Day 11 - Words and pictures

 

I've been working on my art wall.  Panorama photo courtesy of my phone! It's a mixture of photos, pictures, cards etc that mean something to me.  Most of these were already lurking somewhere in the house, I've just collected them into one place.  I'm especially loving the flower watercolour painting.  It came from my uncle's house and was hanging in what was my Gran's bedroom.  I originally thought I would just reuse the frame but there was a wee gallery label on the back.

In the top right corner written in pencil is the price paid that says £3 and 14 shillings, making it pre decimal times!  I looked up the cost for 1960s (might even be before that). £3 and 14 shillings was the equivalent of 2 days wages for a skilled tradesman. I just couldn't upcycle it knowing that so gave it a good clean and hung it up.

It's actually quite pretty and it's a wee family 'heirloom' now!

Edited to add:  I googled the artist and found some info on the painting, scroll to the bottom and read the product details CLICK HERE

In the end I made 2 pictures with Scrabble tiles and boards.  They were fun to do but very fiddly and faffy!!  And took aaaages between all the drying stages!

But I quite like them also knowing they came from my Uncle's house.

I've also been knitting away at my sock, working on the heel flap now.  The colour is a much more vivid turquoise than the pic suggests.  Still keeping my hands too busy to stuff my face!!

Gardening time!

I checked the weather app on my phone on Friday and saw that yesterday was to be very wet and windy (accurate!) and today was to be mainly dry and sunny (fairly accurate!!)  I decided that I would be able to have a gardening weekend.  I bought a copy of Kitchen Garden as it had 10 'free' packets of seeds and a pair of gardening gloves.  Once I'd done all the boring essential household stuff I settled down to read and make plans.

When I was in Australia over Christmas I wrote out a detailed plan of what I wanted to grow in the garden and allotment this year.  Some of the free seeds I got were on my plan.  And those that weren't, I ordered from Real Seeds last night.

I went to Dobbies bright and early this morning to get some seed compost.  I ended up getting a few extra things as well!!  This 5 tier mini greenhouse was reduced from £44.99 to £29.99.  I had a crazy idea that I could start off lots more seeds indoors in my study.  It gets lots of light thanks to a rooflight/skylight and some direct sun towards the end of the day.

I rescued all the trays that were lying around outside and gave them a good scrub.  I have some old tote trays at school I could also use as we upgraded all our trays last year.  I've been saving toilet roll tubes, yoghurt pots etc to re use as plant pots.  They'll fit nicely into these trays 😇 When the weather warms up (usually a month after the rest of the UK!) I'll be able to move it outside.  Or at least that's the plan!!

The 2 brown boxes in the second photo above were my Link-a-Bord raised bed from Harrod Horticultural made of recycled plastic and guaranteed for 20 years! It was so easy to assemble by myself and fitted perfectly into the space left behind by my polytunnel.  It's 2 metres by 1 metre.  I started to put in a base layer of old chicken bedding and Tuppence came to inspect it!

Part of the patio is under the puddle is on the left as it curves round so there isn't enough room for another bed the same size.  But there is room for a smaller one on the right.

I saw this purple metal one in Dobbies and I was really tempted!  But it wouldn't fit in the space 😒 So I've ordered another smaller Link-a-Bord one instead.  Hopefully by the time the school Easter holiday rolls round, my back garden prep will be finished and I'll be ready to make a start on the allotment.  The AGM is in 2 weeks and I'm hoping that I might get a full plot 👍

Gardeners World starts again in 2 weeks (Hello Monty Don! 💖) so it's starting to feel that gardening time is here again 🌱🌿🌸

Day 5: Cook, Clean, Clear and Create

Today's cook is really prep for a family meal tomorrow.  OH's daughter (the one in the army) is home on leave and it's her birthday.  Sometimes we go out for a meal but as there are 7 of us it can be expensive and honestly sometimes the food is just ok. So OH asked if I would do my Chinese buffet here.  Of course!  I love cooking for a crowd and I can control what goes into it.

So, I'm marinading a Lidl beef joint (silverside) in Tamari (GF soy sauce), Worcester sauce, brown sugar, white wine, sesame oil, 3 cloves of garlic, 2 inch piece of ginger and 2 tsp of Chinese 5 spice powder.  Tomorrow I'll pop it into the slow cooker and make Chinese spiced pulled beef.  We'll also have a chicken dish and a prawn dish served with fried rice, noodles and prawn crackers.

My create was taking these 2 framed photos to DS's flat.  The photos were taken a lifetime ago at Skibo Castle (where Madonna got married to Guy Ritchie) by a famous photographer.  We weren't members but our friends invited us.

John Swannell signed this one so it might be worth something some day (ha ha!!) but as it has the ex in it, it's been stuffed in a cupboard.

DS had a lovely watercolour painting but the frame and mount were damaged.  My idea was to take 2 pictures apart and create a new one.

I reused the mount and frame from the friends photo to make a new picture with the watercolour painting. It looks much better than this photo of it!  It's a lovely view of Schiehallion above Loch Rannoch.  As a family we spent a lot of time there when DS was young so it means something to him.  We hung the new picture on his wall.  DS loves it and it was free!! Some more details HERE

My clean and clear task for tonight will be the dining room for the meal tomorrow.  

This week's round up

It's been a busy week!  As you can see my hair is now a short bob and blonde.  Definitely a luxury but I felt with a new job I needed a new look.  It's taking a bit of getting used to but I think I like it.  I can still do my purple toner on it ;-)

We had a big family dinner for OH's daughter's 20th birthday.  I made a chicken lasagne where I used my white sauce to make the chicken sauce bit.

I layered it up with GF lasagne sheets and a home made tomato sauce (with a ton of 'hidden' veggies in it for the veggie phobes) 

Then topped off with grated goats cheese to make a totally delicious and gluten/dairy free lasagne.  No one noticed the difference!!

I've been successfully defrosting and heating the meals I made for the freezer.  Yeay!!

I finished upcycling the hook rack and painted the radiator purple (looks darker in this pic) and am pleased with result.  I've ordered a wee shoe rack to fit in the space between the radiator and the corner.  Just the woodwork now to finish off.

I picked a handful of peas.  TBH I've not had much success with them at all but I'll do an update on my poor vegetable crops this weekend.

I scored some reduced goats milk today with another 3 days before the use by date.  I'm planning to make some yoghurt and soft cheese with it.

I bought some lovely goats milk yogurt with live cultures as my starter so I'm hopeful it'll work the same way I used to make cows milk yogurt.

I also attended the funeral of my colleague's husband.  It was a humanist service and a fitting celebration of a genuinely good man.  It makes you stop to appreciate everything and reminds me to enjoy life to the fullest every day.

Plodding on

I'm still painting my utility room *sighs*  I'm now on the third coat of paint.   I think the end may be in sight.  In between the paint drying (and my enthusiasm flagging!) I've been decluttering and organising other areas in the house.  I'm trying to get as much done as I can before school goes back.  My kitchen still isn't finished *rolls eyes* but I upcycled a tree mug by painting the red base in the purple colour I used on the door and radiator.  Quick, easy and free!!

I tackled my study.  It was the dumping ground for everything.  It's a through passage to The Teenager's den/family room so you can just see the floor is cleared enough to squeeze through!  A lot of this stuff was put there 'out of the way' to be dealt with at a later date, which of course never comes!  Some of it is school stuff to be taken to my new classroom.

 The view from the other end of the room

Ta da!! The after shot!  You can see the rugs again!!

And from the other end 

I currently have 3 book cases (this was my downsized collection after moving) but I'm aiming to get rid of one more.  If you notice the bookcase on the right is sloping (wonky floor!) and has a missing base plate.  This one will be Freecycled along with the books.  Then I'll put Emma's smaller bed in that place instead of in front of the radiator.  She prefers the small bed now so I'll Freecycle the big one she shared with Lucy.

The Teenager has been cooking some new dishes to get ready for uni.  This is his version of the  Versatile Vegetable Stew from the BBC show Eat Well For Less?  There's a new series on atm and already I've picked up a few new recipes from it.  Some folk like to knock it and make fun of the families featured but I think people just get in a rut when they're busy and running a family.  I could easily have been on it a few years ago.

It was actually very nice although we didn't have any paprika so used chipotle flakes instead.  He would make it again so big success!  Tonight he's going to try baked veggie enchiladas like the ones he ate in a Beefeater restaurant.

I made a big slow cooker lamb stew (Irish Stew) with some yellow stickered packs of lamb I'd picked up over the last few weeks.  Really simple, just carrots, onions, potatoes and lamb chucked in plus some veg stock.  I cooked it on high for 1 hour then low for 5 hours.  I read somewhere that lamb is a very good meat to have if you have food intolerances as sheep cannot be intensively reared like chickens, pigs and cows.  So it's not been mucked about by man over the years.  OH won't eat it as he thinks it's fatty but if you use lean cuts and skim off the fat after it's cooled it's fine (I think!)

It's already been portioned up and frozen, some for me and some for my eldest DS.  He does love a good homemade stew!

I also made him some buttery mash to have with it.  I've not frozen mash before but Sue over at Our New Life in the Country did a recent post on it so I'm giving it a try!

All white

I've finally started painting my utility room.  It is the worst room in the house and I knew it would be a big job.  OH and I spent last week filling and sanding all the botched DIY stuff from the previous owner.  All the sockets had been plastered in!  Instead of loosening or removing them they'd plastered right up to the edges.  If I'd been keeping them it wouldn't have been a problem but I'm replacing them with the same black/brushed chrome ones  I have in my kitchen.

The walls, ceiling and door to the downstairs toilet/wetroom are yellow and the woodwork is varnished pine.  The glass door is actually my side entrance and the main door everyone uses to come in.  So really the utility room is my entrance hall.  I'd like it to look welcoming but it needs to be practical as well.

That big white stripe down the wall was from a partition.  Remember this?  Although it's taken me nearly 3 years to get round to decorating the whole room! Again the wall had been plastered up to the partition!! So it's taken a bit of work to get it all smooth.  Plastering isn't one of our skills but with a bit of patience it's turned out ok.

Before (this wall has a large coat rack)

 After the first coat 

Doesn't look too bad so far! In this photo you can see the dreadful state of my back door.  I'm replacing it and the side glass door with simple white ones.

I'm painting all the walls and woodwork in white.  The whole house will be white with splashes of colour here and there.  This is not my forever house so I want it to look clean and neutral for when the time comes.  I don't want to be in the position of trying to decorate just to sell. Been there, done that!

I've upcycled this wee hook rack that I use to hang the dog leads.  It had 4 brass hooks, 2 broken off and 1 bent.  I bought 4 aluminium hooks at 99p each and painted the wooden back purple to match the kitchen door.  Looks much better and has a practical use.

I've still 2 coats of white to do on the walls and then I'll start the woodwork. That should keep me busy for the rest of the week!

New kitchen on a tight budget Part 1

 

My kitchen is almost finished! HOORAY!!  I am so tired but all the painting and sanding and waxing is finally over.  I've created a unique kitchen for a fraction of the cost of having a new one installed.  The colours are claret and soft sage and brilliant white.  There should be a decal in the space above the cooker but I had a slight mishap(!) with it so a new one has been ordered.

 

This is what it looked like before.  It was filthy and covered in grease.  It was dark, dingy and just not nice to be in.

 

 

Yep, I painted a purple door!!  It'll have hooks to hang up my aprons.  I'm waiting for the joiner to return and custom make a door for the dishwasher and I've still to choose some new flooring to replace the manky floor tiles.  I haven't decided yet what to do.

 

My upcycled whiteboard and console table

 

These cupboards were built for me about a year ago as the kitchen really lacked storage.  This was my biggest expense.

 

I've still to put up my blind (reduced in the John Lewis sale!!) and add a few finishing touches. But all the hard work is finally over.  But was it worth it?  I've gone through phases where I regretted even starting this project.  I've made loads of mistakes, some of which resulted in making more work for myself.  That's a blog post in itself!! 

 

A joiner fitted the cupboards and I got someone in to replaster and tile 2 of the walls. But apart from OH doing the electrical stuff and my lovely mum spending one day helping with the ceiling (it hurts my back rollering a ceiling and this ceiling needed 3 coats of paint!!) I've done everything else all by myself. 

 

I'm proud of that. 

Hot Water Bottle

When it's cold I love to snuggle up in bed with my hot water bottle.  I've never liked an electric blanket (The Teenager loves his!!) even though they only cost pennies to run. I recently bought a few new bottles for Christmas presents but they didn't come with covers.  So today I finally dug out some felted tartan and quickly made a cover.  This is the first crafting I've done since school went back in August!  I really enjoyed it. It's not perfect but it's just for me. I'll road test it tonight to see how it performs before I go into production!

A cautionary tale.  Please please never buy a cheap hot water bottle that doesn't have the BS kite mark (or whatever legal safety mark your part of the world uses) and never over fill it.  And regularly check the rubber to see if it's perished. Earlier this year, OH's son had a very serious accident when a filled bottle exploded at the side seam and gave him very serious burns.  His arm, chest, back and cheek took months to heal but luckily he didn't need skin grafts. 

It gave us a huge fright at the time so now we're extra careful using them.

Just use the things you have

I think this poster sums up the way I'm looking at my life right now.  Now that I no longer need to save to buy a house (although I am saving for retirement) my focus has shifted to living a simpler life with less stuff.  Despite moving house over a year ago I still have boxes and boxes of 'stuff' that have never been unpacked.  Methinks if that's the case it's no longer needed.  With one week to go until half term I'm planning a final clear out so I can look forward to Christmas and having my family able to stay without climbing over boxes to get to a bed!!

 

 

In the mean time I've been working on my kitchen.  I'd love to have a new one installed but I'm upcycling the one I've already got. All the old grotty tiles have been removed.  I've removed all the laminate from the cupboard doors.  You can see the door under the sink has been half done!

OH has filled in the hole from the old extractor fan and removed the weird excess sockets.  He's started to replace the grotty white ones with lovely silver and black ones.

And I've been busy with several pots of Annie Sloan's chalk paint, colour Old White (bought over a year ago!)  I just love the stuff.  No sanding, no prepping, just start painting.  My tiny north facing dark cramped kitchen is starting to look fab.  The old unit doors and the new larder doors now look the same.  I picked up some similar handles on Ebay for £8 to tie in the old and the new doors.

My lovely mum gave me some money to get a professional tiler in to put up the tiles.  I was going to do it myself but he will do the whole job in 2 days (I'd have taken weeks!!) and it wasn't as expensive as I'd thought.

Hopefully I can do a big reveal next week :-)