Living the Good Life - mortgage free and living in line with our values

Cheery_Daff

Ooh, how lovely to have newts and toads gracing your allotments 😁😁 Most jolly 😁

I found some stewed apples in the freezer the other day - from a friend's tree last year 😊 Happy memories of picking them, and they were still tasty after being stewed and spending a year in the freezer 🙄😂

themadvix

Newt photo for you Cheery! My allotments seem to provide plenty of space for amphibians - I'm forever leaping with surprise when I uncover frogs on the other one (they live under the shed). I ought to put in a small wildlife pond now I have more space.

While some things definitely deteriorate  in the freezer, I don't see that stewed fruit ever would - glad you enjoyed it and it brought back good memories!

themadvix

Morning all,

Sorry, it was a bit of a mammoth post yesterday - if anyone managed to get through it, well done!

Meeting my ex-Brownies friends later for a cuppa and some games. Was going to need to bike and train but Mr MV has decided to WFH today, so I'll take the car. Might also try to get to the refill shop as he's threatened to go in tomorrow instead.

Work-wise, I've done a small piece for a US client and had a Cambridge meeting. Another Cambridge meeting at 12. I think I'll power up the Cambridge laptop and do some data entry in the meantime. But am going to pop to the allotment first to pick some French beans as I've got some already that need blanching and freezing and I might as well do them all together. In good news, the bread doesn't taste rusty, so I haven't bothered removing the crusts! (A bit of extra iron can't be a bad thing.)

Supermarket delivery arrived first thing and everything's been put away. A couple of dented tins though, so have requested a refund and we'll have to use them up sooner than expected. It's quite nice to have food options in the house again though as things were getting pretty tricky to make a meal out of. Dinner last night was a casserole with the remaining found carrots (not very many) and the first leek from the allotment (not as big as I'd expected!). Still, it fed us and was tasty enough! Tonight we'll have avocado, egg and toast, with some stewed fruit and yoghurt for dessert - the avocado needs eating.

We are off to Disney with Mum, Sis and Niece in a couple of weeks - just after these fingerprinting requirements come in. I saw that the Metro (on its front page, via BBC News) is reporting that long delays are expected, so I have booked a couple of flexible TL rooms (sorry GP!) nearby for the night before, just in case we decide to go much earlier (and prices shoot up because others try to do the same). We may yet decide to keep them anyway - suspect Mum would pay for the one for the three of them as she's very much not a morning person and will be dreading the early start! It was £95 for both on the flex rate, so pretty good value in the scheme of things (I miss £35 PI rooms!).

Right, allotment is calling me! (It's grey and was misty first thing here, so not enticing me to go outside! Need to get my steps in though.)

Greying_Pilgrim

No need to apolgise tmv - you know I would have been super happy to use TL for accommodation - they just didn't want me to! 🤣 Anyway, I should wander into Greying Town later to see if the banking situation has sorted itself out.  It's a week today.  Ta for the prompt.

Greying X

Baileys_Babe

themadvix said:

(I miss £35 PI rooms!).

I miss the £9 TL family rooms, this was about 15 years ago, we used them a lot over the next 3 - 4 years.

EssexHebridean

We've been debating about possibly going down the allotment route as it now appears we'll have extra free time available to us next year and going forwards (thanks to the demise of the beer festival). Lots of musing at the moment, I think we're both a bit worried that it will swallow all our extra free time and a lot more, but we might loo at a half plot and see how we get on, assuming there are any available locally of course, I'm not taking that as a given!) 

LadyWithAPlan

Great news re the second allotment I would love one however even the waiting list for the waiting list is closed (and is currently at 17 years!!)

themadvix

Greying_Pilgrim said:

No need to apolgise tmv - you know I would have been super happy to use TL for accommodation - they just didn't want me to! 🤣 Anyway, I should wander into Greying Town later to see if the banking situation has sorted itself out.  It's a week today.  Ta for the prompt.

Greying X

I am so glad to read that all those pending transactions have disappeared!

Baileys_Babe said:

themadvix said:

(I miss £35 PI rooms!).

I miss the £9 TL family rooms, this was about 15 years ago, we used them a lot over the next 3 - 4 years.

£9? I don't remember these - what a bargain!

themadvix

EssexHebridean said:

We've been debating about possibly going down the allotment route as it now appears we'll have extra free time available to us next year and going forwards (thanks to the demise of the beer festival). Lots of musing at the moment, I think we're both a bit worried that it will swallow all our extra free time and a lot more, but we might loo at a half plot and see how we get on, assuming there are any available locally of course, I'm not taking that as a given!) 

That is sad about the beer festival!

For time saving, I'd recommend no-dig and perennials - much easier to look after! I think a lot are split into half plots these days anyway - what I've now got is equivalent to 1 full-sized plot (plus a tiny bit because my plum tree and currant bushes had been pinched from the other half of my original plot).

LadyWithAPlan said:

Great news re the second allotment I would love one however even the waiting list for the waiting list is closed (and is currently at 17 years!!)

That's a horrendous waiting list LaPlan! But I guess that's London for you. 😬 Do you have a balcony?

themadvix

Afternoon all (just),

Had a lovely afternoon with friends yesterday, managed to pop to refill shop first (£35) and went via Dad's on the way back to pick up some reading material (Anne McCaffrey's dragon/Pern series - old favourites) and borrow a tool for Mr MV. Dinner was as planned, although we didn't bother with dessert (toast slices were quite doorsteppy!).

Work is still quiet today, so I'm doing Cambridge stuff (and will get on with some data-entry stuff soon too). Have baked a loaf and two rolls this morning and a batch of choc chip cookies. It is wet and cold here this morning, so having the oven on has helped with the house temperature (it's not that cold internally, but the cats did demand the door open for a while while they looked at the weather and accused me of being responsible for it). 

We'll be going to the pub tonight (first time in a while) - hoping to walk if it's dry. I have got two portions of spag bol out of the freezer for dinner, to avoid the various temptations of takeaway. We're away tomorrow night for a birthday party, so spends will be required then and I'd really like to get to the end of the month with some personal spends money in hand - both to save me from feeling poor and because it's Mr MV's birthday next month and I know there'll be socialising costs associated with that. So I'm hoping that a bit of restraint now will pay dividends a bit later in the month! (In fairness, I only felt poor this month because I paid over a quarter of my personal spends for the hotel for Mr MV's birthday celebration - which we still haven't confirmed as happening yet! It's a cancellable room.)

Unsure about plan for tomorrow, but I'm hoping we'll go early enough that we can go for a walk around the nearby lake before we get ready for the party. Need to discuss with BIL and SIL at the pub tonight. Should a fun evening and I think we'll be fed. Breakfast is included in the hotel room (HolInn Exp - always a free brekkie). Venue is walking distance from hotel too, so no taxi costs. Will take either lunch or snacks for us to enjoy on our walk, so apart from a few drinks, it shouldn't be an expensive trip. Mr MV and his brother have bought the present and I spent £3.50 on a card and bottle bag (because annoyingly we didn't have a suitable one in my stash!).

Right, better get on with some Cambridge data entry... and hope main client has something for me soon - it's much more interesting!