I gather that some people have not been getting updates. I understand from my techi friend that becoming a follower does not automatically mean you will be notified of new posts as they are published. The easiest way is to get updates set up through a Blog Reader - but this is all far over my head, so I will find out more and let you know of any information that I glean:
After starting this post a few weeks ago, have now found various gadgets that I can add to my blog to make it easier for people to get updates either through e-mail or via a blog reader. These are now all up and running on the blog page. Any problems - please let me know.
Bye for now!
Friday, 30 March 2012
Books
Books are one of the great joys in our family. The children were brought up on picture books since they were a few months old and the two boys have now launched into the joys of reading. My eldest is officially the bookworm of the family, with my husband a close second. Leo prefers collecting books and looking at the pictures but that is still great - anything related to superheroes or dinosaurs is a hit! My daughter is into anything featuring animals or little babies.
Apart from the odd chocolate bar, and bought sandwich when I didn't have time to make my own, my progress on this project so far this year has been really good - I have had very few slips: knitting equipment, a magazine and a few books. Are books a necessity? Well that could start a great debate, but for the sake of my journey this year, I am saying that books need to be borrowed from the library, or bought second-hand, or as a gift. And I think that in terms of buying them second-hand, they really need to be thought about before buying. What are they for? And can I justify buying them? Here's my attempt to do so! ...
A music magazine:
"Mojo" featuring Leonard Cohen. I rarely buy magazines. From time to time I will indulge in a Country Living magazine and I have a subscription to The Green Parent which was given as a birthday present some time ago. Otherwise, I could take them or leave them. I am not into the glossy mags particularly, although Red has caught my attention occasionally. I used to have subscriptions to New Internationalist and BBC Wildlife magazines and gardening magazines were also a regular purchase years ago, but I finally came to the conclusion that they were creating a little seat in my home before I have even managed to read them - so those subscriptions were dropped. So why the music magazine? I can only conclude that being a great fan on Leonard Cohen got the better of me, but it was in no way a necessity and I felt very bad! It was a good interview and I still have hopes of one day seeing him sing live but I have learnt my lesson - no more magazines on a whim!
Two knitting books:
One on technique: "Knitty Gritty" by Aneeta Patel and one for patterns: "blankets and throws to knit" by Debbie Abrahams. Inspired by Soulemama - visit her blog - I decided to pick up knitting needles and have a go. The only time I have ever knitted was when I travelled around Argentina for a summer as a student - it was the best way to pass time on long bus journeys as I feel travel sick if I try to read on a bus or in a car. I also thought that if I bought some wool, I could have a go at darning some of my jumpers. I now have at least three well-loved jumpers which are in need of stitching up in various places - so I'm determined to keep them and not buy more. I will have a go at darning and let you know of my progress in due course.
The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald:
The current book for our book club which needs to be read by mid-April for our next get-together. I tried two libraries with no luck and then gave up. I did however, purchase it from Amazon.co.uk where there is a choice of buying it second hand for one penny or new for £1.99 and free postage - so I went for the latter as it worked out the same in the end. This is the first one this year for my book club that I have had to purchase - which is good going and I will try to continue borrowing them in future months.
The Rhythm of Family, by Amanda Blake Soule:
This seemed to sneak its way into the parcel with the Great Gatsby! No excuse - I love this woman's blog - very inspiring about natural living and simple family life: Soulemama, and I couldn't help myself! It is a great book and full of things to do each month which are free and related to nature and things to make and cook - so a good reference for my year's challenge - ha ha!
A handful of books for work:
These I don't count - if I can't obtain free inspection copies, then I scour Amazon.co.uk for good deals and I would class them as a necessity for my work - so that one is easy to explain!
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| The family's current reading |
Apart from the odd chocolate bar, and bought sandwich when I didn't have time to make my own, my progress on this project so far this year has been really good - I have had very few slips: knitting equipment, a magazine and a few books. Are books a necessity? Well that could start a great debate, but for the sake of my journey this year, I am saying that books need to be borrowed from the library, or bought second-hand, or as a gift. And I think that in terms of buying them second-hand, they really need to be thought about before buying. What are they for? And can I justify buying them? Here's my attempt to do so! ...
A music magazine:
"Mojo" featuring Leonard Cohen. I rarely buy magazines. From time to time I will indulge in a Country Living magazine and I have a subscription to The Green Parent which was given as a birthday present some time ago. Otherwise, I could take them or leave them. I am not into the glossy mags particularly, although Red has caught my attention occasionally. I used to have subscriptions to New Internationalist and BBC Wildlife magazines and gardening magazines were also a regular purchase years ago, but I finally came to the conclusion that they were creating a little seat in my home before I have even managed to read them - so those subscriptions were dropped. So why the music magazine? I can only conclude that being a great fan on Leonard Cohen got the better of me, but it was in no way a necessity and I felt very bad! It was a good interview and I still have hopes of one day seeing him sing live but I have learnt my lesson - no more magazines on a whim!
Two knitting books:
One on technique: "Knitty Gritty" by Aneeta Patel and one for patterns: "blankets and throws to knit" by Debbie Abrahams. Inspired by Soulemama - visit her blog - I decided to pick up knitting needles and have a go. The only time I have ever knitted was when I travelled around Argentina for a summer as a student - it was the best way to pass time on long bus journeys as I feel travel sick if I try to read on a bus or in a car. I also thought that if I bought some wool, I could have a go at darning some of my jumpers. I now have at least three well-loved jumpers which are in need of stitching up in various places - so I'm determined to keep them and not buy more. I will have a go at darning and let you know of my progress in due course.
The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald:
The current book for our book club which needs to be read by mid-April for our next get-together. I tried two libraries with no luck and then gave up. I did however, purchase it from Amazon.co.uk where there is a choice of buying it second hand for one penny or new for £1.99 and free postage - so I went for the latter as it worked out the same in the end. This is the first one this year for my book club that I have had to purchase - which is good going and I will try to continue borrowing them in future months.
The Rhythm of Family, by Amanda Blake Soule:
This seemed to sneak its way into the parcel with the Great Gatsby! No excuse - I love this woman's blog - very inspiring about natural living and simple family life: Soulemama, and I couldn't help myself! It is a great book and full of things to do each month which are free and related to nature and things to make and cook - so a good reference for my year's challenge - ha ha!
A handful of books for work:
These I don't count - if I can't obtain free inspection copies, then I scour Amazon.co.uk for good deals and I would class them as a necessity for my work - so that one is easy to explain!
Tuesday, 20 March 2012
I made it!!!
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| My first batch of marmalade: 17/3/12 |
2pm, on Saturday the 17th of March, I embarked on my challenge and at 7pm, the above was the result: 3 jars of Seville Orange Marmalade! I am so pleased!!
I wasn't slaving over the stove for 5 solid hours; I had time for a cup of tea and a short trip to a nearby gift-shop to find a present for my Mum for Mothers' day. It was very satisfying, but tiring too.
I started off by juicing oranges and scraping the pith and pips into a bowl to keep for flavour. Next task was to cut orange peel into strips and then the exciting part - all the juice went into a pan with the water, pith and pips in a muslin cloth tied to the handle, soaking in the juice to add to the citrus flavour.
It's all fairly straightforward until it gets to the crucial 'setting-point' - where you have to get the mixture just right or you will end up with runny liquid (if you stop the boiling too soon) or hard stuff (if you leave it to boil for too long) - aargh!! All this was happening with my dog and 3 children running around, and Felix (my eldest son) deciding that he would like to make leek soup for supper - a lovely idea but perhaps not what I needed when going through the tricky process of making marmalade for the first time.
Although I won't be able to live on homemade marmalade or manage to make it too often considering the time and attention it needs, it has made me reflect on how lovely it is to make things myself and that this challenge of living on a shoestring has just made me spend more time cooking and baking and making things by hand, which then slows the day down and makes me appreciate the simple things in life - a good change.
Wednesday, 14 March 2012
Flowers for the house
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Tulips, daffodils and irises in vases in our sitting room - that is what I have missed during the last few months. I love cut flowers and although I don't always have them, I would tend to buy them once every one or two months. I didn't feel I could justify cut flowers as an essential this year - so no flowers unless they're a gift or I grow them myself!
So my next mission: to grow my own cut flowers! This is something I have been thinking of doing for a few years now, but I guess it involved too much effort to actually act on my idea. Now I have an incentive - grow my own or I'll have no flowers! I have started by sowing some sweet-pea seeds and have bulbs growing which are now beginning to flower (tulips and daffodils). We have some lovely roses in the garden for later in the year, so I think I will concentrate on growing flowers which are easy to grow. Sunflower seeds collected from France will go nicely with the poppies and alliums that we already have growing in the garden. I am also going to have a go at Dahlias this year. They come in such gorgeous colours and remind me of my childhood garden in Bahrain. The other two I am going to have a go at - simply because I love the colours and shape of these flowers - are some varieties of cosmos and the tobacco plant.
I was going to take a photo of the greenhouse - but there's not much to see at the moment apart from seed trays! I will post a photo soon.
An update on food instead - here is a picture of some home-made goodies!
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| My muffins and soup! |
Bye for now.
Wednesday, 7 March 2012
Gardening month
I now have a selection of seeds to plant, plus some strawberry plants and a couple of courgette plants as I failed to completely convince Chris to do all our veg from seed! Never mind, I have made a start with tomatoes (cherry and beefsteak), cut-and-come-again lettuce, beetroot and cucumber.
Chris has dug out two beds ready for planting. Potatoes have already gone in; they are definitely Chris' thing - so he chooses the varieties, feeds and nurtures them and then his favourite bit is digging them up "like finding treasure"! Potatoes are one of the most successful vegetables to grow for us. Years ago, when we started gardening in our allotment in Bristol, we did things properly - by chitting the potatoes and keeping them in trays in our airing cupboard for weeks in our flat, before sowing them out in our beds. Now, we just sow our seed potatoes straight into well dug beds and they still seem to do really well.
The most exciting plants that we will sow from seed this year are the ones we collected for free from the French countryside on our holiday last August. We have been visiting a beautiful area - Charente-Maritime - for a few years now, and just by where we stay they have beautiful fields full of sunflowers. We collected a small bag of seeds from the side of a field near our gite and hope to bring a bit of France to our Hampshire garden this year.
We have made a good start on tidying and have filled up our two garden bags. Must remember to put them out tonight to be collected by the council! We now need to tend to some of the fences and tidying up the beds where the chickens and dog have been digging. Nuri seems to have turned into a teenager dog and has been a real mischief in the garden! His latest games seem to be chasing the chickens, eating their layer mash, and digging holes to get into our neighbour's garden!
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| Our truckle of sunflower seeds and various vegetables |
Chris has dug out two beds ready for planting. Potatoes have already gone in; they are definitely Chris' thing - so he chooses the varieties, feeds and nurtures them and then his favourite bit is digging them up "like finding treasure"! Potatoes are one of the most successful vegetables to grow for us. Years ago, when we started gardening in our allotment in Bristol, we did things properly - by chitting the potatoes and keeping them in trays in our airing cupboard for weeks in our flat, before sowing them out in our beds. Now, we just sow our seed potatoes straight into well dug beds and they still seem to do really well.
The most exciting plants that we will sow from seed this year are the ones we collected for free from the French countryside on our holiday last August. We have been visiting a beautiful area - Charente-Maritime - for a few years now, and just by where we stay they have beautiful fields full of sunflowers. We collected a small bag of seeds from the side of a field near our gite and hope to bring a bit of France to our Hampshire garden this year.
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| Our family holiday in Charente-Maritime, August 2011 |
We have made a good start on tidying and have filled up our two garden bags. Must remember to put them out tonight to be collected by the council! We now need to tend to some of the fences and tidying up the beds where the chickens and dog have been digging. Nuri seems to have turned into a teenager dog and has been a real mischief in the garden! His latest games seem to be chasing the chickens, eating their layer mash, and digging holes to get into our neighbour's garden!
Thursday, 1 March 2012
Spring is here
So last month was focus on food which I learn a lot from and am finding reducing my weekly food bill very rewarding. I still have more that I would like to comment on relating to food, so will re-visit this topic from time to time.
The weather has been much more mild for the last week or so here and creates a real sense of spring coming now. Snowdrops are out in force and I have some crocus flowers in our garden too. Time to get inspired about gardening again, this time without spending too much. We love our garden and spend a lot of time and money on it. So this year will be a bit different! Usually about now, we are beginning to collect seedlings from garden centres as they appear for both vegetables and ready grown bulbs - such as tulips and daffodils. I managed to plant some tulips and daffodils last November, so that is a help and will have to make do with that this year. No buying ready planted up flowers!! One of my favourites is Sweet Peas, so I filled up a tray with 6 pots full of little sweet pea plants at the garden centre on Sunday - then I put them all back again! I then went to the seed selection and picked up two packets of Sweet Pea seeds - so I am beginning to get the hang of gardening on a shoestring!
We have bought seed potatoes but other than that I am trying to convince my husband that we should use seeds for the other vegetables - so I will keep you posted on that one. I am determined to have a really good year with fruit and veg as it will obviously save us money on shop bought fresh produce. Most seeds need to go in this month - March - so I will report back on what I have planted in little seed trays soon.
Our first job is to tidy up the garden, especially after Nuri (our Labrador puppy) has been creating mischief there all winter! So no money needed for that, just lots of little helpers, wellies, garden bags and enthusiasm.
Bye for now
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