Sunshine : )

What a beautiful day.  I am catching up with the washing that didn't get done last week because of the rain. In fact I have run out of clothes pegs because I have done so much.  I have one last load just finishing in the machine now and I hope some things are dry and can be brought back in so that I can use those pegs for this load.

We've had a couple of those meals that I made last weekend and lots of eggs this week.  I would normally have stretched the mince a bit further but I was running out of space in the freezer.  My new little hens are still laying eggstremely well (sorry!) and we shall be having more eggy meals this week.  I also managed to sell a couple of extra boxes to folk at work, so that has helped too.

We were given some fence panels by some friends to break up for the woodburner.  They were propped up at the back of the house awaiting destruction when my son called in during the week.  He informed us that these panels were in incredibly better condition than the ones in his garden and could we please do a swap.  So my husband is round there this afternoon helping to swap our fence panels for his battered ones.  I'm sure our friends would be delighted that their panels were having a second life rather than just getting burnt.  And when I've pegged my last load of washing out, I'm going round there too and we'll all have tea together.  And I'll get to play with my grandchildren :)

Well-egged

My husband is improving now although he is not sleeping very well.  Problems with the nose means that he is waking himself up with his snoring let alone me.  He had his nose cauterised (yeuk and triple yeuk!) on Tuesday morning which hopefully will deal with all the problems.  He was very embarrassed to discover that the young doctor who treated him was a boy he had taught at school...  When somebody is going to be looking up your nose, it is preferable to have a doctor who is a total stranger...  : )

Exam season is almost upon us.  Years 11 and 12 have gone on study leave now from school and year 13 are going this week.  My husband has started his examiner meetings today for marking/moderating.  After the week we've just had, I was really pleased to have a VERY quiet day today. I had hoped to do a couple of loads of washing but it keeps raining so I didn't.

I've been through the fridge and peered in all the lurking tubs of leftovers and prepared six dinners for the next couple of days and to go in the freezer based on mince ++ and soup. I've also put a couple of (non-food) items in the bin that I was hanging on to "just in case" so I feel quite virtuous.

My new little hens have suddenly decided to up their production and we will be eating lots of eggs this week as well as the meals that I prepared today. I need more customers! Once the spring flurry of eggs is past a couple of the older hens probably won't lay again and the middleaged ones will only lay occasionally.  So after the summer, we'll probably have mainly eggs from the newbies with an occasional oldie.  It is just right now that I am inundated with eggs but it is only a temporary problem -  and it is such a nice problem to have : )

Just two more weeks at school and it will be half term...

Restful long weekend?

Restful long weekend?  I went wrong there somehow.

Saturday was ok.  Pottered through lots of little jobs and popped round to the little Tesco Express to buy some milk to take to church on sunday morning for the coffee after the service.  Happily, I found some nice rolls reduced so I spent 20p on 2 packets.  We were out of bread so I had been going to make a loaf but I didn't need to.  I couldn't make that many rolls for that price for the ingredients let alone add in the cost of the energy to cook them.

Then we practised the music for church for Sunday morning and went to bed but I didn't sleep well.  We went to church on Sunday morning and then called in to Lidl on the way home because I had a £5 off a spend of £35 voucher.  They were out of the half price (weekend special) of cheese and I'm not surprised because it was a fantastic price. However, they had lots of mince at £1 for 500g which surprised me.  So I rang my friend and brought her home several packs to put in her freezer.  That helped me get to my £35 total as did the fair trade tea (for church) at 99p for 80 tea bags which is nice tea as well as a nice price.

When we got home, we were tired so we had a quick sandwich and sat down for an hour to watch a programme we had recorded.  Later, I was glad we'd had that rest!  We did a couple of jobs and then got dinner ready for 7pm.  We had the plates out and were just about to serve when my husband's nose played up again. This is the 10th time in 2 weeks.  He has been to the doctor this last week but the treatment given has not helped.  Last night he had a MEGA nose bleed for 2 1/2 hours.  NHS Direct recommend that after 30 minutes, you make your way asap to the nearest A&E.  My husband was getting weak and dizzy so I phoned for someone to drive us there because I didn't see how I could get him into A&E and park the car in some far flung car park all at the same time.  We were there for four hours and seen twice.  However, he was given an appointment to go to the ENT clinic tomorrow and that is soooo much quicker than if we had to go through the GP.  Our bathroom looked like there had been a massacre ...

I was so grateful not to have to go to work today since it was 1am befor we got to bed this morning.  And it is only just turned 8pm now but I'm off to my bed or I won't be capable of functioning efficiently in the morning.

Long weekend - yay!

So it is May already.  I'm sure that time is speeding up somehow.

My husband has tidied out one small shed this week.  It is one where he stores his wood that is useable for projects and not for the woodburner.  The door doesn't quite close and when he got to the back corner behind the wood, there was a pile of leaves and a hedgehog curled up asleep in it : )
I wouldn't let him turf it out because I can see that a hedgehog might be a good friend and eat up some of the things that I don't want visiting my garden.

And we've collected even more wood.  The further into the future that we can postpone having to actually buy wood, the better.  My friend left us an answerphone message to say that she had driven past a house with a pile of branches at the front.  So we went down to the house and my husband sat in the car and sent me to be cheeky and ask at the door if we could have them. We could so he ventured out of the car and we filled our estate car twice over.  It always amuses me that he stays in the car and sends me out.  These are freshly cut branches again so they will be for the winter after next.  Tonight, we've been to a work colleague's house and collected a car full of wood and a roof rack full of fence panels.  This is the second time we've been to this person's house and come home with just about the limit of wood that the car would cope with.  Last time, some of the lap fence panels got used to roof two of the new log stores.

I've lost another hen this week.  She was old but not my oldest and she had not laid an egg for well over a year.  Actually my oldest is currently laying about 4 eggs each week and she is the sole survivor of her little flock.  The flock that succeeded hers have all gone and so have most of the flock that succeeded them.  So Bluebelle is doing really well!

I notice that I've had loads of visitors to my blog this last two weeks.  I've had as many visitors in two weeks as I usually have in 3 months.  People are very welcome to stop by but I'm just curious as to what it is that has sparked people's interest.  I love it when comments are left here and I go and visit other blogs written by people who think along the same sort of lines as I do. I started writing this blog as a sort of online diary so that I could look back and see what I've been up to and I'm always a little bit surprised but very pleased when other people read my ramblings especially as I've not really got the equipment to put lots of nice photos on the blog.  So if you are new here - then you are very welcome!

I am so looking forward to this long weekend.  I know that I've only been back at school for one week after the Easter holiday but tonight I feel that I could sleep the clock round.

Yawn...   Goodnight!