Cooking for one (Mark Three)

moneyistooshorttomention · 4 June 2018 at 5:55PM

I got the fig tree locally. When I investigated online I could see nice big fig trees available - but, I'd have had to pay a heck of a delivery charge :eek::eek: to get it here. I was told fig trees grow pretty quickly anyway and so, in effect, I might as well save myself the cost of buying a bigger plant - as it wouldnt be forever before a smaller (much cheaper) one "caught up with it" iyswim.

At a very very rough guesstimate - I think I've probably spent somewhere around the £10,000-£12,000 mark on the garden one way or another to date:eek:. I wasnt keeping tabs - but, bearing in mind very expensive purchases and expensive purchases etc - I doubt I'm far out. You don't want to know JUST how much more is going to be spent when I can afford a thoroughgoing revamp of it (whenever that is):eek::eek::eek:

I'm under no illusions about just how much it can cost to get a garden sorted as wanted - having read enough of the "before and after" makeover articles in the "Modern Garden" magazine.

I just took the view that I had to "throw as much money and effort at it" as I could possibly manage - because it was such a pathetic/"concrete garden" apology for a garden when I moved in and so many of the ones in the immediate vicinity still are that way. I need to "feel at home" - as well as wanting to grow some food for myself - and therefore made a decision right at the outset I was going to do my darndest to get it more like the better gardens I'm used to seeing and as similar in style as I can possibly get it to the garden on the "house I thought I'd have" (ie back in my home area). Follows on from getting the house in as near as possible to what I would have done with a house in my home area.

It is important to feel at home - so "If it costs...it costs" is about my motto I guess....

Brambling · 4 June 2018 at 7:29PM

Evening :wave:

My menu planning can be a bit haphazard like today, I took some salmon out of the freezer with no idea what I was going to do with it just that it would be salmon for dinner. I have a well stocked store cupboard and I'm quite good at adapting recipes replacing one ingredient for another. Occasionally if I want to make something specific i will ensure I have the correct veg to go with it ie pak choi and bean sprouts with a planned Chinese meal and if necessary marinade the chicken or meat the night before. Then of course you have to then plan on how to use up LO fresh ingredients :cool:

With regards to gardens I had my front garden redone about 3 years ago, it's about 30 foot long and had a dying cob nut tree on my boundary and broken paving which attracted weeds it was worth the money but it was painful :eek: the cost of new plants don't come cheap

and I wanted all the paving gone. My flat roof replacement took the money set aside for the back garden

so I'm building up the house account again and just tossing up between doing the lounge/dining room (it will need replastering and I want doors out to the patio) and getting the garden done :think:

Now I've finish waffling I've decided as it only a small piece of salmon its risotto with salmon for dinner and I'll take some smoked mackerel out of the freezer to add to a wrap for lunch tomorrow

PasturesNew · 5 June 2018 at 6:18AM

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

....£10,000-£12,000 mark ....

Mine's been £27 on a lawnmower, £30 on an assortment of loppers/choppers and small tools, £5 on weed control membrane, about £10 on bark and £5 or so on fence coating and brushes

Oh and £2 on a pot bought from a Yard Sale I spotted and £10 on 3 little palm trees that were mere saplings and are now about 1' high.

[Deleted User] · 5 June 2018 at 6:28AM

that garden cost is quite scary money, bears thinking about, for me. You see these garden rescue programmes, with wonderful designs and they cost about 8k but that is probably for the basics, I think labour must be provided at no cost.

Food will be simple again, I had a little granola with soya milk. Later scrambled egg on thin toast, then it is whatever veggie food I can snaffle from fridge and freezer, based on a salad and a rhubarb crumble

Looks like better temperatures for the rest of the week. Will go and water allotment in a few days, no point tickling the top 2 inches as it makes roots grow towards the surface, sub soil will still be very damp and roots will grow down, like they should. I am going to take out some wall screws today, fill holes and paint over, just some more prepping jobs for moving

moneyistooshorttomention · 5 June 2018 at 6:29AM

Brambling - I know what you mean about broken paving attracting weeds. I've not started on replacing the broken paving, etc, bit yet - because it's going to cost SO much (some of the hard landscaping is going to be ripped up entirely and there'll be earth there instead - to grow extra plants in). The rest is going to be replaced with something "nice (eg sandstone?/granite?/etc?)", instead of something "cheap"(ie concrete) (as at present). Hence it'll take me a while before I have the money for that..

I was advised to let attractive type weeds grow in the cracks that are there at present in the El Cheapo stuff and that those weeds would start to grow out over the El Cheapo stuff and help to mask it to some extent/distract the eye. So I've now got a very selective approach to weeds - dandelions/thorns/etc get hoicked up and pretty little weeds with pretty little flowers get left and are gradually taking up residence in all those cracks.

EDIT; Cross-posted with you Kittie. I watch those garden revamp programmes too and I'm sure the labour costs don't get factored-in and they receive the labour for free. I never notice a fair size area of "nice" paving either - they either use cheapie stuff or only a very small area of "nice" paving on the ones I've seen. You want to get a copy or two of that "Modern Gardens" magazine - it's out monthly (cost £3.99) and they put the costings there on the garden revamps they do.

wort · 5 June 2018 at 8:29AM

Morning, I woke a bit cold this morning, and it's over at at the moment though the forcast is good.
I'm working all day so won't see it!
Just had 2 toast with spread cheese, got my half baguette made on Sunday ! For lunch, with yogurt and fruit.
Tea will be chicken lo from Sunday probably with pots and salad.

Even though my garden was done with cuttings free seeds from magazines, and numerous garden centre small plants, and some plants that moved house with me, I know it's added up, not to mention the plants that died, or I pulled out by mistake and the ones that outgrew the space.
Hubby got sleepers and cobbles cheap from work, at the time , but paving we bought best we could at the time. But just topsoil and bags of gravel seem never ending.

We bought nice seating from asda a couple of years ago as a wedding anniversary present to ourselves. It's quite a mature garden now and although it's not perfect I get many admiring comments. When houses on this estate go up for sale I often look online at the garden, and most are still just grass and a patio.:o

[Deleted User] · 5 June 2018 at 9:02AM

money, creeping thyme is brilliant for cracks and you get to use it, chamomile too. Wort, all that heavy lifting, it gives me flashbacks.

We shifted 7 tonnes of various colours of gravels and slates to the tiers, all from dumpy bags and most up steps. Then 2 years ago, I myself did an enormous and heavy excavation behind a wooden retaining wall, as far down as I could reach, so was about 2` from the bottom, took out rot, preserved, hardened, filled and then used weed fabric between soil and gravel but not touching wood and back filled with about a tonne of rounded gravel, bought 6 bags at a time as I had to decant into buckets and get that lot up 2 sets of steps. The shifted soil had to be carried and I confess to disposing over the fence where it quickly vanished into the soil and long grass. The result was excellent and my retaining wall will now last me a few more years but I will be gone from here before then, I can see it costing 6k to replace as everything has to be manhandled. I was alerted very simply, by a woodpecker

Oh back to food, I came back from allotment craving poached eggs, so had them and wanted the toast to remain crisp, so plopped them on kitchen roll first. Rolled off and ground pepper on top, that and a big mug of tea, heaven

It is cooler today and dull, so I am about to open all windows, to take some stored heat out of the house, ready for the next hot session

[Deleted User] · 5 June 2018 at 10:00AM

only for those who don`t know. I just removed 3, getting jobs done in advance

screws in rawlplugs in walls, I just used pliers? with a round head. Farway I have no idea of what they are called, help!! I put thick card underneath the round bit and eased the rawlpug out and have filled with a powder/water mix which is so economical because I just make sure the bag is closed tight. Mix in a little dish, use a knife to put it over the hole and then go over with a bendy flat scraper that you can buy, or an old credit card. Finish is lovely and I will be able to touch up paint this afternoon. That will be about 15 removed so far, as well as popholes scraped open and filled and small cracks similar. Next house I am staying with auro white 321 paint, like here, makes it so easy to repair and touch up

PasturesNew · 5 June 2018 at 10:08AM

kittie wrote: »

screws in rawlplugs in walls...

I have a gazillion of these to do this week... putting off starting as I'll be "making it up as I go along".

I've got about about 60 holes to pull things out of, then fill. There are holes where rawl plugs were, holes with them still in and holes with a ring of "washer" type metal round them, that, once pulled, might reveal a rawl plug

What some people might've done was to complain to the previous owner to "make good", but the hassle/cost and everything to do that is simply "not worth it" - and I come from the generation where you "sigh and get on with it" - so they've been there... and I've sat and looked at them for 4 years thinking ... "wish I knew what to do about that" - and now I HAVE to do something.

Foodwise... I've got bread .... and I've got prawn crackers....and a bit of quiche. No idea what I'll be eating, or in what order.

Cool/overcast here today, I might go out and buy paint.

[Deleted User] · 5 June 2018 at 10:14AM

got it, locked far back in memory
They are called pincers and easy to use, just remember to protect the wall

When I did my first rawlplug, I remember trying to grasp the plug and pull it out, made such a mess. Then I had a doh moment and left the screw part way in

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Cooking for one (Mark Three)

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