Holiday survival

It's been a fun frugal half term so far. The weather has been kind so we've been out and about a lot. 

We've been to the local parks and paddling pools, enjoyed playdates with our school friends, enjoyed the cinema club at our church, visited a local bakery for delicious cakes and had the water fight to end all water fights in the garden. 

DH has been working long hours this week so sadly we haven't seen much of him. However yesterday he finished work at 3pm and sent me to Costa with the command to enjoy a break.

I had a wonder 45 minutes enjoying an uninterrupted frappe and finishing my book in peace. I am so grateful for a thoughtful husband 😍

I came back feeling rested and rejuvinated.

X x X 

Tuesday's travels

After dropping the two eldest off safely to school this morning I took the two smallest to Little Thrivers. 

Today's theme was The Man in the Moon based around a story book we read at the end of the session. Usually a few of the children are choosen to act out the parts of the story as its read aloud. Today Gman got to be the Man in the Moon himself. I think G looks rather fetching in a top hat.

After group a few of us got together and raided the reduction sections of local supermarkets and food stores. We were lucky to find lots of fruit, some meat and cheese. With the addition of some cream crackers we had ourselves a mini picnic. 

We ate it together in the town park before those with any hint of energy left visit the playground.

The smallest members of our group, including Baby W, napped in a patch of shade while the adults took turns pushing swings and coaxing toddlers down slides. 

I managed a quick bit of thrifting in my favourite charity shops. I didn't find much but one thing I did spot were 2 packets of Reproduction Victorian scraps. They were only £1 each and both have hundreds of images inside. I'm planning to create a fantasy travel journal with them.

Watch this space.

X x X

Chinese Papercuts

There was a small summer fete at the girls school today. A few stalls and tombolas to browse for goodies before heading home for the weekend.

I found two interesting looking envelopes on the bric-a-brac stall. They looked the same both front and back.

From the writting on the back I thought they both contained a single papercut, most likely the one printed on the back.

How wrong was I! Both envelopes held a set of 10 papercuts. The first was male faces.

The second contained a set of Chinese circus girls. The detail on them all is beautiful. 

 I have a friend who is obsessed with all things oriental who would adore these.

 I'm going to keep them safely stored away until her birthday. I hope she likes them.

What wonderful suprises have you discovered recently?

X x X

Getting my s*** together

 I've been feeling overloaded lately. There's never quite enough hours in the day for the things I need to do. My memory is also struggling with so many costume days, school trips, tombola donations etc etc.
 I've ordered myself a filofax type folder and found several website's that offer free printable pages. I'm hoping that by writting things down on paper I can keep better track and free some space inside my brain.
 You can print pages to track almost anything from the children's wardrobes to weight loss. I look forward to trying some of them out.
  While I'm waiting for my file to arrive I've been meal planning. I now have a food plan for the next 9 days and I've done all the food shopping around it. I've mostly used what we had in the cupboards so we can use up some things ready for our next app food order.

 My afternoon plans are sorting laundry while watching Poldark on Netflix. I'm on episode 3 of the first series and so far I'm quite enjoying it.

X x x

There's a leek.

I spent most of yesterday in the company of my mum. We spent the day catching up on family news and gossip, and drinking many many gallons of tea. 

Before I left she gifted me with a bag of rhubarb and leeks from the allotment.

Baby W played with the leeks on the school run.

I may have been lucky to get them all home. Baby W is obviously a big fan of leeks 😂

With the help of my glamourous assistant DD2 the rhubarb has been cleaned, skinned and chopped ready to freeze for later use. The leeks were cleaned and chopped along with some potatoes and garlic.

I left it all in the slow cooker overnight on a low heat with some Christmas stock from the freezer and plenty of water.

 Today we have oodles of delicious leek and potato soup which is perfect for the drizzly grey day it's turned out to be.

What's your favourite soup?

X x X

Prepping for a long weekend

Its a three day weekend thanks to the bank holiday on monday. 

I've been preparing some craft ideas to keep the small humans entertained, as well as making some past their best banana's into banana and chocolate cakes.

Hopefully if the weather is good I can get us all out into the open air. There's a lot of coughs and colds going around at the moment so we need some Sunshine to burn the germs off.

 Wish me luck?

X x X