Category: fEAsting

all things food related

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feasting ~ and yet more partying

Another weekend of partying and party preparing.

This time it was Master Freddie’s 7th birthday party on Sunday afternoon with many of his friends. He has always been good at arithmetic and quite obsessed with number blocks from an early age, so it came as no surprise that he really wanted a number blocks party. It makes no difference to him that the other boys in his class may have already progressed onto Nerf battles or Pokemon parties – he was adamantly sticking to number blocks.

So we made some.

It took us most of the week to source the bits we needed to build seven number blocks. Not quite cubes, as we used mainly the empty wine boxes Sainsbury’s put out for customers to take, as they were free. Finding the plain coloured paper was not easy and a roll of orange was not to be had anywhere and too late for us to order any, so we had to improvise and join a few sheets of orange A4 card together that we had left over from Halloween (but it did the job…and here they are).

Master Freddie’s mum hired the local village hall and a wonderful party entertainer called Nellie B, who was happy to do a mix of traditional games, team games, dancing and the highlight at the end was the snow machine, which had all 23 partygoers screaming with excitement.

And now we are recovering from the two weekends of partying, and we both came down with a cold on Monday morning. I am not surprised as our diet for the past two weeks has not been wonderful, many quick to make meals and a few cans of soup to fill in when we haven’t been able to make our own. So we are paying the price of not looking after ourselves and the dental appointment for today has been cancelled so we don’t pass on any germs.

In all I am feeling rather weary, it has been quite a hectic time since well before Christmas and no doubt my body is telling me I need to rest. Mum is already pestering me about going up to see her as her party seems a long time ago now to her….increasingly she has no sense of time anymore. I will somehow have to dodge the question of ‘when will I be seeing you’.

January seems to be melting away now, just like the recent snowfall we had. In a weeks time we will be greeting February and all the month brings. I already have a joyful vase of daffodils on my kitchen windowsill and orange tulips on the table. I especially like them as they begin to droop and their stems wander and, had I the time, I would reach for my sketch book and watercolours.

As I eat my breakfast I have a direct sight out to the garden arch we erected in the garden last year. It was one of the non-negotionable possessions that we brought back from our cottage garden in Scotland. I have hung the fat ball feeder from the top and it is wonderful to see a host of garden birds everyday coming to feed. I am not organised enough to take part in the Big Garden Bird Watch, but I will get plenty of pleasure just watching them each day.

Apart from making number blocks I have been making headway with our finances, planning a new budget for this year against the final figures for last year and updating our savings accounts with any interest. This passive income is vital when you are on a pension, so it is important to find the highest earning tax fee ISA accounts that I can when any come to maturity.

All in all, even with the cost of living increasing, we are doing OK but I do worry about our long term future and possible care costs given that my mum has reached 100 now and the cost of her care over the last 2 years has now depleted her savings to the point that we need to apply to her local authority for assistance.

I expect after their assessment they will not want her to stay put in her own home as the cost of her care is over a £1,000 a week now and when you add her living costs onto that it will probably far exceed what the council will pay and they will obviously prefer to pay the all inclusive care home fees where they do a deal with certain homes for the smaller, cheaper rooms.

Of course there is no issue for the council if a relative wants to step in and offer to pay the difference in costs, but this has to be thought through carefully because we have no idea how long mum might live for…at the moment I am thinking possibly to 105 and five years of expenses will be required, and expenses that will increase as she gets less able and with more dementia; this will drain any savings that we have put aside for our long term needs.

Mum is so much better remaining in her own home with carers going in four times a day for almost an hour at a time. She would not get that amount of undivided attention from the carers in a care home. When she fell and had a brief spell in one a couple of years ago she was lucky to be helped to the toilet two or three times a day and that involved minimal ‘chatting’ as they would be dashing to help the next person pressing the buzzer. Her main contact was the support staff bringing a meal.

It is such a worry but all I can do now is wait for the call from a social worker, when one is appointed, and they are struggling to do that until some time in February.

But not all is doom and gloom, there are little signs here and there that spring is on its way and that is always cheerful. On our walks we see the catkins growing longer and in the garden I have shoots forcing their way up through the ground – only to meet with this bitterly cold and wet weather.

I never mind January, in fact I quite like being able to hibernate (parties aside) and concentrate on staying home where it is cosy and warm; bringing the paperwork and filing up to date and if I exhaust that, turning out a few cupboards. And planning, lots of planning…maybe even dreaming a little of what I might do in the year ahead.

It was nice to clear the decorations from Christmas, they are neatly packed away again in the loft, and have a clean around but I never feel it is quite the time for a deep clean until I can get any soft furnishings washed and out to blow on the line. We had a trip to Ikea last Thursday, not for anything in particular just a look around. I like to look at their room sets for ideas, especially where they cleverly use some of the items in tiny spaces. I do want to fit out our built in wardrobe but it is quite shallow and definitely not walk in. The 35cm deep and 50cm wide Pax frame would be ideal to slot in at one side and would give me room to put 3 or 4 shelves above and 3 or 4 drawers below.

I have a yearning to create a capsule wardrobe of clothes that actually all fits into the wardrobe – underwear, scarves, bags, coats, the lot. I have already condensed the clothes in the 3 drawer chest down enough to be able to remove it from the bedroom all together soon as our main bedroom is not very big by today’s standards and space is at a premium. I am replacing it with the Ikea Nordiska dressing table, which will be painted a duck egg blue colour and is just a nice size to fit between the bed and the window wall. DH will have the Nordiska bedside table at his side.

So that is my few ramblings and now I am going to rest and read…quite a treat really if it wasn’t for this awful streaming cold.

Thank you for your previous comments, my mum had a lovely week with plenty of attention, but so far no card from King Charles, maybe he needs a nudge.

Back soon….I hope x

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feasting ~ 100 at last…

We have been waiting for this day for quite a while, planning and plotting and at last the day finally came and when mum woke up on Monday morning she was 100…….. a whole century of living and I cannot imagine how that feels.

On Sunday, the day before, the family (the ones she hasn’t managed to outlive) gathered together for a celebration of mum’s special birthday. I had organised a private room at the Keys in Yarm near to where mum lives for a two course Sunday lunch. The organiser at the venue, Kimberley, couldn’t have been more helpful; the tables were beautifully decorated with flowers and candles – we just added banners, balloons and scattered lots of photos of mum’s life around.

My sister made the cakes, they were wonderful. One had a lovely scene of mum when she was in the Women’s Land Army during the war (a job that she was always very proud of and for which she has a badge) and the other she decorated with flowers. All the flowers and decorations on the cake were handmade by her and her little team (husband, daughter and friend) and I know they were up until the early hours getting them finished.

I made a place card for each of our guests using whatever old photos I could find of them in their younger days, so each person had to find their seat by recognising their own photo. It became a great talking point too with a lot of memories being shared.

It was all a big surprise for my mum, but a very welcome one. I think she struggled to grasp who all the family members were as we don’t see some of them very often, but as she keeps reminding us all now ‘I am 100’ so she is now officially allowed to have memory lapses. I didn’t like to point out that her memory has been ‘lapsing’ for quite a while now!!

It was a struggle to know what to buy her so we bought her a very large display clock for her bedside table that is specially designed for people with memory problems; it tells you if it is morning, afternoon or evening, (in the hope she will not keep ringing us in the early hours thinking it is the afternoon). We also made up a hamper of her favourite bits and pieces that everyone could add to.

The celebrations continued on the Monday, her actual birthday, at the retirement apartments where she lives. The residents had wanted to get together and put a little spread on for mum which was nice as her main carer could attend as a guest too.

So mum is completely wiped out now and will probably sleep away her days for the rest of this week!

Meanwhile, we have yet another celebration to turn our attention to as it is Master Freddies’s seventh birthday party on Sunday, but this time it will be mostly his little school friends attending this one.

Next Monday might see me lying down in a darkened room all partied out.

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dear diary ~ a moment….ous week

Not only was it Remembrance Day yesterday but it has been a week filled with both sad and happy moments.

Last Tuesday my friend K could not come shopping with us as she was expecting a visit from her daughter. I was a bit disappointed as we look forward to her company but we agreed to catch up later in the week for a chat. We almost overstayed our welcome in Sainsbury’s carpark as you only get two hours and I was having a good browse in all the various sections including the clothes and looking out for any Nectar bargains. It was mid afternoon when we got back home and we had just eaten our lunch and put all the shopping away when a little after 4pm we had a phone call from K’s daughter to say she had been rushed into hospital. K was diagnosed with a terminal illness in October of last year and we all knew her time was limited, but somehow she managed to keep going and always keep smiling.

We went up to the hospital to see her straight away and then visited a couple of times through the week but she was mostly asleep or very drowsy, then on the Thursday teatime when we bobbed in to see her after my audiology appointment, she was raised up in her bed enjoying a cup of tea. We had a lovely little chat for a short time and then came away so as not to tire her out. I didn’t know then but this would be the last time we would have together… and I will cherish those moments. On the Friday morning K became unresponsive and eventually slipped away peacefully on Monday.

Although we had an age gap of almost 20 years, K was a dear and special friend who I met almost by accident when I gave a lift one freezing winter’s morning many years ago to her neighbour Bernard. It is a story I have told before on my blog. Bernard became my Tuesday and Thursday morning companion as I drove into work until he became ill and was taken into hospital. That evening I had a call from K his neighbour saying Bernard was asking that I should go and visit him and had passed my phone number to her. We alternated our visits as his family lived away and each evening K and I would speak on the phone to report on progress. After 2 weeks Bernard passed away but K and I continued to phone each other and eventually met at Bernard’s funeral. Our relationship continued and blossomed and we found we liked the same things especially the area of Scotland where our cottage was located. K and her partner often came on holiday to the area around Stranraer and we would meet up if we were at the cottage at the same time.

When I see the poppies now I will always remember our last moments together but I know our Tuesday shopping day will never feel quite the same without the cup of tea and a chat we had afterwards when we took her back home.

The weekend was another busy one for us.

On the Saturday we were determined to fit something in for ourselves and we chose the Sheffield Print Fair at the Millenium Gallery. As I was born in Sheffield near the Wednesday ground I love to go back and now the city centre is vibrant once again after the loss of Debenhams and John Lewis and a certain amount of regeneration and rebuilding has been occurring over the last few years. The planners I think are doing a good job, preserving some of the old historic buildings amongst the new and providing plenty of lush planting and seating around to soften the harshness of these concrete cities.

The print fair was packed and we thoroughly enjoyed browsing the stalls of some very talented young (and older) print designers. There was every kind of printing method on show but I am always drawn to the linocuts and silk screen prints rather than the polished digital artwork.

Afterwards, we had a mooch around the centre. It has been a while since we were last there and a lot of the demolition sites are now showing off the new and restored buildings. It is something I like about Sheffield that they try to keep and cherish old buildings and they sit side by side with the new.

This block housed an old fashioned jeweller in the corner shop; in the upstairs windows you could see them at work with the machinery on old wooden benches. The end of the run was obviously past restoration but they have added a new section to compliment the terrace.

They also flaunt madly the fact that the city grew on steel manufacturing and many of the structures around the centre are made of it. Because of the steel industry Sheffield was hit hard in the blitz and most of the town centre was demolished by bombs and needed a complete rebuild. Nearly everyone had a relative affected by the blitz in one way or another. My grandma had her windows blown out a few times, but was luckier than the people in the next street along whose house had a direct hit.

It is a leafy city as well – had I had the time I would have been picking up some of these leaves to press.

We walked down the Moor to Atkinsons, the family run department store, where this plaque is permanently displayed in the entrance. They are doing well to survive in this retail climate and it is such a comforting department store as it hardly ever changes, just a little updating every so often; enough to keep up with the trends but not huge changes and revamps like John Lewis.

On Sunday it was Sweetie’s 7th birthday – oh the joy and excitement of being seven. We travelled up to north Yorkshire to help at her pottery painting party that she had with a few friends and afterwards she had a second family party at her home and a mammoth present opening session.

This meant two cakes, though at the friends party we just gave out a cupcake each (far less mess than cake cutting).

She struggled at times to read some of the messages in her friends cards!

….but was overjoyed at the presents….

….and she declared the day her best birthday so far.

Meanwhile, this week I was set the task (I don’t even remember volunteering for this) of organising a celebration for my mum when she turns 100 in January. It will be a small group of us as she has outlived many of the family members. We have decided on a private dining space in a local restaurant and will probably opt for the Sunday lunch. Their menu is quite extensive and they even have fish and chips (which I think mum might like) and luckily for us a nut roast. I think there will be something for everyone’s tastes. I just hope the weather is not against us and that no-one falls ill with colds or Covid, especially not my mum! It would be so annoying to wait a hundred years for this special day and then not be able to celebrate it.

I am making sure our vitamin C quota is kept high in the hope the dreaded lurgy in one form or another passes us by and it is a delight to go into my pantry at the moment, the colours are a wonderful sight.

I have bought all the ingredients now for my usual favourite ‘organic’ Christmas cake recipe and managed to get a smaller pack of white icing from Hobbycraft as I only ever cover the top. I am all set to make it the Sunday after next if I remember to soak the fruit on the Friday.

I have also sorted the Christmas Eve Santa pyjamas for the 4 grandchildren, red tartan for the girls and white for the boys, their mum’s choice. I nearly ended up with all the colours in all the sizes and stripped Sainsbury’s bare. Now the respective mum’s have decided on the right sizes I can return the surplus and Sainsbury’s can re-stock!

I also have my eye on these.

I don’t think I have anymore tales to tell of the last week. This week I need to finish the mountain of ironing that has accumulated and sketch out some ideas for the linocutting workshop DH and I are booked onto on the 19th November, only a week away.

After finishing my last 3 tasks I didn’t have chance last week with the hospital visits to do more but I have more or less decided on the next three.

  • Plant the bulbs and small mixed shrub selection I bought a while ago in pots or the garden.
  • Drop off the items we have for the auction at the Crisis charity coffee morning at church.
  • Trim the berberis

Have a great week and thank you for all your comments…so sorry I never got to answer some of them – normal service might resume soon.

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dear diary ~ changing seasons, changing menu

By the time you read this we might be well on our journey (hope so) – stocked up with a couple of home made meals for the first two days (we are self-catering). After months of salads and plates of cold food I am really looking forward to eating some old favourites more suited to this cooler and very wet weather. I don’t know about you but I feel like I went to bed one day in summer and have woken up in autumn; the change overnight was so sudden here. I wasn’t quite ready.

With a change of menu in mind – nothing beats a good nutroast and it is so easy to transport…as long as we don’t forget to get it out of the freezer and yes we have been there, done that and got the t-shirt. The worst ever time I recall was forgetting to get Sweetie’s first birthday sponge cake out of the freezer to take with us to decorate at my daughters 70 miles away – good old Co-op came to the rescue.

This nut roast recipe above that I often use is a firm favourite, easy to make and uses up any celery, carrots or mushrooms at the end of a week or like now when we are going away. I will put the recipe page up on the drop down recipes above for anyone interested. If you like nutroast do try it you won’t be disappointed.

Once cooked and sliced it is a good standby for the freezer providing a homemade ready meal that can be microwaved in minutes. I generally serve it with mashed or roast potatoes, Brussel sprouts or cabbage and roast parsnips, I also add in a couple of small Yorkshires too. The meal would not be complete without lashings of gravy (vegetarian of course) with a splash of Henderson’s relish added (coming from Sheffield what else would I use)? Another unusual quirk of mine is to serve it with a spoonful of apple sauce as you would for pork, I think it goes so well with the nutroast.

Saturday night was Shepherds Pie with brown lentils, topped with swede and potatoes mashed together, a sprinkling of parmesan and a scattering of cherry tomatoes cut in half to provide some colour.

I feel quite smug and organised when I prepare the veg ahead of time ‘Mise en Place’ style though more often than not this is not always possible but it certainly makes life easier if we are late home and making Shepherds Pie from scratch takes far too long when you are a little ravenous.

DH prepped the veg for a curry yesterday morning and made enough for our evening meal and for us to take with us to Cheltenham. I will pack a packet of Tilda wholegrain basmati rice that will cook in 2 minutes in the microwave (I did check there is a microwave!)

My autumn menu plans will feature a lot of the old favourites – roasted veg lasagne, stuffed courgettes, baked potatoes and a medley of vegetables in a creamy cheese sauce. And I have a new soup recipe to try – Cream of vegetable and herb soup with celeriac and parsnip.

DH has taken to stewing the plentiful punnets of plums and apricots I have been buying in Sainsbury’s – often at a reduced price. Accompanied with some creamy Greek yoghurt or creme fraiche it makes a lovely simple dessert or breakfast.

And a neighbour gave me a carrier bag full of eating apples. I think they must be Pink Lady or a similar variety because inside they are a most wonderful rose pink colour. DH cooked them and then froze them in individual little pots and the left overs went to make an Eve’s pudding.

We shared one last night….. just to try it out of course …and yes it did taste good even better as we don’t normally have a pudding – the other one is travelling with us.

As soon as we return from our few days away I have promised myself an irresistable chocolate and pear pudding while there is an abundance of pears in the shops.

When I received the final details for the little flat we are renting we found out the number is 58 – the same number as our first student house in Cheltenham though not the same road.

But how co-incidental is that?

Can’t wait now to see this exhibition, all our old haunts and all the changes.

Back soon x