And now we go again...

Cheery_Daff

Sorry you had what sounds like a vexing day yesterday! 😕

milann

Life does happen when we least expect it. Hopefully all will be fine in the end for you.

starnac

Sounds like you had quite the day! Hopefully there won't be any repercussions and if there are, they are very small. 

Good curtains are expensive but so worth it. In our living room we have double glass doors into the conservatory that are quite draughty. Some good, floor length, heat reflecting curtains really sorted that out. We also added blackout lining to them as we have a projector on the ceiling in there so it makes the room completely dark for movie nights! 

beanielou

milann said:

Life does happen when we least expect it. Hopefully all will be fine in the end for you.

From me too. 

savingholmes

Sorry things are not going to plan. Hope it doesn't cause too much heartache 

themadvix

Hope that today is a better day!

EssexHebridean

Thanks all - today has been better for sure!

I need to give some thought to a mealplan for next week, and it had flipping well better be a frugal one with our food spends of late! I think I also need to set aside some of Friday for some serious kitchen witchery (copyright Foxgloves there I believe!) as that will help to drive down spends going forwards. 

Stuff to think about:
- Soak a big batch of black beans, and one of chickpeas, ready for cooking. I will do each with a good 24 hour soak, and then try 4 or so hours on low in the SC I think and see how that turns out. I can always then put them on for a bit longer if it turns out they need it. I reckon I may even double up on my usual batch of each - as long as I can cope with there being room in the pan
The black beans I will just cook right through to well cooked as the plan for those is to recreate the lovely smokey blackbean and chorizo soup I made a while back - that was just perfect as a winter warmer. The chick peas will be "just cooked" and I'll then freeze them in tin-sized batches I think as that gives flexibility for how they are used going forwards. 
- Proper freezer audit - will need MrEH's help with this to make life easier

Meal options:
Sausages - got one lot tonight, and there is one lamb and one pork still in the freezer I think. Each lot of sausages will also give two left over for use in a risotto, or with pasta or something of the sort. 
Pork steaks - definitely still a pair of those in the freezer
Spicy ragu - 3 portions in the freezer currently - works with pasta or with rice
Chicken - chunks, ideal for a curry really.
Meatballs - I'm sure there are two meals worth left in the pack I bought just after we moved in. 
Lamb: I've got a boned rolled br3ast, and a half shoulder - will probably get two meals from the first, and should get at least three from the second. 
Mince - two good sized portions
Burgers - 2, plus buns to suit.
If I make that soup that works really well for a weekday tea as it's quite substantial and filling - just add a thick chunk of bread alongside and you're sorted. 

Even without counting meat-free options there's a fair number of options there already!

foxgloves

Plenty of good meal options there, @EH.
Curtains an be notoriously expensive, cant they? During our refurb, we bought new curtains for the living room & treated ourselves to floor length velvet ones in dark grey. They weren't the most expensive by any stretch, but were the most expensive I'd ever bought. I don't regret it though as they look fab & set off our front bow window perfectly. The cats look a bit like they are 'on stage' when they are sitting up there! As this was an expensive purchase, we compromised on the other windows - i.e  Decided not to replace the bathroom ones but to give them a damn good soak, wash & press, which brought them up just fine. Our bedroom ones were grotty (I'd already long ago upcycled those with various braids & trims) & would have spoiled the look of all that decorating we paid for if we'd kept them, so I bought some curtain fabric online during Lockdown & sewed a new pair, so that was a bit of a saving. We struck lucky with the new kitchen blind, as we'd seen one we both liked, then I received a small royalties payment from my Dad's estate & decided that would be a sensible use of it. But the floor length velvet ones? No regrets!
F

Sun_Addict

I’m glad today was better and keeping my fingers crossed the curve ball thrown at you yesterday isn’t as bad as you fear. 

EssexHebridean

Morning all - It's a bright one here so far after an afternoon, evening and I think much of the night of absolutely TORRENTIAL rain yesterday. I got distinctly damp heading back from the office to the car and was glad I'd timed it as I did - a short while later leaving and I'd have been utterly soaked I think - in spite of my umbrella! 

Foxgloves we made a start on pricing up the curtains last night - ouch! Annoyingly the living room looks like needing to be made-to-measure - or at the least a mix of ready made and MtM as the windows should be fine with off the peg (more flexibility on the drop there) but the french doors are an odd drop length. One possibility is that we buy off the peg but longer than required and see if a local tailoring service can alter them - MrEH was checking their list of services this morning if he remembered to see if that's something they offer. The front door will - I think - with a bit of sneaky positioning on the curtain rail JUST work with ready mades - we'll buy a pair, just use one and that will give us a spare as well - but that will still be cheaper than buying a single MtM door specific one. Currently the plan is to go for thermal linings all round - with the hallway (door) being Charcoal grey and the front room being a dark blue to reflect the wall panel that will be the same colour. 

MSE Stuff:
- Trying to come up with alternatives to the made to measure curtain dilemma to save a substantial sum! 
- A discussion last night about Octopus Agile/Tracker tariffs - MrEH now knows rather more about them and to my delight didn't dismiss the idea out of hand as I suspected he might. We are both on the same page with a "watch & wait" approach though as we agree that we need to know more about the actual real world running costs of the house before we make the change. 
- Also more discussions about the possibility of solar/battery installation in the future.
- Banks checked and all good
- MrEH hopes to not need to feed his Oyster again before the end of next week - which would be great.
- Just done a price comparison for the paint and it looks like that will come from H0m3b@se - which is handy as at some stage we also need to go to Dun3lm which is on the same trading estate. £3 a tub cheaper than the two main competitors locally anyway. Might pencil in sunday morning for going there.
- washing machine run through last night and hopefully the washing is now on the line - MrEH was dealing with that first thing.


Spendiness:
- A small order placed with the Big River site this morning - reuseable makeup remover wipes for me, some felt pads to go behind our bed headboard where it touches the wall to reduce damage to the walpaper (it's got rubber protective dots on there currently but they're not quite working effectively) and some small syringes which we hope will assist us with filling the substantial number of holes in various walls - our predecessors used screws to fix various things and where they have removed them there are some chunky holes - the hope is that the syringes will let us get the filler right into the hole for a tidier finish than trying to apply it with a scraper or filling knife! Total is just under £17 so not a bank-breaker.
- Yesterday was a NSD 
- Planning on returning the frying pan to T's tomorrow - reverse spendiness if you like - and will then head on to Lil's for the main part of the weekly shop I think. 


We have a confirmed 4 hour timeslot for the Swedish Store order tomorrow which will work fine - although I'll need to try to ensure that I work the shopping around being in for as much of it as possible as MrEH will be working of course. I believe we should get more detailed tracking tomorrow morning too which will help with planning. 

My Plans for tomorrow:
- T's and Lil's as above
- Get the shelves sorted out into the two wardrobes in the dressing room, that should make for better use of storage in there.
- Get the steam cleaner onto the waterfall shower head to see if I can get rid of any of the limescale that way. I'll have a go at the tile grout while I'm up there wielding it!
- remind MrEH that he needs to track down the PTFE tape to see if we can solve the leaking issue on the handheld shower head - otherwise that's going to need a replacement head & hose.
- See if I can get the boiler service man booked for the following Friday. 
- The general clean & tidy round the house - I'm determined to stay on top of this as it's going to be needed with a much larger house. 
- Set the washing machine to run first thing so I can make use of free drying again - sunshine in the forecast!