You Were Given a Second Chance ......

 

 

When you stopped working and I burnt my meal I was cross. 

 

When you started again I was relieved ... I don't like to throw things away.  A week later you did it again, in a hissy fit of anger I threw you stuck at 30 minutes to go in the bin, later while we ate our burnt slightly overdone tea and watched the news relaxing in the living room, a muffled ringing came from the bin in the kitchen.

 

It made us smile, so yet again you were reprieved.

 

 

 

But when I have to eat hard boiled eggs out of my egg cups for breakfast you have pushed your luck just once too often.

 

I'm shopping for a new timer next time I'm out.

 

Sue xx

Our Hens Have Names .......

 

There were so many good suggestions of names listed on yesterdays post, thank you each and every one of you who took the time to think up names for our lovely new girls.

 

The reasons we can't have some of the names mentioned yesterday is that I only have one animal of each name ever!!

 

The one and only exception to this rule is our cockerel Caldwell II, we decided after the bravery of our first gorgeous guy Caldwell, the Lavender Pekin Bantam, that the main cockerel of our flock would always carry his name.  He laid down his life, alongside with his five sons,  in defence of his ladies, so they were all saved by the mass bravery.  He will never be forgotten, nor indeed will any of our birds or animals.

 

The beautiful girl above is Little Lucy, a Lavender Pekin Bantam,  RIP. 

 

 

 

Our Border Collie, Sophie RIP

 

Millie and Mollie, two of our original flock ofWhite Stars, RIP

 

Bourneville, the Welsummer. RIP

 

My beautiful Betty, the Berkshire pig, our very first Rare Breed pig. 

(Sadly gone for meat, I think Lovely Hubby has eaten most of her now) :-(

 

And finally Bluebelle, the Bluebelle chicken, running around causing mischief as I type.

 

So all these names were out of the running straight away, sorry.

 

The girls virtually chose their own names last night, with the names listed yesterday carried in my memory I went over with LH to put all the chickens and geese to bed and to have a good look at them.  As usual one of the geese had put herself to bed in the henhouse, now through Winter we didn't mind this as it meant if all the birds were in one house it kept them nice and cosy, but now with slightly warmer nights we want them to get used to sleeping in their own house again so they all have more space, so each evening we lift her out and with her two sisters walk them over to the Goose Hoose.

 

Last night she was in a complaining mood as she was being carried and set off the other two honking and making lots of noise, the new hens not being used to this dashed out of their bedroom in the Eglu, lined up at the mesh and were chunnering to themselves 'ooooh oooh ooh etc etc, for all the world sounding like three elderly ladies watching naughty childish goings on.

 

So in my opinion they each have to have names that would befit a group of gentle elderly ladies complaining about carryings on.

 

 

 

So the names of my lovely trio of girls are - (in the order that they are stood)

 

Ethel as picked by Heather

 

Dolly - picked by Jo

 

and

 

 Enid - picked by Welsh Poppy

 

 

I have picked up your email on your Blog Jo, so I will be in touch shortly, please could Welsh Poppy and Heather drop me an email with your address so I can post off your eggs.  (If you scroll to the very bottom of the Blog you will see my email address in the left hand column.)  Well, in the case of Heather as you have the same problem as me I will send you something else as a thank you for coming up with the name rather than an egg.

 

Thanks again to everyone who took the time to leave a suggestion yesterday, some of them were inspired!!

 

Sue xx

 

 

Goose Eggs, Chickens, and a Challenge for YOU (it's a sort of Giveaway)

The first time I ate a goose egg, scrambled I think it was, I felt really rough afterwards, my lovely Mum said at the time 'do you think you might be allergic to them', I in my infinite wisdom pooh, pooh'd the idea.  After all I eat hens eggs til they come out of my ears, so how could I be allergic to goose eggs I thought.

 

WRONG!!

 

The above picture is Lovely Hubby's breakfast cooking on Sunday morning,  yes those goose eggs are big ...

 

 

 

... look how they fill his big dinner plate (he did admit to being absolutely stuffed afterwards and didn't eat anything until tea time that day, after all one goose egg is equal to THREE hens eggs.  While his was cooking he scrambled me a single goose egg, (I was going to share mine with the dogs, I knew I couldn't eat a whole one).

 

Just a couple of  forkfuls in I started to feel really rough, I stopped and the dogs got a much larger portion than they had hoped for.  Thank goodness I did stop because I felt really poorly for a couple of hours afterwards.  I walked the paddock with the dogs, round and round, such was my need for some fresh air and my desperation to get rid of this awful yucky feeling. 

 

 I had woken up so bright and bushy tailed and was dismayed to suddenly be feeling soooooo bad :-(

 

Later that morning we moved Chicken World further along the paddock so the birds, especially the geese had fresh grass to run on and eat.  After being out and about for a few hours I made myself have a piece of toast and then I started to feel better.

 

So now I think I can safely say although I may not be 'allergic' to them I am most definitely intolerant of them and no more goose eggs will be passing these lips.

 

 



 

Luckily for me though on Sunday we nipped out and picked up three of these lovely birds to add to our collection for this year. so there will be more hens eggs.  This picture isn't mine it's from Google Images, our new birds are shy at the moment and we have them in the Eglu inside Chicken World while they get used to the place and the other chickens and while the other chickens get used to them, so I can't get a good picture. 

 

They are called Skylines and are a Legbar hybrid.  They are supposed to lay eggs of blue or green, but because they are a hybrid (a mix of two different breeds of chicken) we won't know which until they start laying,  there is also a chance that the eggs could come out white or cream so we will see, whichever of these colour will be fine for us as at the moment our girls are laying pale and dark brown eggs.

 

So this week's task is to think up some names for these girls.  They are unusual in that they have extra feathers on their heads that look like a little feathery wig, two of them are pretty identical in looks, with almost Welsummer colouring and the other one is larger and more standard brown in colour, but all are wearing a feathery wig!!

 

So now we have a very unusual competition for all my Followers. 

 

Leave a comment saying what you would call these new girls and the three commenters that say the names I decide on will win a Goose Egg, (well somebody has to help LH eat all these lovely eggs).  Just pick one hens name each and it will give three of you a chance to win. (They are all girls.)

 

I am very sorry but this can only be open to UK residents as we have to get the eggs to their new homes pretty quickly and they have to be able to stand up to the Royal Mail postal system :-)

 

I'll pick the names from the comments tomorrow night and post the winners names on Thursday morning, if you can get back to me as quickly as possible the eggs will be straight in the post, possibly in time for your breakfast this weekend.

 

Good luck, it's time to get your thinking caps on.

 

Sue xx

 

My 30 Ways to Save a Pound

 

As this Google picture says 'I Love Saving Money', and when I heard about this challenge from moneysupermarket.com on Ilona's wonderful Blog I just had to have a go.  (The link to moneysupermarket .com is no longer active - sorry.)

 

So here are my 30 ways to save £1

 

 

 

1.  Keep a grip on your finances and simply don't take that £1 out of your purse or wallet to spend.  Have days out with NO money, go for a walk, take a flask and a sandwich and stop for a break on route.

 

2.  Instead of buying a magazine or paper call into your local library and read them for free, in Winter it's usually nice and warm too.  Borrow a book while you're there and you'll resist the urge to buy that new recipe book that's just come out or that juicy bestseller that everyone's raving about.  You can pre-order new releases so you can borrow them straight away.

 

3.  Talking of heat, turn your central heating thermostat down by just one or two degrees or alternatively set it to come on a few minutes later or go off a few minutes earlier each day - or do both. If the house feels a bit chilly grab a cardigan or jumper instead of automatically reaching for the heating controls.

 

 

 

4.  Start watching the pennies, they soon add up to a pound, and if you see one on the floor pick it up and pop it into your money box at home, set yourself a challenge to see how much money you can find on the floor during the course of a year.

 

5.  Use half the recommended amount of washing powder or liquid, I have done this for years and my clothes are just as clean.

 

6.  Stop using expensive fabric conditioners in the final rinse of your clothes, white vinegar works just as well.

 

6.  Never wash and rinse your hair twice, one dollop of shampoo is plenty for most hair. 

 

7.  Use a cheaper brand of hair conditioner, it is there merely to neutralise any soap left in your hair, if you're not keen on the scent add a couple of drops of your favourite essential oil to the bottle the first time you open it and shake to mix through.

 

8.  Dilute your washing up liquid half and half with water, if you buy a good brand (ie Fairy) when it is on offer for £1 a bottle you have saved a pound straight away.   I dilute it one third liquid to two thirds water and it still works fine to get those pots and pans sparkly clean, so I save two pounds for every bottle I buy.

 

 

9.  Switch to supermarkets own label basics ranges, experiment with all the different products until you find the ones that you like best.  I love this Peanut Butter for instance it knocks the socks of many others I've tried and it saves me almost a pound every time I buy it in preference to the others :-)

 

10.  Make good use of your leftovers so none of your food goes to waste.  Have  'planned leftovers' so something cooked with tonights tea forms the basis of the next days lunch or part of the next nights tea.

 

 

 

11.  If you can't think what to do with your leftovers, most things taste delicious in a pie or pastie, so simply make up or buy some readymade pastry and pop your left over veggies or whatever in a gravy or white sauce and put them in a pie.  This makes food go so much further too and who can resist a lovely steaming homemade pie with a spot of gravy on top, almost a meal in itself.

 

 

 

12.  Make your own tomato based sauces when you have a glut of fruit in the greenhouse, you can keep yourself supplied all year round with the taste of fresh tomatoes.  Brilliant when used in all sorts of recipes, on pasta, in casseroles, as a pizza topping and as the base for a curry sauce with veggies or meat.

 

13.  Have a meat free day at least once a week, veggie meals work out so much cheaper than meat based ones.

 

14. Menu plan for the week ahead with the foods that you have in the fridge so that nothing gets wasted

 

15.  Make up a big pot of soup with all the veggies that you find leftover in the fridge drawer at the end of the week before you go shopping.  It will vary slightly each time and will save you a fortune on lunches or starters.

 

16.  Find a food that your pet loves and give it that one, even if it's perhaps not the cheapest one available, there's nothing more annoying and wasteful than throwing your animal's food away because they just won't eat it. 

 

17.  Make your own dog food from scratch with the cheapest mince, some rice or pasta and a handful of veggies, simmered in water for an hour or so and then stored in the fridge or freezer in meal sized portions.  Saves a fortune on expensive tinned foods.

 

18.  Spend time grooming your dogs and cats, less loose hair on them means less on the furniture and carpets and less hoovering means less electricity.  Of course this also makes for happy well cared for animals and you can spot any little cuts or problems with their skin before the problem becomes an expensive vets bill.

 

19.  Don't wash your pets bedding too often, they actually like their beds to smell of them.

 

 

 

20.  Instead of buying a bag of expensive potato wedges, make your own.  Simply wash and slice the potatoes to the size you prefer, place on an oven tray and sprinkle with sea salt and paprika, or herbs or whatever takes your fancy to go with the meal you're having.  So much cheaper, you only need about one medium sized potato per person.  These can be open frozen and then bagged ready for cooking from frozen too.

 

21.  Whenever you have a glut of home grown veggies, prepare and open freeze them on trays so you have free flowing veggies, they'll be just the same as you would get from the frozen food section of the supermarket. but cheaper and tastier.

 

 

 

22.  Make your own plant labels from ice cream carton lids or any plastic tubs, cut carefully and keep in bundles ready for use when potting up plants.

 

 

 

23.  Use the inside cardboard tubes from toilet rolls and kitchen rolls as starter pots for veggie or flower seeds, this saves pounds on buying pre-formed starter pots and you can leave the seedling in the tube when it's time for planting out in the veggie or flower beds as a good watering or shower of rain will make it vanish into the soil around it.

 

 

 

24.  Make good use of your icecube trays and freeze anything you need in one teaspoonful amounts in each section.  This saves lots of money on opened jars of sauces that might go off in the fridge.  Once frozen tip into labelled tubs for ease of stacking.  This is also great for that leftover half glass of red wine.  You can then add 'wine cubes' to sauces and casseroles for a lovely depth of flavour.

 

25.  Never throw away old worn towels, cut them down instead for cloths to use around the house and in the garage.  Old facecloths are also brilliant as floor cloths, saves buying lots of disposable cloths and paper towels.

 

26.  Don't buy cloches for tender plants in the garden instead use empty plastic drink bottles cut in half.  The top part becomes an individual plant pot sized cloche and the bottom, with a couple of drainage holes punched through can be a very usable plant pot.

 

 

 

 

27.  Don't pay out your hard earned money for a scoop to use in the greenhouse make one out of a plastic milk bottle cut to shape.  Different sized bottles make different sized scoops.

 

 

 

28.  Do as I do and buy all your seeds for next year in the garden centre sales at the end of Summer, I rarely pay more than 50p a packet for my seeds this way saving me an average of £35 a year.

 

 

 

 

29.   Grow your own Mustard and Cress.  For the price of 2 packets of seeds you will have all the mustard and cress you can eat throughout the summer months, and keep on growing throughout the year for all year round freshness on your salads..

 

 

 

30.  Blitz together stale bread and herbs to make a wonderful topping for many savoury dishes, with a sprinkle of cheese on top and then 30 minutes in the oven you can turn things like a simple macaroni cheese or veggie in a sauce into a filling feast.  Much cheaper and healthier than buying a ready meal ..... and you get so much more for your money.

 

So this is my 30 Ways to Save a Pound ..... what are yours?

 

Sue xx

 

 

 

 



One Day and Seven Counties

 

 

Yesterday en route and returning from what could potentially be our new home we passed through seven counties of England.  It made for an interesting drive.

 

  We started off in Berkshire, then briefly into Buckinghamshire, then it was the turn of Hertfordshire, then Essex, then Suffolk and then finally Norfolk, on the return journey we went into Cambridgeshire as well.

 

Lots of lovely countryside, different architecture and some pretty towns and villages.  What a brilliant road trip all in the space of a day.

 

   I love this country :-)

 

We stopped en route at the services for coffees but took our own biscuits to keep the costs down, we picnic-ed on what could be our very own land with the dogs playing and running freely around, smelling all the exciting smells that only land new to them has, the sun shone all the time we were there and then the rain set in on the return journey.  It was a good day.

 

 

There's lots more work to do yet before we can try to buy but luckily Lovely Hubby relishes this sort of a challenge,  the auction for the land and property is almost two weeks away, and in the meantime we have to contact our solicitor and check that everything is okay with the land and it's documentation.

 

 Oh,  and one more thing ..... we also have to count up our pennies every last little one of them.

 

Sue xx

The Last Shop ........

Pictures from Google Images

 

This is how I felt when I left the supermarket this morning. 

 

In truth I didn't even have a trolley full, but I'm so used to shopping on a small scale that it felt like this.  I was on a mission to get some meat for the freezer for my Lovely Hubby.  My man is a true carnivore and chomps his way through the animal kingdom at an alarming rate (well it seems like that to me anyway.....lol), I guess in reality he's just a normal guy but against my zero meat consumption it seems a lot.

 

I spend a total of £84 from my rapidly diminishing budget but I did manage to get quite a lot of meaty things for my money and most of next weeks fresh stuff too, I am now on a mission to stretch it as far as possible.  All the meat has been individually wrapped and popped into labelled boxes in the freezer.  I want to get around to doing another freezer inventory so I can see exactly what I have got and see how many weeks worth of meals I can make from the supplies.

 

It had better last a while as this is a HUGE chunk out of my £2 House Keeping Challenge money.

 

 

 

Do you always use your own bags now or are you still a carrier bag addict? 

 

I always use my own, I keep them in the boot of the car at all times and have a nifty little fold up one in my handbag for emergencies.  I ask because the guy behind me in the supermarket had loaded all his shopping onto the conveyor belt and then realised he had left his bags in the boot of his car, so just as I was paying he said "excuse me" and squeezed past me to go and get them.  Now I smiled thinking how conscientious of him, but the lady behind him in the queue did not look quite so pleased !!

 

When I've done this in the past I have simply put all the food back into the trolley after paying for it and then filled my bags back at the car, I think it took some guts on his part to actually go and fetch his bags.  I wonder how long the lady behind had to wait?

 

I'm hoping this will be my last big shop for quite a while, just a bit of salady stuff each week now until the growing season kicks in and I have £16 worth of Nectar points that I can use for the next fresh shop, so fingers crossed my housekeeping tin will stay unraided for a couple of weeks.  I may have to resurrect the 'How Low Can You Go Challenge' with the cupboards and freezers being stripped back to the bare bones.

 

This weekend we are off on a very exciting jaunt, to visit a couple of properties that we are hoping to bid for at auction in a couple of weeks.   One of which may, just may be our forever home, one of them would be a 'fixy up' and the other a complete build, both look very good to us on paper, but until you see them in real life it's hard to judge.

 

 Fingers crossed that this time we are lucky :-)

 

Have a good weekend everyone, lets hope the weather is as they say it is going to be .... warmer and a little bit more Springlike.

 

 

Sue xx

The Year of Less - Less Food

 

How little is less?

 

This was my cupboard last night, this morning I am slowly but surely working my way through the shelves, looking carefully at each and every item in there.

 

In this Year of Less we want to re-jig our diets, relying less and less on pre-prepared, packaged foods and cooking from scratch, so it's important for me to go through our cupboards which yes, are ridiculously full, and keep only the foods that fit in with this way of eating.  Obviously we are not throwing food away willy nilly, those foods that we have decided not to eat will be sold on our next car boot sale, only foods that actually need throwing away will be thrown away (and no I don't stick religiously to 'best before' dates I use my commonsense, my eyes and nose to determine what foods are safe to eat).  The money made from selling off any foodstuffs will be added to our £2 Housekeeping tin to make this last longer.

 

 

 

This was how it looked when I had emptied just the lower shelf, somehow it looked even more spread out all over the worktop, and this was after I had thrown away some foods that had gone off (a couple of jars should have been in the fridge after opening....oops).  Foods in the bin, jars in the recycling box.  

 

Now I am on for the second shelf and it's contents are all over the worktop, I am Blogging while the shelf dries after a thorough wash.  While I'm doing this I'm also sorting foods into types and storing like with like, it will make for a much easier rummage through cupboards while we chomp our way through the contents of them all.

 

Using most of this food up before we go shopping for similar will make the £2 House Keeping Challenge last even longer, and now I am getting to know exactly what I have in stock I will be able to meal plan that much more effectively, and see the contents of the shelves go down in a very pleasing way.

 

Yesterday I had a good sort through the larder cupboard ...

 

 

..... freeing up lots of space and managing to fill some baskets for the car boot sale with over £20 worth of food and thats a lot of food when I've priced most of it at just 20p each (they are out of date items, so I will have to sell them cheaply).

 

I am constantly sorting and re-sorting at the moment, since this picture was taken I have already moved the pasta sauces over to the other cupboard to be with the tins of tomato puree and chopped tomatoes, hopefully it will all make sense when I finally finish :-)

 

The shelf will be dry now, so it's back to work I go.

 

Sue xx