Tag: Everyday life

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dear diary :: the close of the year

I thought I knew what I was doing today but then life happened. DH received a phone call from the garage about our car – they are having difficulty getting a part and it will be Friday before they can do anything. He asked if they had a courtesy car to tide us over, as my little car is away on holiday in Norwich with my daughters until Thursday………. but they didn’t. Then 30 minutes later they rang back and said they had managed to rearrange things and if we could get down to the garage in town straight away they could give us one.

So my original plans for today changed in a few seconds and we had to scramble around to get our things together and walk down to the village for the bus. It was one of those local independant bus companies that set up using the old cast off buses that are sold on from the main companies – Metro and First buses in our region. The bus called Tiger buses was bright orange and so clapped out I did wonder if it was actually road worthy as we rumbled and rattled our way into town. It was the ride from hell; I swear it had square wheels. I just managed not to be sick down the women sat in front of me ( a morbid fear of mine when I am on a bus).

Opposite us was a young family, mum dad, baby in a pram and young teenage daughter. It hit home how lucky we are to have a car and how difficult and expensive it must be when you have to use public transport. The journey cost £2.70 each into town – it is 7 miles so too far to walk. The young daughter must have been going to stay with a relative or friend overnight as I overheard the mum saying that she was to pick her up at 8pm tomorrow evening. Because there are no buses running on New Year’s day she would have to organise a taxi to go and collect her -I wonder how much that will cost her on double time.

We collected the rather striking red and white Citroen C3 (doesn’t quite fit with DH’s image – he is hardly a boy racer!) and drove round to Sainsbury’s with some returns and to get a bit more fresh food and bread. Then round to TK Max to exchange a fridge container that we bought yesterday, and was later found to be broken, for another one. I confess it is plastic but not single use and should last me for years even if we change the fridge. I already have one or two in the fridge and they are so useful to keep like things together and pull out so that you can see everything at once and saves me having to contort myself whilst trying to rummage to the back of the fridge past many jars and packets.

I aslo bought a few reduced Christmas cards ready for next year. They are handy to have in case I don’t get to make my own or don’t make enough of my own next Christmas. They are packed away now already for next year.

Before Christmas I made a selection of ‘Thank you’ notelets intended as a gift for a friend who uses a lot of them; but then decided they were not really good enough to give as a gift but are OK for me to use. So that is what I am about to do now – write my thank you cards so that I can give them out when we see our friends tonight for our new year gathering.

In fact I need to get a move on so I have time to have a shower and do something with my hair. It is not a dress up evening just smart casual – it is lovely to be able to end the year amongst good friends if you cannot be with your family. My mum is with my sister and BIL down in Torquay, my daughters, partners and grandchildren somewhere on the coast in Norfolk and my brother does not do new year – so we are so lucky to bring in the new year and share a meal and a festive tipple with some of our oldest friends and that they live close enough for us to walk round there and leave the C3 at home.

I hope whatever you are doing this evening you have some pleasant memories of the passing year and I wish you health and happiness for the coming year.

Thank you everyone who reads my blog and for those who frequently comment and those who drop me a line only once in a while. It is lovely to hear from you all with your good wishes and good advice. I send greetings and hugs to you all. x

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2020

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creating a simpler Christmas * day 17

My days do not often go to plan and today was no exception. I intended to do the small pile of ironing, then a spot of wrapping, weigh out the fruit for my Christmas cake and then a little crafting.

I managed most of the things on my list – ironing (done), present wrapping (more or less done), weighing out the fruit to soak in the alcohol ready for making the cake (this is when I discovered that…shock horror…the brandy bottle was almost empty). I was getting on well with my tasks but then from this point on we had a visit from a very dear friend who had called round with his gift and Christmas card – I swear he can smell my chocolates from the other side of the village. He was in luck only four pieces left – we had one each and he had the spare one. He went away happy.

We had a late lunch of soup and then let it digest whilst watching a little Columbo on the TV. I say a little as I promptly fell asleep…but then awoke with a sore throat…where did that come from…and tonight a runny nose.

Mum and my sister are doing a flying visit here tomorrow; coming down by train as mum wants her old hairdresser to do her perm. The young ones don’t seem to have the training now in perms and mum’s new hairdresser where she lives is very young. I will pick them up from the station and deliver her at the hairdressers while sis and I will go for lunch somewhere and I will try not to sneeze all over her.

Only a little crafting got done this afternoon – it may even warrant a photo.

Meanwhile DH has just about finished the pantry. The flooring went down today – it is only temporary sticky back vinyl until we do the kitchen and whatever we choose for this will run all the way through both. There are shelves to cut down to fit into the wall cupboard and a little sealant to go around the edge of the worktop. I can then start to arrange things on the shelves.

I will of course take some photos to show you the finished result but right now I am off to snuggle down in bed with a hot water bottle and a drink of vitamin C. x

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creating a simpler Christmas * days 10-16

Doesn’t time seem to evaporate during December? One moment you are ahead and the next lagging behind. I am definitely behind. Most of our Christmas decorations are stored in the loft and as yet we have not brought them down but during the last week I have been slowly decorating parts of the house with posies of Christmas foliage and flowers and a very few special decorations that I keep in a box downstairs. But I am loving the minimality and I might not bring down the rest of the decor at all. Well I did say I was going for a simpler Christmas.

Christmas would not be Christmas though without an appearance from my knitted Christmas pudding tea cosy, my red china cup and plate and the handmade robin print napkins designed by my daughter and kept in an old Christmas tin from Crabtree and Evelyn.

In the last few days I have been making a few gifts. Starting with the chocolates. I always take a tray full round with me to our neighbours get together – they positively drool with delight; they are rather more…ish.

Homemade chocolates

Once the dark and milk chocolate are combined in a swirl I throw in handfuls of Christmas delights such as nuts, raisins and glace cherries in one half and pieces of fudge, honeycomb and glace ginger in the other. Anything goes. Sprinkle on a few tiny Christmas sugar beads, stars or meringues and decoratively lace all over with melted white chocolate. Leave to set and cut into small squares.

Any left over chocolate can be made into lollypops and decorated.

I made enough chocolates to give a box to a dear friend of mine together with the table decoration of hypericum berries, eucalyptus, euonymus and tiny cream roses arranged in……you guessed it one of those vintage style plant pots!

We have also been on a shopping frenzy – well it felt like it for us – we had one or two gifts to buy for the grandchildren and some temporary flooring for the pantry.

We have been particularly mindful this year with presents to buy items that are as ecologically sustainable as possible or make little impact on the environment. The grandchildren have got mostly wooden toys – the two babies have a little trike each and a smaller educational toy, they are far more expensive than plastic but are so much nicer. Little L has a new leotard (knitted cotton jersey) and ballet shoes (leather) for when she returns to her classes in January and my friends will receive the table decorations and either chocolates or florentines. So minimal plastic in any of our gifts.

I have bought one or two new decorations that again are wooden or of natural materials like hessian and pine cones. I did relent though and buy the little LED pink glittery stars which are £3 from The Works.

The cards and newsletters are all written and posted but I do need to deliver a few now and make arrangements to go and see my old work colleagues one day this week.

There still seems to be a lot on my list to do – lemon curd for the girls (can’t disappoint them), a cot duvet cover for Sweetie, the Christmas cake (yes you did read that correctly) and the mince pies. So it is a week of making and baking again – I had better get a move on.

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creating a simpler Christmas * day 9

Today was definitely a slow day of getting my head back into gear. We took mum home yesterday with many carrier bags so I think she had a good time and bought everything she wanted. She is finding it difficult to accept her limitations now and we had to abandon our usual trip to Tissington and Ashbourne this year as her feet and legs had swollen up so much with the travelling that we felt it would be a step too far and decided to stay a little closer to home, only venturing as far as the Chatsworth Estate near Bakewell to visit the farm shop and The Derbyshire Craft Centre nearby. I packed up a car picnic for us so she didn’t have to wait in a queue for lunch and a good job I did as it was so very busy everywhere.

I only managed to take the one photo during the weekend – mum kept me too busy – she managed to leave her stick in every shop and cafe we went in and sometimes her gloves too. Her handbag was safe as I carried it most of the time. Manouvering her in the crowds is not easy these days and people were trying to push her out of the way in their hurry – I was worried she would over balance. None of the shops have a seat for the elderly anymore so I didn’t get much of a chance to look for anything myself – as soon as she had what she wanted she was off back to the car for a sit down!

The scenery and Christmas lights on the journey into Derbyshire did not disappoint, though on the whole I felt there were less decorations around this year in everyone’s gardens – maybe a lot of people are feeling quite behind as far as Christmas goes – neither of my neighbours have their lights up yet.

I have been feeling pretty exhausted today and rather than do any of the Christmas things on my list I made a start with a little clearing up and cleaning – I had the beds to change and washing to do and then some hoovering and dusting so that the house is ship shape and ready to decorate when I get round to it.

I am still dithering over the indoor tree – we are away for Christmas and not really hosting anything so I may even go for a simple decorated branch or a £10 potted tree. At this very moment I feel too worn out to even think about it.

For lunch we had a simple winter salad of grated beetroot, grated carrot and cucumber with a drizzle of olive oil dressing – apparently it is one of the healthiest meals you can eat – packed with vitamins and minerals; we had ours with some egg mayonnaise sandwiches and it was nice to have a meal at home after living on a lot of cafe meals in the last few days where they serve you a garnish of limp lettuce and an unripe tomato.

For the rest of the day I printed down my Christmas card list and tomorrow I will make a start on writing them and finishing our yearly newsletter. We have to stay in as the worktop man comes at 9.30am so we will need to have everything ready for him. DH has been working on cutting the wall cupboard down to size so hopefully by the end of tomorrow I should see some advances in the pantry.

Thank you for all your lovely comments wishing me a good weekend – I am not sure how much longer these Christmas visits will be possible for my mum so it was especially nice to be able to take her out so she could still get some of her Christmas bits and bobs.