Mortgage free in Forever Home :-)

KajiKita

Stayed on to attend a global review meeting and got growled at for not following a new protocol that (I think) hadn’t been clearly explained 🤷‍♀️ I vented my frustration in a constructive email of how it could be made to work better once I got home!

Also did a helpful thing for Mr KK. His accountant died suddenly just before Christmas, but he knows that she ‘did his books’ for him before she did, as he was able to log into HRMC and see it had been submitted and got his usual tax rebate. 

I have been saying for a while that he needs to see her family, offer to lay the bill and retrieve all his paperwork. But what with being ill and all the rest of everything, it has slipped into ‘the hard pile’. Tonight, I wrote a letter for him with all his contact details explaining all of the above and expressing his sorrow at her death (genuinely was a horrible shock for him), that he can drop through the letter box of her house on his way over to the hairdressers at that side of the Forest tomorrow.

NSD today 😊

KK

KajiKita

NSD today 😊👍

I am trying to do one constructive thing per evening, even if it is just a 10 minute job, so there is less looming at me at the weekends. This evening I discovered that my tomatoes have germinated (only sowed on Sunday! 😳😂) so have set up the gro-light on a timer for them. That didn’t take too long, so I have also swopped over the failing and new Windermere-land collapsible laundry basket in their packaging, booked the collection, put their email to me inside the box, sealed it and attached the printed label ready for collection from here on Saturday! Whoop! That’ll do me for today 😊

It’s been quite a nice day 😊
Was in a coaching training session for four hours this afternoon, which was quite intense but I really enjoyed it. Another one tomorrow.
Also was able to offer and had accepted a role on my team - yaay! I really, really like this candidate and have a good feeling about her 😊
It means I will have three people coming in in quick succession over a period of c. 6 weeks, but after 12 months of being 4 people short I am prepared to ride that element of chaos 😉

Mr KK didn’t make it into work today - had a really bad night and was in too much pain to go into to work today. 

He did get his hair cut and dropped off the letter / collected his books as well as seeing his parents so he feels like he has accomplished some good things today 😊

KK

KajiKita

Mr KK had another bad day today - too much pain to go into work and then had a letter saying that his urology appointment is being postponed from March to May! 😢 He is NOT happy ….

NSD for me. Have used the oven being on for dinner tonight to cook a frozen vegan ‘sausage’ roll for work tomorrow and will make myself a sandwich to go with it, so tomorrow should be an NSD too. 

My ‘one task’ this evening has been to meal plan for next week *and* start the online shop. I am trying to stay within my monthly grocery target …. But it’s going to be very, very tight ….. I am hoping to do two batches within this for my lunches and also for a dinners batch.

I have a week’s leave coming up the week after next. I’m starting to think about what I want to do with the time. At least three days of it I am going to allow myself to be a complete zombie!! 😉

KK

KajiKita

It has been a very long week ….. but I have made it to the weekend! 😊

I have all the usual chores to do but focusing on the Joy Things:

- Another £5.89 sent off to the mortgage from QM33 

- I am in bed with a fed, but still purring like a little motor, Floof

- we have a coffee morning in the village chapel to go to (it’s like our social centre), to celebrate the unveiling of the village fabric map which could be quite fun. Should also be quite short so won’t absorb all my social calories! 

- I remembered to put some fava beans to soak last night so I can try making some Ful Medames for the first time today - this has been postponed many times due to Mr KK’s illness but we have a new ‘normal’ I can live around now

- I will be able to plant out my replacement broad beans today, might fleece them a little against any wild winds

- I should also be able to finish the path in the Border of Doom today, which will be visually and personally satisfying 

- Mr T is bringing my shopping later which means I don’t have to spend hours in a shop!

 - I have a sassy book to read (Her Majesty’s Royal Coven), which I’ve just started but is already quite funny!

- Mr KK is cooking dinner tonight 😊

KK

South_coast

Ooh, I love the idea of social calories 🤣!

KajiKita

@South_coast, it’s a surprisingly effective way of pacing yourself, especially if you’re something of a secret introvert as I am. 

I am full on, extrovert, dominating the space, leading from the front (whilst still being quite good at reading people 😉) etc etc in work, but very much need alone time, stillness and silence to recharge and readjust.

KK

KajiKita

Had a good day today. 

Got all my chores done, finished my 8th book of the year 😊 and got a solid 1 1/2 hours in the garden this afternoon, weeding one of the veggie beds (still not finished but another square metre or so cleared - masses more bindweed root evicted!) and putting manure around all the roses. The roses that are struggling to get going also had a can of water (it is very dry here atm) and the beds on the front of the house now have a bark mulch as well 😊

Managed to tidy the coffee table next to my side of the sofa, emailed the hospice shop to see if I can off load the bed from the spare room into them so I can start turning that space into a crafting space and done a little more of my tapestry - pale violet thread tonight 😊

Had to order more Korean chilli sauce for my Frugalwoods rice n beans work lunches - I ordered the last one in September so it lasts me a while! 

I have dried three loads of washing in the line this weekend (which I love! ❤️) and my ‘grundies mobile’ as Mr KK calls it (like an underwear hanging frame) is absolutely on its last legs (I repaired it last summer with lots of cable ties, but the whole structure is failing now) so have ordered a new one from the big river site which is steel rather than plastic and turns up with spare clips! It will be interesting to see how it performs. 

I did also buy two new watering cans on Saturday. I had the previous ones for c. 15 years but they have gone brittle in the sun and I am getting wet legs carrying the cans round the garden. Enough is enough and I spent £20 on two new ones. I avoided the snowdrops in the green - £8 for a tiny clump!  The ones I relocated last spring would have cost me £40!!!!!! 😳🙄😂 I did succumb to two pots of small, pale blue, spring flowering irises that were just £2.50 per pot - put one clump either side of the drive.  Whilst planting those I also tucked in the pot of hyacinths that I was given at Christmas but are now doing that very specific, stinky, gone-over hyacinth thing! 😂😊

Another positive for me thing I have done, is to reserve / order a few library books that people have recommended to me.

Last week before a week off. More boss’s boss’s bosses are in for various reviews …. Gonna be a grim week methinks, but there is light at the end of the tunnel thanks to past me booking some leave! 😊

KK

SandyShores

Sounds like you've had a very busy and productive weekend Kajikita.  Oooh, snowdrops, and I've just read on the RHS website that they can thrive in clay soil if well drained.

Suffolk_lass

I use wooden pegs on the crossbar of some sturdy plastic hangers for pegging undies onto. It's very flexible (and uses what I already have in). I have a ceiling hanging four rail pulley airer like this and hang all my laundry that will hang on hangers, on the rails. Be careful with steel, it will rust onto your clothes in a surprisingly short time 

KajiKita

@Suffolk_lass - I will keep a wary eye out for the rust issue ….

Quietly plodding on here. 

Failed miserably to donate the spare bed to the charity shop - although the mattress, head board and memory foam mattress topper have fire tickets the divan base doesn’t so they won’t take it! Argh! I will try offering it for free on FBMP and see if it can get rid of it that way - seems bonkers to dump it just because of one ticket 🙄

Managed to do my one ten minute thing last night; folding Mr KK’s washing from the airer and taking it upstairs. I appreciate that this doesn’t sound like much but typically washing that doesn’t get fully ‘processed’ at the weekend sits there until the next weekend, so to get that task completed in the week is a ‘mind hurdle’ cleared 😊

I ate *all* the chocolate last night and have promised Mr KK pancakes at the weekend 😊 Aiming to give up all chocolate and crisps for Lent and significantly reduce my reliance on processed foods. My weight is creeping up and this needs to be both stopped and somewhat reversed! I am hoping my week off next week will give me the head space to set some new eating and food prep habits. At least I am not going into it as ‘on my knees’ as I usually am before a break. 

Not keeping up with any £logging atm. Really struggling with this. The whole thing with Mr KK being ill (he has managed to work two days this week so far) has totally thrown me. I am trying to track NSDs though and being conscious of my spending, avoiding looking at Malvern show etc …. So some of the better habits I had built up are still with me. I will catch up with myself this coming weekend / next week.

In a brighter note, the library now has three books for me to collect. This reserving thing is a whole new ‘game’ for me and one I could get to like I think 😊  Makes me wonder how obscure a book I could call on …. 🤔😂

KK