Next steps; grip-relaxing bimbling, and avoiding the temptations

peb

I checked the score when I went to the loo at tea, and ended up listening until the end.  Today may not be that productive but I am making the lasagne for family tomorrow, making sure I have what is needed for a slow cooker chocolate pudding and planning for new year when I'm  catering for a celiac.  Planning on making cheese source with corn flour.  

Suffolk_lass

I watched the six minute clip on BBC Sport while Mr Sl was prepping the veg for yesterday's meal with friends and it was bonkers for a test match. Nevertheless, a win for England. We were there (Melbourne CG) for the Boxing Day test in 2006-7 and had a miserable experience watching Andy Simons smack the England bowlers all round the ground for his century. It was when Shane Warne got his 500th wicket, that went well with the 5-0 Australian whitewash that year.

Anyway, enough of cricket (until Sydney). I collected our friends from the Station at 12.00 - my word there were a lot of people out yesterday! Hopefully there were enough to keep businesses going and not so many that big debts were being incurred! I plan to go and look in hobby places (Home on the aga and hippycraft) to look at small bag prices and candle moulds - I may yet stick to online but I shall take a look. We had a good chat, they joined Mr Sl and dog and took a stroll over to the next but one village where I joined them with the car to bring them back before dark. The pub was also busy, but plenty of seats. Then back for turkey pie followed by homegrown rhubarb (courtesy of the freezer) crumble and cream. I took them back to the Station in good time for their 7pm train. A lovely day and catch up and back to normal by 9pm. My kind of day.

I also heard from our other friends who used to stay over New Year. She has been very unwell (a heart arrhythmia and then hypochondria-related anxiety) and he has that genetic thing where your blood makes too much iron (Haemochromatosis) so has blood regularly taken. Anyway, no longer able to plan ahead too much they are going to join us on NYD and I will cook salmon and lovely simple, plain veg, which I know they can eat. I'll bring the salmon fillets in from the cart lodge today as there is room in the little kitchen freezer now!

Other than that, I need to process the other turkey (the whole one, and make curry, pies, slices, sangers, and stock or it will not be used!

Have a good day all. Keep the money-saving faith!

rtandon27

I love the civilised time that your festivities wrap up!

Suffolk_lass

rtandon27 said:

I love the civilised time that your festivities wrap up!

Oh me too! New Year's eve, I have Mr Sl researching playing the festive countdown from another time zone, like they do in some care homes - so everyone gets to welcome in the new year, but early enough to go to bed at a civilised bedtime (leaving the staff to enjoy themselves into the new year)! 🎉🎉🥳😴😴😴

Humdinger1

@Suffolk_lass I know what you mean about strong feelings that something is happening.  Apparently, more people miss trains/planes etc than usual when accidents later happen, so well worth listening to that still small voice. Loving your festivities Humdinger xx

Merlin's_Beard

Suffolk_lass said:

rtandon27 said:

I love the civilised time that your festivities wrap up!

Oh me too! New Year's eve, I have Mr Sl researching playing the festive countdown from another time zone, like they do in some care homes - so everyone gets to welcome in the new year, but early enough to go to bed at a civilised bedtime (leaving the staff to enjoy themselves into the new year)! 🎉🎉🥳😴😴😴

Honestly I am looking forward to the care homes if this is what I can expect!

Suffolk_lass

I love this early bedtime chatter!

Thanks to Raiders of the Lost Ark, a need to boil up the whole pot of turkey soup (Mr Sl only heated up the two portions we had for supper!) and the discovery of a completed load of washing that needed to be dealt with, I was definitely not early to bed. I could not leave a basket of washing for this morning so everything was hung up, and some bits had a crease-removing five minute TD blast before doing so. As a result it was close to midnight before I got to bed, and then I could hear him watching the film under my bedroom. To be fair it wasn't that loud, but just enough so to remind me of where the film had got up to as I pretty much know it by heart! So post midnight before I fell asleep.

Anyway, I stayed in bed until 6.20 this morning but am pottering; a bit of tidying, wiping down granite with last night's snack debris still in evidence (him, not me) and back to the washing, rotating damp t-shirts to the aga and drying them off there. I do need to prepare some food for NYE - I am doing a couple of simple curries - a beef one that can be quite hot, and a mild curry one. I have a pre-prepared paste I can use for the beef. Not sure re the vegetable but likely to include chick peas, onions, spinach and Guatemalan blue squash, the latter roasted before being gently spiced. I did venture into Aldo's on Monday and picked up a pack of two giant naans, so Mr Sl is off the hook for making flatbreads on NYE!

Our friends will bring a chicken curry, and I shall cook some rice, with the other friend (a single chap) bringing the poppadoms, chutneys, yoghurt and any other accompaniments. She is also bringing a lime torte dessert. I was going to make a trifle but I might not bother, and encourage some consumption of cheeses instead.  I will have to buy grapes as some like them with cheese (I prefer celery - and port!) but I have everything else.

Other than that, today is all tidying, vacuuming, dusting, making beds. Should be done by lunch time and then a quiet read, I think. Have a good one everyone

Suffolk_lass

Well the single chap is arriving at about 3.30pm - I just need to move my car so he can park at that end of the house with his campervan and easy access to EHU. He is bringing grapes for the cheese, a bottle of port, and poppadoms (and naan bread, that he bought before Christmas before I said "don't bring...") The other couple will be a little later as he is working (from home). The can park in the new parking space we made last month, as there is plenty of room for 3 vehicles

Mr Sl pulled an epic upstairs cleaning and tidying day yesterday, coming down for a little break at 1pm, then resuming the decant of stuff to the small bedroom where he had magazines in neat piles all over the floor until yesterday. I don't know what he has done with them but I can get to the linen wardrobe, so our bedroom won't get backed up with clean bedlinen like it did through most of 2025 (because I could not get to that cupboard to put it away). That door is closed, hiding much of that "stuff". Mr Sl also made up the bed in the big room, dusted and vacuumed and it looks much better for being clear. I was despairing a bit about getting it ready.

Encouraged by his efforts, I have thrown 5 pairs of shoes away and three more pairs are in boxes for the charity shop (good condition but too wide). My shoes are neatly stacked on bookshelves in boxes now. I also know where my snow-boots are if it comes to it, although the forecast seems to have changed. I sent him back upstairs for a long hot shower while I prepared a really simple supper of soup and garlic bread with the last of the stuffing. He also had the last of the bread pudding with a second mug of tea, during a little break. Me? I fell asleep with a nice warm dog snuggled up on my lap. Hopefully I have greater staying power today!

This morning's quick check of the finances raised a smile as his state pension has appeared two days earlier than I expected it. Most welcome. The illusion of affluence has been reinstated. Not sure where his occupational pension is, but that might appear on Friday. Mine is showing as pending for Friday in the other account that is better at showing future transactions. It is coming Friday as it is due Sunday, if you see what I mean. 

I want to be more diligent about using what we have in already, and completing some of our unfinished projects in 2026 and I want a low spend month in January, just to get everything back up to date and more straightforward going forward in 2026. 

Back to today, I have to complete the vegetable curry I started by roasting some squash last night (in the end I used a bag of frozen butternut as the freezer it was in was too full) - just onions to chop and cook in a while (I didn't want to wake Mr Sl with the smell of cooking onions) and then it is mostly assembly. Then I need to cut up the shin of beef and OOD sirloin steak to make an altogether spicier beef curry. I'm keeping it simple. Raita and rice (brown rice is already soaking) and I'm done. That leaves the preparation of a few nibbles. Hardly the most taxing thing, I am doing two or three - blinis with a little smoked salmon (bought 2 for 1), lumpfish caviar crème fraîche and a dob of sauce, and fresh pickled cucumber with prawns on skewers. And a pot of spicy nuts.

Time to get on. Have a good day and happy new year, here's to opening our purses carefully in 2026

Makingabobor2

Happy New year to you & Mr SL. Enjoy your evening. X

Suffolk_lass

Thank you @Makingabobor2, and the same to you and yours. I hope you are feeling better, and ready to start 2026. I had a lot (for me) to drink last night. Fortunately I was using small glasses by today's standards as five or six glasses of fizz and then a brandy alexander, and lots to eat!. Lots of water and coffee for me this morning! All the cleaning up is done and we are ready for the 2/3/1 more visitors today. We shall walk across the fields to the pub this morning, about 2.5 miles, then either walk back or get a lift with the other couple who should e coming (if her anxiety hasn't overcome her). Simple oven baked salmon with plain vegetables planned, as she no longer eats spicy food.

Happy, healthy and frugal days my friends, as this new year gets underway