Making Good Use

Up With the Lark - Groan!!

It was an extremely early start here at chez 'Making Good Use' as poor old P had to travel to Middlesbrough today to give a presentation.  I was awake at 5.45 am and up at 6.30 waving P off in a taxi to the station.  And, boy, has that early start really messed with my whole day.

In the normal run of things I'm awake about 7.15 am and up at about 7.45 (no point getting out of bed any earlier as the bathroom is being used by P to get ready for work,) and waving P off just before 8.00.  It all works very well and after my breakfast (and a sneaky 25 minutes watching a re-run of 'Frasier' on Channel 4) I'm ready to get going for the day. 

Today, with the ferociously early start (for us anyway) it took me five hours from waking up to getting out of the house - and I kid you not!!  I've no idea why it took me so long.  I did try to go back to bed at 6.30 but was only really dozing when my slumbers were completely finished at about 7.30 by the banging and crashing of the builders across the road.  So I dragged my protesting carcass out of bed and went to have my breakfast.  I was slumped semi-comatose on the settee until 8.50 when 'Frasier' finished.  Then I went off to have my shower.  And then what?? No idea.  Next thing I knew it was 10.45 and I had to nip to the Post Office.

I did feel a bit better when I came back and tackled a humungous pile of washing up, made myself some lunch, went through all my Amazon listings (and removed another eight items,) spoke to my Mum on the phone, checked out some blog sites, ordered Mum's birthday present (and actually remembered to click through to the site from 'Top Cashback', thus getting 8% of the price back - eventually!!)  Then, mid-afternoon I knew it was no good, I was just going to have to have a small lie-down.  Predictably I woke about 6.00 pm feeling totally dopey and with a mouth like an Arab's dap (a good old Bristolian saying for a dry mouth.)  I don't know how you early birds do it. 

Goodness knows how P is feeling as he's had a five hour train journey from Essex to Middlesbrough, a two and a half hour solo presentation, and another five hour train journey home again.  I should think he'll fall through the door tonight at 10.30 pm and straight into bed.

Saving a Silk Tie

When P arrived home from his travels in the Far East he was a little upset to discover he'd got some unidentifiable mark (he suspects it was food related) all down the front of one of his silk ties.  He asked if I could have a go at getting the mark out - and not to worry if it proved un-shiftable as both he and I were pretty sure the tie had been a charity shop find in the first place.  But still, the tie was silk and, as P put it, a useful one that went well with a lot of shirts.

Well, said tie hung around the house for a couple of weeks - firstly draped hopefully over P's suitcase and finally moved on top of the pile of hats and scarves downstairs (so I noticed it every time I passed).  Eventually, one day last week seemed like as good as day as any to attempt to get the mark out.  I filled a plastic bowl with warm water, added some non-bio washing liquid, covered the stain in Ace bleach and added more Ace bleach to the water.  I left it all soaking for a few hours (if truth be told I forgot all about it and finally remembered it again when I went back in the kitchen to make myself a cup of tea - the instructions on the Ace bleach bottle say not to leave things soaking for more than an hour!,) hung it totally dripping (no squeezing in case the silk got all wrinkled) over the washing line in the garden and left it out overnight.

I was thoroughly amazed the next morning to find that the mark had gone - result!  A light going over with a cool iron and the tie was if not as perfect as it once was, at least wearable again.  Both P and I were delighted.  It's just as well I don't have to wear a tie as I'm such a mucky eater I'd have marks and stains on every single one I possessed.  Seriously, it's a miracle if I manage to get through a meal without dropping something down my front - and it's usually tomato-based so is the devil's own job to get the stain out again.

And We're Off

Yay, first car boot sale of the season yesterday morning.  I didn't find anything really spectacular but it was wonderful to be setting out full of anticipation about what I might find and to have a good old mooch around.  In some ways it seems forever since I last went to a car boot - although it is only six months - and yet in other ways it seemed like it had hardly been a week or so since I was last walking round that field, checking out what was for sale, and being sorely tempted by the smell from the burger vans.  Normally I would never touch a burger but when I'm a little hungry and out in the fresh air they do smell mighty tempting.  I'm happy to say I did resist, although generally I'm with Oscar Wilde - 'I can resist all but temptation.'

Anyway, yesterday's car boot was all about vintage linens really.  I've noticed before that sometimes I find loads of clothes, or some weeks loads of books or toiletries - this week it was loads of linens.  Amongst other things I found:

The most fabulous psychedelic piggy Irish linen tea towel for 30p.  If I didn't have a drawer-ful of perfectly good towelling tea towels I would be tempted to keep hold of him but instead he's destined for ebay.

This rather nice rose-print tablecloth (30p) is a bit worn in places so this may well end up as cushion covers for the wooden chairs that go with our garden table.  The chairs look lovely but are pretty hard on the old derriere after you've been sitting on them for a while and this year I'm determined that I will make some cushions to go on them (I've been meaning to do this for perhaps the past five summers!!)

And a wonderful set of unused 1960s placemats and napkins featuring native Australian plants

Only a designer of the 60s would have been mad enough to team chartreuse with bright red

I love 'em and think the colours work fantastically together.

And at 50p for the lot I wasn't going to leave them behind.

Free Seeds

I watched the most lovely gardening programme on the BBC iPlayer yesterday - Edible Garden.  It was so inspiring to see somebody growing fruit and veg in a 'normal' sized garden - 60 x 20 ft I think - and making it all look damned pretty into the bargain. 

It gave me loads of ideas and inspiration to get on with planting a few things up in the next couple of weeks - especially the growing pea shoots from boxed dried peas suggestion, what a genius idea.  Amazingly, some of the lettuce leaves that I sowed last year are showing through the soil again.  I would have thought that our extreme winter weather this year would have killed them off but, no, a few hardy little souls definitely survived.

Anyway, there was a link at the end of the programme to the Dig In website (part of the BBC gardening site I think) where you can get five free packs of seeds - mixed salad, courgette, french bean, basil and carrot - by just filling in an online form.  Sounds like a good deal to me so I thought I'd spread the word.  

Odds and Ends

No great news from Essex today, nor has anything very exciting been achieved - a fair bit of cooking, some photographing ebay items and playing pop and dodgit with the showers whilst trying to get the washing dry - but mainly a very quiet day at home, so I thought I'd have a bit of an 'odds and ends' blog post today.

Lighter Later

I came across this 10:10 Lighter Later information over at A Piece of Wood blog and thought it was such a good idea. 

'It’s about changing our clocks even further so we are awake when it’s lighter.  The current clocks forward and back will still happen, but the time as it is now moves forward another hour and then doesn’t change. So we move an hour of daylight from the morning to the evening when we are awake to enjoy it!

From the cutting emissions point of view, that means less lights being used in the evenings.

They have received huge national and local support, so please sign up if you think it’s a good idea.'

Personally I hate the dark winter afternoons with a passion, and whilst I realise that the mornings would inevitably be dark for an hour longer I feel that would be more than offset by the afternoons not getting dark until 4.30 or 5.00 pm (and that would only be in the very depths of winter.)   Plus we'd have daylight until 11.00 pm in mid-summer - how cool would that be!! 

I've got a feeling there was an experiment with double summer time in the late 60s / early 70s which I seem to vaguely remember - and I know they had it during the war too (I don't personally remember that but do remember my Dad telling me about it) in order to save energy.  It seems like an excellent idea to me and I've already signed the petition.  The link is here  if you too want to add your support. 

Mr Motorbike in the Garage Next Door

I'm delighted to report that P having a polite word with Mr Motorbike seems to have had an effect.  Although he was around every day over the Easter weekend there was very little revving of motorbike engines and what there was didn't happen until around lunchtime - which was fantastic for us.  Let's hope this is how things will continue, if we get more trouble again then I'm sure another 'chat' will have the desired result.  Mr Motorbike is a very pleasant and reasonable sort of chap - although his hatchet-faced wife is another matter (I've had a run-in with her before) - and I'm so pleased that things seem to be resolved for the time being.

Mind you, I was very surprised when we went to have a second look at a house for sale in the next road over from ours and the lady there said she'd been wondering where the annoying sound of revving motorbikes had come from (we were talking about the problem we'd had with the noise).  Just goes to show how far sound travels in a quiet neighbourhood, and how many people were probably being affected by such noisy engines early in the morning.

Homemade Birthday Pressies

It was my sister's birthday on Easter Sunday and although I failed to make her the patchwork skirt she'd requested (sadly my sewing skills not being up to the challenge,) I did make her another skirt from a piece of fabric I had lurking in the stash.

She said the fit was just right and that she was very pleased with it.  Me, I was delighted with it - having managed French seams and all - until it came to the hem which ended up like a dog's dinner.  It really wasn't my best effort and I had to put a 'warning' label on the wrapping paper saying that it was a very sub-standard homemade gift.

I also made her an embroidered cat card.  I'd done one very similar for my Mum for Mother's day using orange coloured thread to look like Lily (who is ginger and white) but made the mistake of outlining the eyes in black which changed the cat from looking like Lily to looking like the Lone Ranger!  I didn't fall for that one again and did my sister's card in grey around the eyes too - to look like her Maine Coon cat, Izzy.

Vintage Knitting Pattern Nirvana

For a biggish town there aren't all that many charity shops left in Southend - and one of those is Oxfam so the prices are eye-wateringly high.  I didn't have the highest hopes of finding anything too wonderful and indeed I didn't until I came across a charity shop I hadn't seen before, on the high street just before you get to the sea. 

It was for a charity I'd never heard of - Lady Somebody's Breast Cancer charity - and the shop was so neat and tidy and full of nice things that I wondered if I'd misread the notice on the door saying it was in fact a charity shop.  They were doing a fantastic trade - and deservedly so as many of their clothes appeared to be in excellent order and keenly priced.  I made my way to the back of the shop where I spotted skeins of embroidery floss marked at 10p each.  They only had pink, green and blue so I bought two of each.

 

It was only when I got home that I realised they are very upmarket - being linen thread and not cotton.  They are a bit faded in places but that won't stop me making use of them.  There was also a huge box of vintage knitting patterns, being eagerly looked through by someone else.  As she was flipping through them I realised that every single pattern in the box dated from the 1940s or 50s and were in excellent condition.  Turns out the other lady was looking for crochet patterns and couldn't find any so when she moved off I dived in.

 

There was pattern

 

after

 

pattern

to

choose

from

And they were all 10p each.  I came away with a dozen I think.  Some I might use but others are just such wonderful pictures that they were worth the 10p for that alone. 
In another charity shop I also found two lovely thick bath towels priced at £1.00 each.  Although the floral one was a bit raggedy at each end (I'm covering that up with some uber-large bias binding I happend to have) they were both in much much better condition than some of the towels I've been using for years.  In the spirit of not cluttering the place up too much I dug out two very tatty old towels from the airing cupboard and put them out for the textile recycling collection this morning.  One of them was my 31-year-old Coca Cola towel which I saved ring-pulls or bottle tops or something for all those years ago.  It hadn't been used for many years and was only fit for dumping - with the logo being so faded it was almost illegible, all the edges were raggedy, there were two holes in the middle and remnants of hair dye all over it.  Why was I keeping hold of that??

And, finally, one other purchase made in Southend - two large (1000m) reels of Gutermann sewing thread - £14.00 for the two.  Flippin' 'eck I nearly keeled over at the till - I'm hoping though that some really good quality thread will put an end to the annoying thread snapping that is going on every time I use the sewing machine.  At that price, they better had - or else!!

Posh Nosh

It's become a little bit of a tradition for P and I to take ourselves off to Southend-on-Sea every Easter Saturday.  P goes to check out the chess at the Southend Chess Congress and I go to check out the charity shops and generally have a bit of a wander.  We meet up during the afternoon and have a spot of lunch.  This year we went back to a rather spiffy French restaurant in one of the quiet little side streets that branch off the main shopping area. 

The food was delicious.  I had the fanciest, tastiest sausage and mash ever - with some very nice onion rings balanced on the top.

And P chose steak and rice in a curry sauce.  He pronounced it delicious.

For pudding we went for the rather upmarket-sounding 'assiette of desserts' to share - P, who speaks French, informs me it only means 'a plate of desserts!'  (Why does everything sound so much posher when written in French?)  They were absolutely gorgeous.

It was all very nice and civilised in the restaurant, with a beautifully painted ceiling

A pianist playing a grand piano

And pretty little vignettes of antique items to look at (including a large cello in a copper bath (!) but I didn't have the nerve to photograph that.

 
  
The weather was lovely - not overly warm but not raining either - so we went to have a look at the sea.

I managed to find a few rather nice bits and bobs in the charity shops and also to spend an obscene amount of money on two reels of sewing thread - but more on that tomorrow.

Sweet Violets

Teeny tiny little wild violets are springing up everywhere in the grass verges around here.  They are so small and so pretty and, hopefully, a sign that Spring is truly on its way.  They make me wish I had a pack of Parma Violet sweets in my pocket - can you still buy those?, I don't think I've seen them in years.  Wishing you all a very Happy Easter.

Perhaps It's A Spring Thing

I don't know if it is because Spring has officially sprung (although someone forget to tell the weather that - it's freeeeeezing here today,) or whether it's because we're now on British Summer Time - yay, daylight until 7.30 pm - but I seem to have gone in to declutter overdrive at the moment. 

It was lovely to be able to get rid of two sacks of 'stuff' last Friday, and the fact that they were being collected from the front path prompted me to delve into the seemingly endless pile of 'stuff' that lurkes in the bottom of the wardrobe - and subsequently put a few items into the charity sack and also take a punt and list a few more on ebay.  Oddly enough, a lot of the 'stuff' I found had been rattling around in there for months (if not years) and I'd pretty much forgotten I had it.  Quite a few of the items I listed on ebay have already got bids on them so it looks as thought it was not a complete waste of my time to photograph and list them.   

Once I'd finished with the 'stuff' on the wardrobe floor I moved on to being rather ruthless with my summer clothes.  I think there's some rule that says if you haven't worn an item of clothing in two years, get rid of it.  Hmm, there were quite a few items in there that fitted that criteria - anything really nice will go on ebay but a couple of the items had some minor faults (nothing serious, just little things that meant I wouldn't feel happy listing them on ebay) and they went into the charity sacks.  A couple of items were beyond being of any use to anyone so they went into the pink recycling sack with a 'textile' sticker on it.  I think it's great that Basildon Council will take textiles as part of their fortnightly recycling collections.  Apparently if the items are in good condition they are passed on to charity, if not they're cut up and used as rags for idustrial purposes.  They'll take any sort of textiles and even shoes and handbags - although I'm not sure they could cut those up for rags!

I've finally located a place in Wickford where I can recycle batteries - Boots the chemist.  I don't get on with rechargable batteries as they only seem to last about five minutes in my digital camera and I do get through rather a lot of AA batteries as I take quite a few digital pictures.  P has always been scandalised that batteries were not easily recyclable here and I've always felt rather uneasy about lobbing them into the general rubbish when I know they are full of such horrible toxins.  Thank goodness I've now found an outlet for them to be recycled.  (Have just found this useful site that lets you find your nearest 'Batterycan'  battery recycling point.) 

And finally, in a bid to clear up the pile of 'stuff' that lurks on the bedroom floor (yes, I have piles of 'stuff' just about everywhere) I got out the sewing machine and converted the 'I-don't-believe-it' king size duvet cover into a double one.  After all the hassles I had coverting the other 'bought in error' cover I was expecting a full afternoon of swearing and cussing but it went really smoothly and within approx. 20 minutes I had a pretty good imitation of a double duvet cover.  Some of the seams may not be entirely straight - hind leg of a donkey is perhaps more accurate - but I think I'm with the Amish when they say only God can produce perfection.  I know I certainly can't!!

Toast Trousers and Many Many Thanks

Monday morning always means a trip to the post office to send off ebay items and them a swift rummage through the jumble at the 'Coffee and Jumble' in the local church hall.  I start with the bric-a-brac, which is located just inside the door, and over the years I've had some very useful items from amongst the various bits and bobs for sale on that stall.  Then I move on to the books, again I've had a few good ones from there - both for re-sale and to read myself.  Sometimes, depending on the time of year, there are pullets eggs for sale or garden plants, fetchingly displayed next to a pile of ancient-to-the-point-of-antique 'Hello' magazines. Then a cursory glance at the china and glassware table (don't think I've ever bought anything of that ilk there), and then, finally, a look at the clothing and linens table.  This section is always (wo)maned by Rene, 92 and very spry, and is definitely worth a rummage through.

This week I turned up trumps by finding a pair of Toast ladies trousers in excellent condition (sadly nowhere near my size - I doubt very much that Toast makes anything in my size - but an excellent find for reselling on ebay.)  Then, unbelievably, I found not one, not two, but three skirts in my size amongst the piles of clothes.  Now admittedly I very rarely wear skirts - even when the weather is really hot - as my ankles and lower legs are very swollen these days and I don't like showing them off.  However, one of the skirts in particular has really taken my fancy and may get an airing in the warmer weather - even if only in the garden.  The other two are not really my style but one of them is a lovely Ann Harvey black crepe evening skirt with bugle-bead embroidery on the waistband.  I know how expensive Ann Harvey stuff is and I'll bet that skirt cost an absolute fortune when new.  Needless to say, that one too is destined for ebay.

Many many thanks for all your comments you left on yesterday's post.  There are a lot of different viewpoints and some really really useful ideas.  I so appreciated such detailed replies and excellent suggestions people made - it's given us lots of food for thought and ideas about how to resolve the issue.  Thank you.