Making Good Use

A Whole Lotta House for the Money

This afternoon Mum, my sister, my brother-in-law and my nephew all went off to have a look at the most amazing six-bedroomed Georgian house with annexe, garages, lofts and a cellar which is on the market for a ludicrously low price.  I was planning on going with them but stayed home as I didn't feel too good.  

Whatever eventually happens to this house (and I suspect a property developer will turn it into flats), someone is going to get the most fabulous views over the city to the Mendip Hills from the top floor.

Now that's what I call a kitchen cupboard.  Just imagine how much 'stuff' you could fit in there.

 

Mum said it was like stepping back into Jane Austen's time and a really interesting experience just to have a look inside such a house.  If those walls could talk I'm sure they'd have some tales to tell!

Making Hay

When you're six years old, spending the day with your Mandma and Auntie, and the sun is miraculously shining for once, you're really going to make the most of it by:

1. Lying out on a makeshift bed in the garden  - please note the Panama hat for shading your eyes in the sun (it used to belong to my Dad and, worryingly, fits my nephew's six year old head as well as it used to fit Dad's.)

2. Jumping in and out of the 'it-took-flippin'-hours-to-fill' paddling pool, thereby depositing a goodly portion of the garden in there with you - plus essential football and jug for water play and maximum splashing of all and sundry.

3. Build a tent from two huge golfing umbrellas.  Then get too hot in said tent and have to go indoors to build some Lego.

Of course, by teatime the rain was pouring down AGAIN, but it was great fun while it lasted.

There's a Downside to Being Frugal

I've discovered a downside to being frugal.  When you don't often shop in conventional shops and most of your supermarket shopping involves a) shopping in Aldi so you have to pay if you want a carrier bag, and b) pretty much always using a shopping trolley so you don't need bags anyway, you end up with a dearth of carrier bags to line the kitchen bin.  Things have got so bad that I've used every carrier bag that was big enough to fit in (and a few that weren't - not a clever idea!) in the house to line the pedal bin, and today I've had to capitulate and actually buy bin-liner bags. 

I think I can honestly say that I've never bought a pedal-bin bag before in my whole life - they've always seemed to me one of those unnecessary items, like air freshener or tissues in fancy boxes, that people buy who've got more money than sense.   The ones I bought did come from Aldi (I didn't actually know they sold them, never having looked before) so would have been pretty cheap, although to my shame I'm not entirely sure how much they cost!

I think it's really good that the consumption of carrier bags has fallen so dramatically in the UK lately, and long may it continue 'cos those things are just evil in landfill - even if, like me, you've re-used them as pedal-bin liners.  But it does seem a bit odd to then have to actually buy 'new' plastic bags in order to line a bin.  Does anyone out there have a suggestion for something else that can be used to line pedal-bins - something a bit more environmentally friendly?

One, Two, Three

As a bit of gentle knitting during the evenings I've been making these little beanie hats.

They're knitted in some lovely soft Rowan Kid Classic yarn (thrifted, of course) and decorated with a pure-wool plant-dyed felt flower and a vintage button.

I know it's not really hat-wearing weather just yet but I'll put them away until the autumn and then see if they'll sell on ebay.

Another Saturday, Another Village Fair

This Saturday saw another local village fair take place.  As an added bonus it took place in a village which has a very nice gastro pub so P and I had a rather tasty lunch before wandering down to the village green (or 'tye' as it's known in Essex) to have a look round the fair.  There were all sorts of craft stalls and other stalls, as well as the traditional village fair items like a Tombola, a 'guess the weight of the cake' competition and a Coconut Shy.  I was immediately drawn to the second-hand book stall which had some really old books for sale.  I'd already picked out a handful before I even asked how much they were - as the answer was 10p each I bought quite a few.

They also had a 'stop me and buy one' ice cream man doing the rounds, and as the weather was pretty hot he did a good trade.  There was a dog show - all very amateurish and good fun - with some lovely dogs being led round the ring by their child owners. 

People sat around the 'ring' on bales of hay (very comfy, not sure I'd ever sat on one before.) 

And then there was a very precarious tango demonstration on the back of a small flat-bed trailer!  We thought it was tight enough for space with just one couple dancing but when two couples got up to give a demonstration it was positively cramped.  Not quite what you expect to see at a village fair but good fun nonetheless.

There was a chap in charge of the microphone who seemed to specialise in stream-of-consciousness Joyce Grenfell-type banter.  He urged all the children queueing up to register for the dog show to 'be patient, be English', and then remarked that the badly parked taxi was annoying the village bobby', two seconds later he had to say 'sorry, I've been told she's not the village bobby - she's a Police Community Support Officer', that must be one very picky PCSO.  His best comment was when four small children and their pets took to the ring for the 'small pet competition' - there were two rabbits ('are they related?' microphone man asked), a guinea pig and a tortoise - all being held lovingly by their young owners.  'Now I do hope you've got four rosettes', he asked the organiser.  'Oh, dear, you've only got two!'  We didn't hang around to find out which two little ones went home disappointed!

You Win Some ....

I'm still delighted beyond reason with some of the 50p tops I found at the car boot sale the other week.

This black one with a bow detail to the front goes wonderfully with my beige combat trousers.

And this lime-green one with an unusual back cut-out detail looks wonderful with jeans or combats.  I love 'em to bits and am still amazed that I actually found things so nice, in my (full-figure) size, and for only 50p each.  There were other tops too but some of them are more winter weight so I haven't got round to wearing those yet.

I was also very pleased to find this nice sleeveless top in one of the Billericay charity shops this week.  At £2.75 it was a lot dearer than the others but its a lovely fit and I don't have many sleeveless tops that are fit to wear outside the house.  (Now all we need is the weather for me to get some wear out of it this summer!!)

Those are some of the recent wins.  But, for the THIRD time, I've managed to buy a king-size duvet cover instead of a double. 

I was a tad annoyed to find my 'new' duvet cover - which I'd been assured was a double by the seller - turned out to be a king-size.  I only discovered it when I put the double duvet in it - grrr!  Shall we just say that my language was 'choice'!  Ah well, it did only cost £1.00 and it can always go in the next charity collection bag.

Granny Square Crochet

I wish I could crochet, I really do, but somehow the skill just eludes me.  I've been incredibly envious of the many talented crocheters out there who have been producing some lovely 'Granny Square' items recently.  I'd love to be able to sit down with my crochet hook in hand and whisk up something pretty and useful but, for the sake of my sanity (and the sanity of those around me), I've given up even trying. 

So, I was very pleased to find this small crocheted blanket at this morning's car boot sale for 50p.  It's done in lovely pastel colours and is a really nice firm texture.  I suspect it may have originally been a pram or cot blanket but it looks lovely just gracing one of my garden chairs and will be equally useful over my lap in colder weather.  Very nice, and utterly totally beyond my ability.

PS - Did you know that Captain Hook (from Peter Pan) is known as Capitain Crochet in French?  Ah, it's amazing what little gems you can discover at Euro Disney.

I Can Almost Taste the Jam

Slowly but surely - despite the lack of sun recently - the plums are beginning to ripen.  I'm imagining warm buttered toast with homemade plum jam on cold winter mornings - yum!

For the sake of my washing I shall be quite glad when the plums are ready to be picked, the branches are so heavy they've taken to leaning all over the rotary drier - making it like The Krypton Factor trying to hang things out.

Last night's evening meal saw the first of the garden produce being eaten - salad leaves.  They were lovely and there are tons more in the same pot and another pot well on its way too (much to P's consternation!  Like all men, he doesn't really 'do' 'green things'.)

Quart into a Pint Pot

De-cluttering and generally sorting things out seem to be quite a hot topic in the blogosphere at the moment.  Shoestring had a very interesting blog post on this subject the other day, and it got me wondering about my latest de-cluttering and sorting out session.  My latest passion for down-sizing my wardrobe came about (I think) for two reasons:

1.  The arrival of hot weather after several non-summers in the UK gave me a good chance to re-assess my summer clothes - and I was rather taken aback to find just what I'd accumulated and how many items I was unlikely to wear again.  Some of the items I didn't like any more and some of them were just a tad too tight on me now - ahem!!

2.  I was really lucky to come across a fantastic lot of clothes in my size at a recent car boot sale.  After spending the princely sum of £4.50 on nine items it now feels like I've almost got a whole new wardrobe.  (Check out Sharie's recent Wardrobe Challenge posts to see what lovely clothes she's managed to find at car boot sales.)

I sold what I could on ebay (there are some perks to being a 'plus' size - the larger clothes tend to sell really well on ebay) and this morning took a further bag of items to the local charity shop.  My wardrobe is looking a lot more organised, although there are still a frightening amount of clothes in there, and I'm still debating what to do with one or two items.

I haven't gone through any of the winter clothes as yet, I'll leave that until the autumn when I can decide better what I still want to keep and what can go.

I also had a 'eureka' moment about the teetering piles of books in the bedroom.  These piles were getting seriously out of hand and finding two more books at last week's car boot sale was the final straw - something had to be done.  I'd been bemoaning the fact that I had nowhere to store them in a bookcase when I suddenly realised that there was quite a lot of space in my 'Amazon' bookcase in the dining room.  This is where I keep all the books I've got listed for sale on Amazon and their numbers have dwindled a lot recently - partly because I've been selling quite a few and partly because I've been de-listing items which are no longer worth selling.  A quick rearrangement of the shelves and I found I could easily fit in all the books from the bedroom floor.  Why I hadn't thought of this sooner heaven knows, but at least the penny dropped eventually.  Now all I need to do is get the hoover out and clean up the frighteningly dusty patches where the piles of books once stood!

The house still seems to be groaning at the seams with 'stuff' but I begin to feel I might, at last, be making a positive dent in it all.

Every Cloud

The vintage Christmas lights were still around at the 'Coffee and Jumble' this morning so I decided to take a punt and buy them.  I knew they didn't work as one of the helpers had tried them out for me last week but thought I might as well have a go with them myself - after many reminders from the various helpers there that I should be very careful, and to make sure I'd unplugged them before fiddling around with them.  The helpers are all gentlemen of a 'certain age' who probably feel women shouldn't be messing with anything electrical - although I very much welcomed their help and concern for my well-being.

I tightened all the bulbs, even read the instructions and changed the 'fuse bulb' (there were some unopened spares with the lights), and have messed around with the very vintage bakelite plug but, sadly, all to no avail - the little blighters refuse to work.  Ah well, you win some, you lose some.

However, what I hadn't noticed last week was the rather spiffy 1960's tin the lights were stored in. 

Helpfully marked 'Pony' on the side, just in case you were in any doubt as to what exactly the creature on the lid was.