And now we go again...

amber03

I’ve bought all of my Xmas advent calendars already. Used to work in a supermarket and every 30th nov, we used to have customers come in and go mad as there were no calendars left. X

rtandon27

ooo - I'm unusually prepared for xmas too!  We have our calendars, Danish biscuits, box of carr's, fairy lights and a small tree for the window all ready to go!  I also have stashed away a his/her xmas mugs and a new pair of slippers for the OH.  Just put in our order for xmas fruit and veg.  Nothing left but some cheese/charcuterie and the joint and tbh it might just be a very large chicken!

EH - I might just join you in that November challenge but scaled back to once a week! - Did a 20 minute standing yoga session between meetings last week as I had a room with a door and a lock booked for a few hours and oh wow did it loosen up the back, neck and shoulders!  Think I will try to squeeze in another one (maybe two) sessions each week this month!

EssexHebridean

Debs that Christmas cake bag does sound like a good idea! MrEH’s cake is to a family recipe though - it’s the one his Mum always used to make whether all lived at home, it makes a massive cake, but the flip side of that is we eat it piece by once through a good chunk of the year! Definitely not a budget bake, but a good one! 

BM I’m impressed with the level of organisation - and Amber and RT too! I did note that Al’s now have their Christmas stuff in so will be acquiring a chocolate pannetone fairly soon, before they sell out, and will also start buying a couple of bits each week from now. We usually treat ourselves to lots of the nice savoury bits and pieces that they only sell at Christmas! 

The washing didn’t quite dry…or at least, the heavier bits didn’t. It started well - by lunchtime when I turned it round it wasn’t feeling too bad, but it never really dried much more from that point I don’t think. It’s finishing up on the airer upstairs now anyway, although as the law of s0d would have it the heating didn’t come on this evening at all so my best laid plan re ensuring the wettest bits were nearest the radiator was largely pointless. 

DW & WM set to run overnight anyway - electric prices through the day tomorrow aren’t the best so I may as well make use of the lower stuff overnight. 

Oh and day 1 of what I have christened “Yovember” done - a 22 minute Yoga With Adriene mobility one - to be honest most of them will be hers! 

badmemory

If you think that is organised you should see my lists of tinned stuff, bottles of ketchup & the like.  My username is not an accident.  I forgot to list a bottle of orange squash that I had bought a week before & bought another one.  It is just self preservation really.  Thankfully it isn't caused by old age as I have always been the same.  We are a family of list makers because of that.  I mean who do you know that needs to list that they need to vacuum because if they don't remember to do it before tea they risk waking the baby next door.

milann

I’ve been collecting Christmas cake ingredients for a few weeks now…..just need marzipan now.

lucielle

I’ll join you on the yoga challenge. 

L

EssexHebridean

Yay L it will be good to have someone else onboard with it too! 

BM I would absolutely be that person who needs to make notes and lists about everything! SHOCKING memory - always have had, but equally I do now ensure that important stuff gets listed/noted!

milann I cheat and dodge the marzipan/icing - as the cake is really only for us, we just leave it bare! 😁

MrEH was asked last night if he might be up for a game of rugby today - he definitely was, and this is for a county charity veterans side he was asked to join last season so he’s pretty chuffed with that too. Because of the international match being on later, they were doing an early kick off though so that did mean him leaving home at 9.30am which came as a bit of a shock to the system I think! 😂 I’m just waiting to hear from him about what his plans are for watching the England match, whether he’s going to the club or heading home. 

I’ve made the most of my unexpected soo day thus far anyway -
— Regular savers have been fed - and one of them automated as well, the new Pr1nc1pal1ty one which I have decided can come straight from the joint account.
— An hour of pottering in the garden, two courgette plants removed and split between garden waste and compost bin, the final cucumber plant removed and composted, last two tomato plants into the garden waste, the over enthusiastic jasmine given a good prune - need to decide what to do about that, it’s far more interested in producing leaves than flowers, so it might end up getting dug out I think. I could then get a second clematis and some trellis, and encourage those to cover the fence instead…
- got some wool Slug deterrent out round the Ajuga in the front garden - the slugs have suddenly decided it is a gourmet feast so hoping this saves it. 
- bird feeders refilled, we are now desperately short of fat balls so either need to get to a reserve with a shop, or order online…
- bit of a sort out in the shed, not sure where the tin of white satinwood paint I was sure we had ended up - I’m wondering whether there was little enough left after we painted the sills at the flat that we binned it rather than bringing it here. Annoying through as that was what I was going to use to do the front room sill. 

- Brought in the half full mahoosive tin of white emulsion as that is a good starting point for dealing with the random bits of wall in the dressing room
- having carried paint, brushes etc upstairs, decided I may as well paint over the Marilyn Monroe wallpaper - then continued and painted over some of the silver paint on the other wall - that needs an additional coat of the white before I can do anything more (and I also have a patch still to cover at all, as I couldn’t get the curtain far enough out of the way, 
- turned the squash I roasted yesterday in to soup with a couple of finely chopped onions, a can of coconut milk, some smoked paprika, a veggie stock jelly and some water. 

- ate a portion of said soup for lunch - OMG (as the kids say) it was fabulous! I really must make soup more often, it’s stupidly easy, and always so tasty. There will be several more portions there to be divided out and frozen.
- pulled the portion of roasted plums out of the freezer to bolster the stewed apple I’d already taken out - that will be turned in to some form of pudding for tomorrow I think.

Next plan is to make houmous for later, then I’m going to head back to the shed to find the paint I want to cover Marilyn once and for all (and hope there is enough of it, I happen to know Mum still has a tin of the same colour otherwise though, so I will be calling in favours!)

amber03

We’ve just had to stop feeding the birds in the garden, due to rats. One appeared and a couple of days later we counted 4, so gave up.xx

EssexHebridean

Just looked at our first Octopods bill since being on Agile. SO MANY GRAPHS!  It pleases my inner energy-geek greatly - I knew we’d get some good detail but not quite what form it would take. From when we switched to it (12th October) to the end of the month we did indeed average around 13p/kWh which is astonishing, although also I’m well aware not something we will be reliably achieving going forwards! (It’s a nice boost for the first bill though!) It’s pleasing seeing how little use we have made of energy during the peak period - which is after all the idea - and seeing the individual daily averages is interesting. So far we’ve had one day which nudged fractionally over the rate we would have paid on our fix, and a couple of days which are pretty much matching that rate. Other than that, every day has been under by at least a couple of pence per kWh, which is plenty good enough for me! 

There was sufficient of the paint I wanted to use - the same colour we used in several places in the flat, a gorgeous soft colour like milky hot chocolate, and the first coat is done. I confess that I haven’t gone to the lengths of moving furniture - frankly we’re not even sure that the wardrobes and tall chest of drawers in there would move out and go back intact - they were the ones our sellers left! There’s sufficient gap behind that I can get the brush in just far enough to mean no Marilyns are visible though, so that will do! I’m pleased to have made a significant change anyway - it’s one of those jobs which went straight on our list when we moved in, so nice to have it started, at least! 

Cheery_Daff

Ooh, glad you can say goodbye to the Marilyns! 😂😂

We had an Agile bill, but since it only covered a single day it didn't tell us much 😂 will have to wait til the end of November for a proper one!