Getting Back In The Swing Of Things.

Hi!!

How are you doing? Just a little catch up with the first week of the new year, getting back to normal routines, kids to school, bread baking etc.

This is probably not in the right order but never mind.

We have had the first, be it 4 days, week back at school. The boys are going to a new Sports Club at school on a Wednesday so I pick them up instead of them coming home on the taxi bus. 

Harry is taking part in a cookery competition at Urdd this month; we have had the first practise of making Cauliflower Tabbouleh and it was really yummy with the burgers we had on Saturday night.

A fairly big thing is that we have made the decision to keep two cars. We bought one to do up and sell but Jon decided it was a very good car; seven seats, tow bar but I didn't like it but was willing to use it. However, the blue one which we bought a while ago is a little cracker I love it. We had paid off the tax off in one go and when we discovered the insurance was less than £15 a month we decided to keep both. It is very economical, £35 to fill it and does 50 to the gallon, so I can whip about fetching the boys from various things and do the food shopping on a Friday instead of having to do it at the weekend spoiling family time. 

I've been looking for a pair of mantlepiece dogs for ages and we saw some in Craft in Aber at the weekend. They were £15 but I seen odd ones before for £10 on their own. Look!!

I also found this lovely little marmalade pot in a charity shop and reminded me of one we used to have when I was young.

News from the outdoors includes the progress of our garlic...

glove is there for scale!

Then we are making some changes to the fire pit area to improve our outdoor eating experience. Jon used the sleepers from the last flower bed we took up to make the narrow table at the tip of the picture and the horizontal pieces are on top of narrow logs to section off the area and also for people to stand against. A little bit of work to finish but looking good.

This stone plinth is the base for what will become our pizza oven.

We have a very cheeky little robin who comes in the garden a lot. We put some cake on the kitchen window sill and after a few minutes here it came.

I have treated myself to a laminator. This is good if I want to keep anything special of the the boys, a really nice photo plus, of course, cutting down on paper when I can keep a dry wipe list of something instead of always printing off. I will always have paper things because that is me but for a checklist in each of the letting rooms, wipeable things we will need for the bed and breakfast etc I can see if being very useful.

Right, must dash now. I have cleaned the bathroom from top to bottom today, which took an age, and I mean that involves toothbrushes in nooks and crannies. on did some work on it a few days ago by adding this lovely splashback, for want of a better word, to the bath surround.

I have also baked two loaves, vacuumed everywhere and prepared the veg for tea so going to have a brew now and get the rest of tea ready.

Bye for now.

Lou.xx