Tag: general chit chat

Posted on

dear diary ~ dismantling Christmas

You will all have heard of the saying ‘it will get worse before it gets better‘ – well that is the state of my house at the moment…in the getting worse part.

So far, DH helped with removing the baubles from the Christmas tree, dismantling it and returning it to the box and bit by bit all the decorations were taken down and repacked in their boxes ready to go back into the loft. It is always a little sad….there are many memories in our decorations and we only see them for a few days a year.

I sorted through the unused rolls of wrapping paper, replaced them in the special long ‘wrapping paper box’ and this too will have to go in the loft as there isn’t another place to keep it in the house.

Why, I am wondering, did my mum never have such a box, nor my gran – were they able to estimate to the very last sheet the amount they would use so there was none left over to deal with? I am left with yards still on a roll…and there is more than one roll and it is difficult to store in a small house. I did have the bright idea this time to take a photo of what is in the box before it disappears away so I don’t buy more unecessarily next year – I can’t think why I didn’t think of this before. I took a photo of all the decorations as I repacked the boxes.

When that task was completed, I turned my attentions back to my new planner notebook – that is always a much more pleasing job. DH reckons my love for stationery and anything admin is due to having a post office set at a very early age.

I have ready made calendars and checklists for birthdays, household tasks and such like, stored on my computer that I print off and stick in the front of the book. Other lists are written in as I go along. Each month I start with a list of intentions, a note of appointments, events etc and then the list of tasks – some I have to do, others I would like to do. It is a catch-all for anything of interest or anything I need to remember as well as a place to plan for wekly menus, birthdays and parties, holidays and Christmas. I also make a note of anything I need to buy this month, gardening notes and tasks and to keep tabs on our monthly financial and administrative tasks.

Each month I try to do a review. It reminds me how much I have done and what is still to do and going forward this year I will also make a note of what worked and what didn’t. I am determined to only repeat things that enhance my life not make it more difficult.

I have for many years made notes about Christmas so that I don’t repeat mistakes the following year – so below is a review of what worked well for us and what didn’t.

I thoroughly enjoyed the visit to Mrs Gaskell’s house and this will certainly be on the do again list, it may not be this same house but something similar.

I also enjoyed the lino cutting workshop, the result of which I turned into our Christmas card. I would certainly enroll on one again, but next time even earlier in November would be better. I have yet to overview my Christmas card list and revise it ready for next year.

Even though I made it myself, I have loved my Advent calendar and will be sad to take it down. I have a couple of sheets of black card already cut out with the windows so I might make them up ready to send as a little gift next year with a card.

The tiny outdoor flower lights that I bought, reduced at Argos, have looked so pretty at night in the wooden planters, the batteries are still working and they were very little trouble being on a timer. I am undecided whether to keep them out for a while or remove them and pack them away.

The little desk calendars that I made as gifts for my friends took a large part of my time so if I do them again another year I must start them earlier so I am not burning the midnight oil.

The gingerbread stars were well received and I am told were very good, though I would add even more ginger to the mixture next time. They were a bit fiddly with the different chocolates, but they did look Christmassy and quite effective. I would make them again and I will add the recipe to the menu below the header.

The children loved the session we had decorating the gingerbread too and this will certainly be something we will do again, and I would buy the ready roll again for them, and maybe, I will ask them if they want to make a gingerbread house.

The Santa visit to Portland Basin at Ashton-under-Lyne (our second year there) was good too because the venue is geared up for children; it was a really lovely family day out, but whether the children might want a change next year we shall see. They do like repeating things they get to know, like our yearly holiday to Scarborough. I shall have to make a diary note though to check for the booking form early as there are very few slots available and they sell out quickly.

The gift from Santa’s Elves that we put on the doorstep on Christmas Eve is still a magical mystery to the grandchildren, so I will probably keep that going next year, the difficulty is thinking of some game they can all join in with across the age range.

I think (touch wood) I managed to bake my cake for the right length of time this year in the oven – it turned out perfect for once …not under or overcooked. So I have made a note of the times and temperatures for next year.

There are always things that don’t go well or to plan, I was disappointed to miss both the Carol singing events and the Christingle service. Every weekend was taken in December and so conflicted with the Carols and there was so much Christmas ‘stuff’ to pack into the car on Christmas Eve for our trip up north that we set off later than intended and it meant something had to give…. and it was the Christingle service.

Having to pack cookware and food to make a dinner for mum and ourselves on Boxing Day in her apartment was a big hassle, partly because we had to keep a lot of the food in a coolbag or my daughter’s fridge over two nights. It worked OK last year but we went to mum’s straight from home on Boxing Day morning. This time we were staying the two nights before in a hotel and didn’t have access to a fridge.

Luckily, the temperatures outside in our car boot were freezing which helped to keep the coolbag cool. We had to go into Yarm to Sainsbury’s on Boxing Day for vegetarian gravy granules. DH had made the gravy at home and I accidentally forgot to take it out of the fridge and put it in the coolbag! I wasn’t sure Sainsbury’s would be open on Boxing Day, but it was and looking back it would have been far easier to have bought some ready meals or something which would have been a lot less trouble.

Blogging everyday leading up to Christmas was another challenge which I may not do again, I might only be repeating myself anyway. Taking the pictures when the light is at its’ worst during December is also a trial. It was fun, but quite time consuming and I admire those bloggers that ran the course.

Tomorrow, we will put the decorations back into our loft for another year and then maybe tackle the overflowing box of Christmas items I have for crafting – ribbons, cracker parts, and embellishments and hope I get some ideas for creating a few bits and pieces for gifts next year. I doubt I will get to do anything with them immediately as we really need to make plans for the mammoth decorating bonanza…long overdue.

So if I haven’t bored you to death with my random thoughts, I will be back soon with even more random thoughts!

I hope anyone reading this who has some brilliant ideas for making Christmas an easier and super simple time, will share them in the comments!

If you would like to leave a comment please click here.

Posted on

dear diary ~ a new year, a new day, a new start

Wishing all my readers and blog friends a Wonderful and Happy New Year.

Thank you to everyone who reads my little blog and to those who leave a comment. I always find such pleasure reading them; hearing snippets of your own lives, little words of encouragement and advice – I welcome it all, it builds connection and we certainly need more of that in today’s world.

Many of you, both bloggers and readers, will no doubt be thinking of the year stretching ahead and what it might bring, what you wish for, what changes you would like to make, places you want to go and people you want to see and not forgetting those dear to us, but sadly, not with us anymore.

I love this day, more than any other.

That marvellous feeling of ‘the blank page’ with an air of excitement and an expectation that perhaps a dream you have had for so long might come true. Or perhaps, like me, you are hoping for a year where you can get to grips with your life and if you feel like you are just bobbing about like a boat on the water, going nowhere fast, set yourself on a new course and break free from any accumulated bad habits and that feeling of being in a rut.

Of course, just as bad habits accumulate over time, inching their way into your life unintentionally, it takes time to establish new ones and often slow and steady wins the race; not being one to rush into anything, this will certainly be a year of slow change.

And hopefully change that will last.

Did you all have a good New Year’s Eve? – whether celebrating with family, friends or even your own company; staying up or going to bed at the usual time.

We spend Christmas with our family and always New Year’s Eve with friends. For us it is a good balance and another of those ‘it works for me’ moments, so this is one thing in my life that will continue.

We had a different take on our get together this year which would normally be during the evening and well past midnight, always tuning into Jools Holland for the countdown. This year our hosts decided their year had been hard and they were tired, so they hosted an afternoon get together until just after 6pm.

On the morning I asked if I could bring something and the reply came… ‘something sweet’. I hurriedly checked in the fridge and found fresh raspberries, we had nuts too from making the nutroast and cake and DH dashed down to our friendly Co-op for a tub of cream.

So out of nowhere, and after a seriously long phone call with my Sis-in -law that delayed production of my hasty effort, I managed to produce this Raspberry and Hazelnut Roulade within the hour. It is a recipe I have done so many times before, basically a swiss roll mix with ground hazelnuts and you crush a heap of raspberries into the cream (or you can use creme fraiche) then spread it onto the cake base and roll – I threw on a few festive sprinkles this time for good measure and just to glam it up a bit.

It was well received and vanished within minutes. I will put the recipe in the Menu section on my header strip and I can vouch for the fact it is relatively quick and easy – and quite an impressive dessert, though mine did crack a bit in places – nothing that a little piped cream didn’t cover and hide any flaws!

After a lovely time chatting with friends we hadn’t seen for ages and sampling the bits and pieces layed out on the table we left for home just before 7pm. It was a brisk walk with our empty cake tin in the freezing cold and we were glad to get inside and warm up. The preprepared curry DH had made yesterday may also have helped!

We started to nod off during Vera (we had seen it before) so switched over to watch Ken Dodd, the unseen footage – there is nothing like a good laugh for that well being feeling – and ended up going to bed later than intended and we were still awake at midnight listening to the local fireworks going off outside and the constant tune alerts on my phone as the Happy New Year messages started to come in from our family.

We have a very strange new year message, known only to a few in the family, which is Shimme Hips Wob. It is a standing joke from when I had my first mobile phone for Christmas a long time ago. It had predictive text, of a sort, but not very sophiticated and of course, as with most of these things, it learns over time what you want to say. I am 100% certain I typed in happy new year, however, the message was ‘predictively’ changed as the phone didn’t recognise these words I had typed and substituted some of its own. I had no idea how to change it back to what I wanted and in trying the message got sent. It read ‘Shimme Hips Wob love Mummy Nonmo and Daddy Faddidy!!

And so that sticks even today and I still get cards written by my daughters to mummy nonmo – quite an affectionate term I think.

So, today is that day when the festivities are truly at an end, well for us anyway, we have the day ahead to rest, chat, make a new batch of soup, maybe watch some TV and grab an early night. I might look to do a review tomorrow – taking stock.

Until then, this is mummy nonmo signing off and Shimme Hips Wob to you all x

If you would like to leave a comment please click here.

Posted on

dear diary ~ if it’s not one thing….

….it’s my mother, as DH and I often say when things happen.

And things are happening almost daily now with mum. She gets an idea in her head and can’t let go of it; we tell her the real version and within a few minutes she is telling us again of her rather skewed account.

Mum has not been eating much of her evening meals lately that my sister makes and puts in her freezer for her. The carer always ask her in the morning what she would like for tea and takes it out of the freezer to reheat at the 3 o’clock visit. She has been wasting quite a few meals recently having them heated up but then not eating them but opting to eat more cake and sandwiches instead and like last weekend asking for a Weetabix once the meal had been cooked which is quite wasteful. Needless to say my sister is not impressed after spending time cooking and providing meals for her. Anyway the long and short of this was a week of phone calls to me with mum accusing a carer of telling my sister she was eating Weetabix instead of her meal to cause trouble, which was not the case.

That was last week, and now she seems to have let go of that and developed a new, equally bizarre story this week with mum telling me she hopes she doesn’t have a Christmas like last year…it was the worst Christmas she has ever had! She sobs every time she tells me as she thinks, again mistakenly, that when she went to my sister’s on Christmas day last year (as she does every year), that my sister was ill in bed and her husband ‘had to do the best he could’ to feed and entertain her. She then reckons that no-one went to see her on Boxing day and she was left on her own. Well actually, my sister was not ill at all on Christmas day – it was a normal Christmas and we went up to see my mum on Boxing Day and spent the whole day with her until about 6pm when the carer came to help her to bed. So where she has got these ideas from I do not know.

There has been a noticeable decline in her mental state recently and for the last two weeks she has just begun to ring me at night after the last carer leaves at 7 o’clock after helping her to bed. She keeps ringing mainly to test her phone is working over and over like someone checking their door is locked. The most comical is when she rings me to help her over the phone to try and get a program on the TV. I tell her over and over the number of the channel and the time of the program until she finally brings it up on the telly (I can hear down the phone if she has got the correct one). Then everyday she will say to me I couldn’t get Vera on last night there must be something wrong with my TV! Sometimes you just lose the will….

It is hard to appreciate just how much her brain and thinking is so muddled now and full of absurd things, mixed with anxiety and paranoia. Dementia is a terrible affliction and difficult for those around her dealing with it, she often leaves us all exasperated.

***********************************************************************

In between I have been busy though; both helping elder daughter with her epic move of the century and crafting for the Crisis coffee morning at church which helps to raise money for the homeless, we also spent an enjoyable morning at a lino cutting workshop I had booked for DH and I, carving out a lino cut design for my Christmas card this year.

It felt good to do something just for ourselves.

I had little time to produce something for the craft stall; I had been making some pomanders in the evening and using the transfers I got from The Works I decorated some small candles. So it was a start.

I also printed out and hand coloured the original snowdrop design I had made for the lino cutting session to make some new cards.

My idea was to assemble a few Christmassy items together and pop them into a box that could then be given as a gift to a friend. Each box to contain a homemade pomander, 2 small decorated candles, a pack of 4 handmade cards, 4 gift tags, 2 Christmas chocolates and a tiny Angel, (well everyone needs an Angel at Christmas) from a garland I happened to have.

Many long time readers might remember the little boxes I made for a previous Crisis event in 2023. If you want to see more of these click here.

….and I decided to carry on the theme again this time but not having any suitable boxes I used some rather lovely little handmade Indian paper bags I found in Homesense.

The pomanders and candles I wrapped in some Christmas tissue and slipped the cards into a cellophane wrapper.

A picture of the contents was placed in the bag so everyone could see what was included.

I called them ‘A little bag of Christmas’ and I am told had I done more they could have sold more.

Must go now, my evening meal awaits and I won’t be asking for a Weetabix instead!

Hope you all have a lovely week…thank you for reading…I will be back soon. x

Posted on

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.