Simple living in the country - back to basics

Karmacat

Yay, reached the end - I'm glad you're trying to make a few proper holiday days during your holiday.  And yes, congratulations on the promotion - I had to mention it on your thread, as well as my own  that's a very big deal.

Cheery_Daff

redofromstart said:

I am impressed at your duo lingo process btw, inspiring.

Thanks, I'm pretty impressed myself 😂 Set myself a target of 3 minutes a day when I started - it's certainly made it easy to stick to because even if I'm on the way to bed when I get my final reminder, I can do 3 minutes 😊 It's made me feel like I CAN stick to things as well!

Cheery_Daff

And thanks KC! I'm very pleased that I don't have to apply again next year 😂 Not been announced publicly yet - I suspect that will happen this week while I'm off...

We rarely eat any meat alternative stuff other than sausages, occasional burgers, sometimes mince, and Mr Cheery is fond of an occasional Swedish style ball 😂 We don't bother with any of the more fancy pants stuff - it's all far too expensive for a start! 😮

Another hour of hay making this evening - I've done 4.5 hours in total now. I think some of it will be dry enough to make some wheelie bin bales tomorrow which will be nice. Our neighbours from down the hill are coming up to have a go on the scythe (they want to borrow it to do their own field) so I'll get them to help a bit with the baling as well 😂 

That all means doing more turning during the day (I can do that while the chickens are out - daren't wield a scythe til they're safely locked up as they have no sense 😱). And I might need to do a bit of adjusting of the angle of the blade, it's not quite doing what I want it to do at the minute. 

So tomorrow - 

* swimming at 8am
* collect prescription
* watch scythe course video and make adjustments to set up
* turn hay
* clean out wheelie bin 😂
* find string 
* more washing - trying to take advantage of the nice weather to do all kinds of random things that don't get done very often, but also I've not yet washed the spare bedding from when I had covid so that definitely needs doing! 

Here's a scything progress picture for you 😊 That mound in the middle of the picture, near the LPG tank, is cut, I've just fluffed it up to dry out. Hoping my progress pictures will start feeling like they're showing progress soon 😂

beanielou

I don't know how you do it!

Baileys_Babe

redofromstart said:

I remember old style being obsessed with Glamorgan sausages for a bit, I quite liked them but a faff to make so I haven't bothered for a while.  Always mean to try doing something vegan with the chick pea water but never quite manage to find the motivation.  

I haven't made nor eaten Glamorgan sausages in over 20 years, I had completely forgotten about them.

I sometimes use aquafaba to make vegan meringue 😋

Cheery_Daff

We have far too many eggs to start making vegan meringue 😂😂 Mind you, the only time I ever even tried to make meringue it turned into some kind of weird green glue stuff 😮😂

Anyway, bit warm today 🙄 I went swimming this morning, which was jolly, and then we tried to go to a cafe with an excellent view from their outdoor benches, but they were only doing cake (I'm quite happy with cake for breakfast but Mr Cheery isn't 😂) so we ended up at the cafe in the big Sainsbugs, which was nice and airy and cool, and we had a nice egg butty 😁

Then traipsed round the charity shops until we were too hot and grumpy 🙄 I did buy a skirt that will do nicely for work though. 

In financial news, lost £5 on the Happy Wheel this morning, yawn.

In better news, had the LPG invoice, and joy of joys, they have stuck to our 50p a litre fix, which gives me hope that they will stick to it for the next 2 years, which I am delighted about. I think on normal consumption, at a rough calculation, that'll mean roughly £210 a month for gas 🙄 I'll put aside £250 for now so we're ready for an invoice around Dec/Jan, and will see what else we can do to reduce consumption - we had the thermostat fitted early last winter which i think helped, as did some extra double glazing, but I'm going to make thermal blinds etc for the kitchen and a curtain for over the back door too. 

Anyway, tasks for this afternoon:

* lunch
* hang washing out
* watch scythe video and set up scythe
* clean out wheelie bin
* clear space in the freezer for a 2 litre pop bottle - we freeze one and keep it in the chicken house overnight to cool it down a bit
* put up some boards round the chicken run to deflect the worst of the heat
* turn the hay

Visitors coming about 7, so four hours.

Lunch first!

badmemory

What is in the pop bottle - only water I hope.  My son used to drink coke & years ago I made him some ice cubes from coke as we were then in a heat wave.  they all grew to over half as much again.  I am sure if it was a bottle it would have blown.  I have seriously considered putting my hot water bottle in the freezer though as water from the tap just seems to dry in less than a minute.  I need to wear one like a hat as my head sometimes feels like it is going to explode.

Cheery_Daff

Ha, yes just water. Don't fancy exploding pop, either in our house or the chicken house!

Cheery_Daff

Well, I actually managed to do everything on my list except clear out the wheelie bin! And as it happened, it didn't matter anyway, as neighbour pals just tried out the scythe quickly and then we sat around drinking and basking in the light of the glorious supermoon as we watched it rose, surprisingly quickly, over the hills

😊😊😊😊

An excellent evening, and one of those times when you can feel your social batteries being replenished as it's happening 😊😊

Fortune_Smiles

Cheery_Daff said:

In different news, I had my first text conversation in German today! 😂 I've been using Duolingo, just doing 3 mins a day, for 180 days now, every day. Actually managed to cobble together enough useful phrases to arrange a video chat with our friend who lives in Germany tomorrow night 😁 Won't actually be speaking in German, mind you, but I'm impressed I managed this much on 3 minutes a day. Little bits add up, whether finances or learning new things!

Well done Cheery!  Having had some success using Duolingo to learn a little Ukrainian, I'm now revisiting Spanish.  Amazing what a few minutes a day adds up to isn't it.

Fortune x