The Kitchen

 

 

The kitchen took us longer than anticipated but only by a week, and that was only due to the last minute change of mind to do the extra green wall, which needed two coats of paint.  I'm so glad we did change our minds, it looks fantastic now.

 

 

The kitchen all started with a change around of the units, moving this base unit from where it had sat next to the previous owners cooker, into the space vacated by their washing machine and tumble dryer.

 

Lovely Hubby could then tile the wall behind where the Aga would sit ...

 

... and then it was installed in just over half a day.

 

The next step was to make good use of the worktop that had sat on this unit, so we had it sliced into three to make lovely chunky shelves to go on the side of the kitchen where there are no wall units.  Two to the left of the Aga and one to the right.  The kitchen was then painted, the worktops and shelves were sanded and re-oiled, and then last week I found a bargain that finished it all off perfectly.

 

 

LH had asked me to call to Homebase top pick up a double socket blank to go on a socket that is hidden behind the freezer that actually has no wires running to it !  When I pulled up I was amazed to see the car park absolutely full, it's always quiet at our branch of Homebase, then I saw the signs 'Closing Down Sale'  'Everything 50% off''.

 

I was very good I only bought the light bulbs we needed and a couple of other bits and pieces and then walking down the aisle to get to the checkouts I spotted a flat pack radiator cover, slightly too large but just what our kitchen needed.  It was mine for half of its £109.99 price tag.

 

It was very sad in Homebase to see the shelves being picked clean, people were piling their trollies high with bargains but the staff were being as just as friendly and helpful as they had always been.  I chatted to the nice man that carried it to the checkout for me, he had been working there for 13 years and they had just been told that half of them would be unemployed from the end of this month, the other half have been promised jobs at the new Ikea which will open soon on the same site, but in the meantime they would all be out of work just a month before Christmas.

 

I'm really pleased with how the radiator cover looks in place,  LH got it together very quickly with just a couple of little alterations.  I am going to be using the top ledge of it for storing some of my large dried food storage jars.

 

With the wall now painted behind the shelves I'm loving the way it's all coming together, there will no doubt be a bit of arranging and re-arranging of the things on them until I have everything I need to hand and it also looks good, but that's the fun part of finishing the kitchen off.

 

This weekend was spent putting things in the kitchen cupboards and seeing what we have and if there is anything else we need, although I really don't think there will be.  We are planning to whittle things down until we have just what we need and then a car boot sale will be done in the Spring to get rid of any excesses.

 

As well as the kitchen this weekend we were concentrating on the hall, or rather LH was.   Manfully climbing high on the ladder to do the stairwell walls and ceiling, I couldn't watch, so I didn't .... I nipped off to Manchester to spend a lovely few hours with my Mum and to pick up some Blueberry bushes and garden ornamentals that she can't take to her new bungalow with her. LH did have strict instructions to take care and keep his mobile phone handy in case of accidents, which thankfully didn't happen.

 

While I was away for the day he also nipped in Llandudno and picked up all our now stripped doors, so soon we won't be as open plan, and the rooms will feel cosy again.

 

When I returned from my travels on the wet and windy night we went round to visit our nearest neighbours, she lives on the other side of the  hill to us but rather than climbing over it in the dark we took the easy option and drove the 100 or so yards along the road to get to her driveway.  We had a lovely evening chatting, drinking coffee and eating homemade cake and finding out all about her and some of the local characters in the area.  We left clutching a piece of paper on which she had written the names of all local tradesmen that she uses and while we were there she called a friend of hers to  let him know that we had a field of very good grazing on offer for a while, it seems such a shame to leave the lovely lush grass to lose all it's nutrients over the Winter when a few sheep could be fattened off nicely on it.

 

So yet another productive weekend and now back 'home' it's starting to look very bare, the balance has now very firmly tipped and I can honestly say we are longing to be home in Wales full time.

 

Sue xx

 

Fuel for the Workers

 

It's still very much the case of using things up here, everything from the toiletries to the food, hopefully lessening the things we need to transport to the new house.  One way of doing this is to turn the ingredients we have into ready made food for our journeys and to feed us on our long days of decorating.

 

Taking basic ingredients and making tasty treats ....

 

... that keep us going and stop the hunger pangs that so much physical labour brings.

 

Stodgy foods seem the order of the day with quiches, pasties and the like being our favourites.

 

That they can be eaten hot or cold only adds to their appeal.

 

 

This stream of pictures show how I make my pasties. 

 

 

Mostly I make my own pastry from scratch, well me and Mr Kenwood that is, but sometimes I cheat and use shop bought ready rolled pastry, this was on offer at just £1 a pack and when your time poor it's a real help, so how could I say no.  So that was six salmon, spring onion, feta cheese, onion marmalade and mashed potato pasties for a total cost of around £3.50, that's less than 60p each.

 

Lovely and tasty straight from the oven but I was strong and resisted the urge to sample the goods.

 

I wasn't quite so strong though when it came to the chocolate chip cookies, made from an Approved Foods mix I bought recently.   Very tasty I thought the first time I sampled one, even more tasty the second time as I munched and pondered, and later half way through our 250 mile journey sat in the services with a Skinny Latte they were even better, especially when we sat and watched as folk bought themselves three course 'meals' from C*sta Coffee, HOW MUCH!!

 

I was super strong and resisted sampling the bread too, although it didn't last long once we got there, a quick snack with homemade jam before bed after the journey and then toasted and dripping with butter the next morning. 

 

The decorating may be nearly finished, but soon I think it will be time to start to plan the diets :-)

 

Sue xx

Mushrooms, Vegetables and Funny Foibles

 

Walking along the edge of our side of the woods this week trying to dodge the worst of the rain with the dogs, these beauties caught my eye.  I have no idea whether they are edible or deadly poisonous, but I simply had to pick them to show to Lovely Hubby before the torrential rain rotted them away.  I also wanted to look in our mushroom handbook to see what sort they were, but the book's at the other house ..... as are most things we need and when we're there it's the same story, we go in a drawer or cupboard to get something out and realise that, yes ... it's at the other house!! 

 As it happened within an hour the rain stopped and we had a wonderfully sunny day, so I thought I'd photograph them for posterity and so I can check them out when I am reunited with my handbook later.

 



 

This week it's been all about the veggies, bringing in the last of this and the last of that.  The weird and wonderful carrots were all blanched and then open frozen, the yellow courgette and beans were roasted with other veggies from the fridge for tea that night.  The lettuce, the wonderful surprise lettuce, was my lunch today on a sandwich with a slice or two of cheese and there are a few more lettuces to bring in next week.

 

Yesterday saw me pulling up what was left of the Beetroot, Lovely Hubby had some with his tea last night and the rest was bottled up with some vinegar to eat once we have eaten the Pickled Beetroot from 2010 that we are manfully ploughing our way through at the moment.  Why didn't I have any with my tea, well the smell of beetroot cooking really puts me off it for a while, I think it smells dreadfully 'hot earthy' and just not nice.  But I love the taste of it, so in a couple of days I will be able to eat some from the jar in the fridge with no ill effects but in the meantime ..... YUK no way!!

 

I have  lots of funny little foibles ..... do you?

 

Sue xx

Courgettes, Marrows and Packing Pots

 

This week I am spending an hour in the Veggie Patch each morning after I have finished cleaning out the henhouses, generally tidying up and bringing in the last of the crops.  I thought it was about time I harvested this beauty before the wet, wet weather gets to it and turns it to mush ..... then I found some new baby courgettes growing on the sad looking plant.

 

So one huge and five small, and then ....

 

... I realised the giant had a brother.

 

The little ones all went in tonights tea, now I just have to think of what to do with two giant Marrows.  It was Lovely Hubby's idea to put the teaspoon in the picture so you could get an idea of the sizes :-)

 

I also picked all of the carrots and spent a little bit of time this evening blanching and open freezing them, so that's us with a stock of carrots that should last us a couple of months, tomorrow I think it's the turn of the Beetroot.

 

I did have a really nice surprise when I found some lovely crisp lettuces just begging to be picked, they seem to love the masses of rain we've been having and were super fresh and crisp.  Lettuce picked from outdoors in November, now that's a new one for me.

 

I hope you like the new header picture, I realised the other one had to go when I packed the 'Basil' sign in with all the plant pots and things I was packing yesterday.  The plants lasted until about two weeks ago, but were suffering with us being away so often and getting sporadic watering so they were given to the chickens to peck at and then went on the compost heap.

 

Sue xx

Green and White

 

This was a corner of the kitchen on Saturday night.

 

 After much umming and arring and negotiation, when we left there yesterday the wall behind the radiator was painted with it's first coat of green.  Now I know why I call my Lovely Hubby my Lovely Hubby .... the man has lots of patience he'll do anything I ask of him, but then it works in reverse and I do the same for him, it's called love :-)

 

There was lots of prep work needed in the kitchen and it was still being done just before we opened the paint pots.   It's funny when you view a house things look so neat and tidy and well presented, but when you get down to the nitty gritty you find all the botch jobs, all the loose plasterwork and all those things that you know you have to put right as you find them or they'll just get left much longer than they should be left or you won't get round to doing them at all.  Which is why we're doing everything that needs doing NOW, before we move in fully, because the way the timing is going when we do move in it will be time to really set to with planting and organising things outside if we want to continue to feed ourselves.

 

So the kitchen is almost finished, just the second coat of the second green wall to do, and already we can see it's going to look fantastic.  I can't wait to set to this week with packing up lots of things that will be being put into the kitchen cupboards and onto my lovely new shelves when we go back next weekend.

 

While LH was painting downstairs I was busy upstairs painting round all the door frames while the doors are away being dipped, next week we will paint the walls and ceiling of this landing area and then work our way down the stairs. 

 

The end is in sight thank goodness, did I ever mention that ...  I HATE PAINTING !!

 

Sue xx

When Does a House Become a Home

 

When does a house become a home?

 

This is a question I've been asking myself a lot recently.  At the moment travelling between our two properties, our rented one in Berkshire and our bought 'forever home' in North Wales we feel a little bit caught between two houses, or is it two homes.  I honestly don't know how more well off folk that actually own two homes manage long term, I guess you get into a routine and have lots of duplicated items so that both properties feel like 'home'.

 

For me I need one base, one home that both we and our animals love to be in and I am looking forward to this being the one we are in forever.  The decorating is almost finished, we still have the kitchen to paint although all the prep work was done last weekend so this week we will be actually getting the paint on the walls, then we will get round to doing the hall and stairs and then finally, the conservatory, which is where we are currently storing all the paint and DIY necessities needed as you tackle a whole house at once.

 

As each room has been finished we have been bringing our possessions from 'home' to fill it and make it ours.  Sometimes it still feels a bit 'showhousey'.  Too neat and tidy, too organised and slightly unused, but I'm hoping this will change.  I don't want, nor have I ever had, a house that looks perfect, a house where children can't touch things or animals can't wander from room to room, although I did draw the line at the chickens roaming through the house when they started shaking the soil from their dust bathing all over my kitchen floor :-/

 

I love it when you can read a persons or a couples characters from their home, their rooms and their belongings, when you can stand and browse a friends bookcase and smile at their choice of books, coveting those you have always wanted or thinking 'snap' when your tastes are just so similar and you realise just why they are your friends and you love them so much.

 

I actually think that soon it will start to feel like home, the more we add to it the more familiar it feels, the more I want to be there and I  am really looking forward to the day in the not too distant future when we will.

 

I had an email question about the display that I have put above the bookcase in the living room, saying it looked identical to how it looked at our current address - well spotted.  It is almost identical there is just one new addition.  Each time we move or have a truly memorable occasion one more item gets added to it, I guess now it is almost complete.

 

 

So here is our life in pictures, the things are numbered in the photo above.

 

1.  My 'Where's Mum' limited edition print bought when I bought my first ever home of my own after my divorce.  A tiny kitten in an almost empty room looking for her Mum.

 

2.  A carved wooden Gecko, almost the same as the one tattooed on my arm, I had the tattoo done to celebrate my freedom the day after the divorce came through, hence it's nickname Freddy Freedom.  This wooden copy was bought for me by Lovely Hubby on a trip to a Christmas Market the year we got engaged when I realised I didn't need to be alone to experience freedom .... I could share it with my soulmate.

 

3.  A tinplate picture 'Le Chat Noir' that we bought on our first trip to Paris, it brings back memories of walking hand in hand through the streets of the most romantic capital in the world.  Early morning coffees sitting outside little coffee shops and bistros, and seeing the Eiffel Tower perfectly lit on a Saturday night from our hotel window.

 

4.  The advert we placed in farming magazines and newspapers when we decided that we were going to live our dream and start our new life in the country while we were young enough to enjoy it and build it up instead of waiting until we had both retired..

 

5.  One of a limited edition range of framed photographs that I used to sell in my little shop, that I simply had to have for us when I sold up ready to begin our new lives.  It is taken by one of the most talented landscape photographers I know - my brother.  It reminds me every time I look at it of happy times in the Cumbria and reminds me of Graham.

 

6.  A Welsh Love Spoon bought by us during our two weeks of decorating our new house on a day out we had to Carnarvon to relax a bit in the middle of all the chaos.  We had lunch in a warm and cosy restaurant and then a mooch around the shops.  Welsh Love spoons are composed of different symbols and the one we chose has two hearts and a keyhole, which symbolise love and home.

 

On the top of the bookcase lives 'Mother' our Christmas Cacti passed down to us from my lovely Mum in Law, it was her Mum's before that so how old she is I really can't work out, but she flowers at the most unexpected times and burst into bloom just after Jessie died and she came to live with us, a sign we took that it was meant to be. 

 

Now that these are all in the places where they will stay, it really is feeling a lot more like our little Welsh house is edging forward in the 'home' stakes and our cute little rented bungalow is merely full of things waiting to go home.

 

So in my opinion, in answer to my own question ... 'when does a house become a home?' 

 

When you fill it with yourselves, your love, your memories and your hopes and dreams for the future.

 

Sue xx

 

The Post That Never Was

 

This Blog post was going to be called 'The Chicken That Ate My Earring', then something amazing happened.

 

The other day whilst cleaning out the henhouse, on my hands and knees and with as usual always one too many chickens than really can fit in the henhouse with me inside there as well, little miss naughty chicken (above) decided that the flash of gold from my earring was just too tempting and she had to have it.

 

I didn't even realise it was missing at first it was later in the morning after washing my hair I realised I was 'earring-less', remembering the attack on my ear I knew where it must be.  Obviously my first thought, being the kind chicken mummy that I am, was  'Oooh I hope it passes through alright', yeah right my first thought was something a little bit more like 'bl**dy gold robbing chicken', nope I'm not the angel some of you might think I am :-)

 

I told Lovely Hubby about my earring theft and he just said 'well at least now I know what to buy you for Christmas' ... typical man!!

 

Next day back on chicken shit mucking out duty I had my eyes peeled, in a vague and very unhopeful manner for my gorgeous little stud earring and guess what ..... there it was!!  Lying glistening in the nice clean bedding staring up at me .... miraculous!!

 

 

Teeny tiny earring .... can you see it ?

 

In close up.

 

Knowing I had a few spare earring backs because I am always losing my earrings, I was as happy as Larry and brought it back indoors to sterilise in some boiling water.

 

Then while getting changed from my workout, guess what I spied lying on the bedroom floor ..... the back of my earing. 

 

 It must have been stuck to the back of my ear when I came in to get changed from cleaning out the henhouses into my workout gear the day before (yes I am currently on three changes of clothes a day, it's getting tiring, I really must sort something out after all I'm most definitely not Sindy or Barbie needing to be changed over and over).

 

So I now have a pair of gold stud earrings again ..... and this post would have been totally not needed to explain my lop-sidedness, but I just thought I'd mention it because some folk think chickens are a little bit daft and can't see very well ....

 

... WRONG.

 

 They have better daytime eyesight than us.  Seemingly they have more cones in their eyes that can distinguish colours, movement, shiny things (bugs as well as earrings) and whereas we may look down and see the grass they see a whole sub-culture in the grass, tiny movements of potentially edible things on the soil beneath.  They are also long-sighted in one eye and short-sighted in the other, hence their cute tipping their heads from side to side movement, watch your chickens when a large bird flies over they will all tip their heads the same way to watch it's progress and make sure they are safe.  They manage this little miracle when they are in the shell, a couple of days before hatching the tiny chick turns it's head so that one eye is near the shell and the source of light and the other is tucked down looking at it's own body so the eyes develop slightly differntly, amazing.

 

Their only downfall is their night vision which is why they take themselves off to bed as soon as the light dims and dusk is upon us,  and now that the clocks have gone back this means our chooks are all tucked up in their henhouses by 5.15pm which makes for a perfectly long evening to have our tea, sort out some more stuff for packing and generally have a little bit of time to ourselves.

 

So  be warned ..... watch out if you glisten near a chicken - it'll have you!!

 

Sue xx