags, which usually does me for the season. Must repot my houseplants too - I only have 2, and am dire at looking after the poor things. 

We've had a nice morning, but a bit faffy. Went back to bed with a cuppa after letting the chickens out (very unusual!), then went to the cafe - but their coffee machine had broken! And there was an enormous queue, so we abandoned ship for our second favourite cafe. Fortunately checked before setting off - they're shut on a Sunday. So, onto third favourite cafe - definitely open, but, as expected, entirely filled with bikers and a queue out of the door - no chance of even a cuppa inside half an hour and definitely no chance of a seat inside or out. Finally made it to another cafe - looks nice, but VERY noisy (with a massive heat blower thing and rubbish radio) and the coffee was DIRE. Also the veggie sausage sandwich came with those awful 'cheap vegetables mushed together into a vaguely sausage shape' sausages - urgh. Paid 4 quid for 2 of those 'sausages' and a cheap pappy bun, and won't be going there again in a hurry (well, I might chance it for tea and cake on my own as their cake looked nice, and you can't really ruin tea, but we won't be going for breakfast again!)

Anyway, this will teach us a lesson we did already know but ignored - remember you live in the middle of the most visited national park in the country, and don't bother trying to get in a cafe on a sunny spring Sunday  

Anyway, home again now, and feeling a bit rubbish after being a bit unintentionally mean to poor old Mr Cheery. What I said was true... but probably unnecessary... Anyway, I think (hope) he has forgiven me but is staying out of my way for a while... 

In the meantime, I've been drinking hot chocolate and playing the Happy Wheel - £26.04 up today, bringing MB total for April to £95, and April's extra money total to £126.90. 

On the cards for the rest of today... 

* parcel up second lot of books (and possibly take to newsagents, or maybe Mr Cheery can do it tomorrow)
* quick tidy round the house
* pack bag ready for tomorrow
* get tomorrow's lunch out of the freezer
* decide clothes for tomorrow
* washing on
* washing hung out
* clean out chicken house

That's probably all that NEEDS to happen. I could do a bit of outdoor pottering, might investigate blinds options for the new bedroom, sort out some clothes in the old bedroom etc, but equally, I might just loaf about as I'm still not feeling up to much and am back at work tomorrow... 

Cheery_Daff

Ha, even my 'needs to happen' list isn't getting done today! 🙄😂

All I've done from the list is clean out the chicken house 🙄 I got sidetracked attempting to make a blind for the bedroom window 😂 I think I've made a passable prototype of a 'relaxed roman blinds (without rods) but it looks pretty scruffy... well, it's not hemmed or anything, but we're not liking the way it hangs. 

Going to investigate buying a roller blind mechanism and using with our own fabric - I've got some excellent red and gold Chinese style stuff which will look perfect in there.

Realised I hadn't had dinner, which won't be helping my mood... (we didn't have breakfast til about 11.15 but even so). Just knocking up a stir fry and then I'll spend an hour or so doing a quick clean round and sorting stuff for tomorrow, then I might lock myself away in a bath....

Ooh, or I might dye my hair! Found four boxes of hair dye in the bathroom cupboard, so that sound count as decluttering too, right?!

badmemory

Definitely a good declutter (if the colour is good).  I had trouble getting anything like my colour in lockdown but I wasn't going to go grey.  I walked into the hairdressers a few weeks later & I kid you not my hairdresser cackled. There is no other way to describe it - she cackled.  She's been doing my hair 20 yrs & was at school with my son, so between our combined hysterics I just told her fix it NOW.  She didn't even charge me extra for having to strip the colour off.  As I said to her how can someone tell me that would be a good colour.  I now have a good DIY colour on the shelf, which will hopefully be massively OOD before I could possibly need it.  But it is like insurance, if you have it you don't need it & if you don't have then you do.  I did have to do it with the correct colour once & it was pretty near exact, thankfully.  The trouble with hair is that unless you are going to wear a woolly hat 24/7 then it is really noticeable.

rtandon27

Dying my hair is on the list for easter weekend! Last done before our move last August - The grey roots are now 4 inches long and someone asked if I'd had highlights done [insert blue shrieking smiley here]

greenbee

My hairdresser would kill me if I went DIY for my colour. I'm more scared of her than I am of anyone else, so made it from Feb to about whenever they reopened in 2020 without doing anything about it. It turned out to be useful as seeing how grey I was and how it worked has actually changed the way she does my colour.

The biggest issue I have with moving is that I'll have to try to find someone else to do my hair. Or travel 4 hours each way...