Lifting Carpet

I stripped my room bare this morning so that the boys could move the furniture and lift up the old carpet.

Thankfully, underneath is varnished chipboard so it was easy to vacuum up the dust that had accumulated over the last forty years.  (So gross!)

I took advantage of the bare bedroom  by vacuuming clean my mattress.  I used to do this every 6-12 months, but it has been a couple of years now since it was last done.

For breakfast this morning I made up a Breakfast Bowl with a Middle Eastern flair.  Chopped egg, cucumber and  tomato were placed on a base of Greek yoghurt, some chickpeas were added, then a sprinkle of za'atar spice and a drizzle of olive oil to finish it off.

It tasted surprisingly good and kept me going until lunchtime. 

Wishing everyone a happy day,

Margaret xx 

An Old Blanket

When one starts cleaning out things, it is amazing what can be found lurking in dark corners!

I only have a single bed, and my preference is to use blankets instead of duvets although it is difficult to find the right sizes (most have too much or not enough tuck-in).

I found this green blanket in a storage box. My mother-in-law gave it to me about 30 years ago - it was threadbare then (it even has a few holes), so I shudder to think how old it actually is.

It is the perfect size for my bed, and still quite warm (the tag says 100% wool, made in England).

I'm now thinking I may use it as a template to cut down a couple of double-bed size woolen blankets that we received as a wedding gift (over 50 years ago!).

I'm not sure whether to bind the edges with satin ribbon or learn how to do blanket stitch.

Has anyone ever tried doing this?

Margaret xx 

Fire Lighting

As we head into winter, we often have a fire in the evenings.

Son does this, and has a set routine he follows.

First, gather your firewood.

Set the fire.

Add a little ignition help.

Use a lighter to get things going.

And then it's time for me to sit back and enjoy the blaze! 

After years of being chief fire maker, fire maintainer, and fire cleaner, it is nice to let someone else do all the work 😀

Margaret  xx

Happiness In Little Things

MY SON LOVES HIS HANGING BASKETS.  THIS ONE HAS VIOLAS BLOOMING IN IT.

THE YELLOW ONES MAKE ME FEEL HAPPY WHEN I SEE THEM GLISTENING IN THE SUN.

SNUGGLES KEEPS WATCH OVER MY BED EVERY DAY.

ENJOYING A SLICE OF HOMEMADE CHEESECAKE WITH TEA MADE FROM FRESH LEAVES OF CHOCOLATE-MINT. 

APPRECIATE THE LITTLE THINGS IN LIFE.

MARGARET xx

At Home

SHEETS DRYING IN THE WARM AUTUMN SUNSHINE

THE VINTAGE SWIFT-WHIP EGG BEATER THAT ONCE BELONGED TO MY MOTHER

THE GRAPE IS STARTING TO LOSE ITS LEAVES

A PRETTY CORNER IN MY LITTLE TUB GARDEN 

MITTENS DISCOVERED ME SITTING IN THE GARDEN

HAVE A GREAT DAY

MARGARET xx

Butter Spreaders

 

Several months ago, one of my dinner forks decided to leave its companions and take an adventure all on its own.  I have been waiting for it to come home again but so far it hasn’t yet turned up, so I went and purchased another one.

Sitting beside the loose dinner forks, as part of the same cutlery set, there were butter spreaders.  Now, I know these have probably been around for ages but I have never used one before.

Growing up, we used bone-handled flexible blunt-bladed knives to butter our bread.  The knives I now use are slightly larger and still have the blunt blade but are not flexible.

I’ve been seeing these spreaders in use in several of the Japanese and Korean housewife vlogs I’ve been watching lately (a good activity when the afternoon gets too hot), and a French internet site told me they are specifically designed for evenly spreading butter, jams, pates etc. onto slices of bread, crackers or rusks.

My cutlery set now has seven new additions (counting the fork), and I can report that I love using the spreaders.  They are slightly different to using a knife, but feel good in the hand and the act of applying a spread to the bread felt like a work of art instead of something you do automatically (though no doubt that feeling will change!).

Isn’t it nice to have something different for a change?  It adds a little bit of spark to daily life 😊

Margaret.

 

Morally Wrong?

 

It seems to be a common theme of conversation these days about how our societal standards are slipping.

Terms such as decency and integrity are disappearing along with keeping your promise.

A good friend of the family organises events for a group he belongs to.  He found a suitable venue for one event and booked it just over one year in advance, as well as paying a substantial deposit to secure it.

Now he has been told, through an email full of apologies and excuses, that he cannot have the venue – basically because a larger organisation has come along and wants to book the place for a longer period of time.

“Your deposit will be refunded in full” and “We are sorry for any inconvenience this may cause” doesn’t really help the situation.

On the home front, son has been building more built-in bookcases (he is a bibliophile!) and is currently staining the wood.  It smells awful while he is doing it, but thankfully that soon disappears when you open up a couple of windows.

Our weather is still unsettled, with the odd rumble of thunder about.  Currently, it is overcast and rather dreary.  Both cats have the right idea - they are curled up and sleeping!

Always do the right thing 😊

Margaret.

 

Daily Life Continues

 

History is like life.  It is never constant, always changing, and we have just witnessed a major change as one monarch passes and another takes the throne.

As with all historic events though, our daily life continues on.  We watch ceremonies broadcast live on television and read news reports to keep up to date, but all the while we continue on with our normal lives.

I found these lovely Spanish Bluebells growing almost wild on the lawn beneath a tree in a friend’s garden.

Son has a few things stored in a friend’s shed in Auckland, and he made a trip up there during the week and brought back my old coffee table.

It was given to me by my mother-in-law around 1985 and it was one of the items I found myself unable to dispose of when we moved into the caravan to live in 2008.

Son has had it in storage ever since then.  For all that, it is still in remarkably good condition although the top looks like it may need to be redone at some stage.

This is what it used to look like:

Wishing everyone a happy weekend,

Margaret 😊

 

My Sitting Room

 

What name do you give a room that doesn’t really have a name? 

Most of the rooms in our house are named after their function, such as the kitchen, bathroom, bedroom etc. 

But what name do you give a multi-purpose room that has no clear function?

I have taken over grand-daughter’s old bedroom and have been working on developing a room for myself, somewhere I can sew or read or iron or take an afternoon nap.

Mittens often keeps me company when I am pottering in this room

I began calling it my Craft Room, but it seemed that the room was more than that as I seldom do much in the way of craft work. 

It is not my Bedroom, and we already have a Living Room (part of the open-plan kitchen – dining – tv area) and a Lounge (the sunken area next to the Living Room, where son has based his Office area).

Then we thought about Sitting Room.  After all, I do do a lot of SITTING in there!

The room contains a recliner lounge chair, a bookcase, storage drawers and shelves, and will eventually have a table as well.  Most of the day the sun shines into the room and it really is a very pleasant place to be.

So, it looks like this house now has a Sitting Room – set aside for the use of the Grand Old Dame who resides here! 😊

Be happy,

Margaret.

Keeping Busy

 

What better activity in lock-down is there, than to clean everything in sight!

Our neighbour started it.  First the net curtains were all taken down and washed, then the windows scrubbed, and the whole room was turned out before they moved to the next room.

When the sun shines they are outside, hosing down the exterior of the house and pottering around in their garden.  I even saw the wires on the clothes line get given a wiping over.

It started off another neighbour.  Over the last few days they have pulled almost everything out of their garage and are obviously sorting it out and generally tidying up.

I should explain, I am not simply being nosey!  We live at the end of a cul-de-sac and it is impossible not to notice what each other of us is doing.  Our houses are not so close together that we can reach out our windows and touch each other, but they are still only metres apart.

Always make time to sit in the garden and be happy

Anyway, it has started me off cleaning as well!  I’m calling it an early Spring Clean, especially as spring officially starts in around a week’s time.

The kitchen got a good clean not so long ago, but I have started there again and have thrown quite a few items out.  Surprisingly, it makes quite a bit of difference when there is only two people to provide for instead of three.

Do you have any favourite activity to do during stay-at-home lockdown?

Margaret 😊

 

Warm And Cozy

 

The last couple of days have been rather dreary, with very little sunshine and lots of rain.  It has not been that cold though, but a warm lazy fire seems to cheer everything up around it. 

Many years ago (sometimes I feel old!), I spent a few years living in a house with no electric cooking facilities.  We had a coal range to use (it also heated all our hot water).  The warmth that old range put out had a special quality about it, seeping into the bones like nothing else did. 

I used to be amazed at any visitors we received as they used to gravitate towards the range and stand with their backs to it.

Not the best of photos but all I have - got to love that 1970s wallpaper!

I used my spiralizer again tonight and cooked up a mushroom stir-fry with ribbon carrots and courgettes, plus cabbage, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, celery and noodles – all made tasty with some soy sauce and sesame oil.  Grand-daughter even went back for seconds!

It has been a holiday in New Zealand today (Queens Birthday weekend) but the day has gone by the same for us as every other day does.

Wishing everyone a very happy and productive week ahead 😊

Margaret.

It Is What It Is

 

First, thankyou my dear blog friends for all your wonderful supportive comments. 

We cannot change the way a person chooses to act or what they choose to say, but we can control the way we react to it.

I am learning that things are what they are, it is what it is, and one cannot go back and change things that have happened.  I need to have patience, love, and forgiveness in my heart, and continue on with my own life.

With that in mind, I have been spring-cleaning my bedroom (in the autumn!).  Son helped me move the bed and drawers around (they are getting too heavy for me to move by myself anymore) and I have hung pictures all over the walls.

They are all paintings and photos that I love and that have good memories attached to them, the type of pictures that make me smile when I look at them.

The aptly-named Hope River in Canterbury

With the sun moving lower in the skies it is again catching my crystals hanging in the windows – for most of the day I have little rainbows scattered across my room whenever the sun is shining. 

More happiness 😊

Margaret xx

 

Getting Back On Track

 

For several months now I have been muddling through my household chores, not really knowing what I was doing.  Now my depression is beginning to lift, I am getting back on track and starting to follow my old system again (of doing certain chores on certain days).  That way I don’t suddenly find a week has slipped by and something important hasn’t been done.

I have been Home Alone this weekend, with granddaughter at her mother’s and son away at a games tournament.  It has just been me and the cats and the rats – very quiet and rather relaxing.

I have been back to see my doctor and he is very pleased with my progress.  Apart from going through the final stages of my grief process (there is no time limit on this, it just happens), he also feels that my depression may be related to the bad concussion I received when I fell in late 2019.  I have never heard that idea before, but it makes sense.

The doctor was also happy to see my blood pressure (with the help of meds) has now reduced from 180/110 to 130/70.  No wonder I am beginning to feel alive again!

It is overcast this morning, rather dull with frequent showers, but it is not cold.  I slipped outside for a while to deadhead some of my flowers, and discovered my asters are beginning to flower.

Tonight, my dear brother and his wife have invited me around for dinner.  Something to look forward to.

Take care and stay safe 😊

Margaret.

No More Rain Fade

 

At long last, yesterday morning, we were able to have a new television aerial installed.  The technician also put in a splitter box, so both our televisions receive the signal at the same time (no more ‘sound echo’ if they are both on).

For months, every time it rains the television signal disappears – usually just when it is something you want to especially watch.  It has been very frustrating but other things have taken priority.  However, it is done now. Yay!!

I had a very pleasant day yesterday visiting with my brother’s wife (another of my sisters-in-law!).  We had a simple lunch of homemade sandwiches and sat and gossiped all afternoon.  Another friend called in as well and we had a very enjoyable time together.

My sister-in-law in hospital is having a rough time with her chemotherapy.  I was hoping she might have been one of the lucky ones and not have too many side effects, but it seems not.

Our weather this week has been hot, too hot for me to be outside after about 9am.  I just wilt in heat like this – which made me unappreciative when Mittens decided to curl up beside me in bed last night.  She was SO hot!! (she never got a chance to stay there very long LOL).

I hope your week is going well 😊

Margaret.

Lazy Days

 

And so another lazy day slides by.  Maybe it is summer lethargy, but I haven’t had much energy for doing anything in particular.

I get up in the morning, have a shower, get dressed, eat breakfast, do my chores – and then sit down to my computer, usually with Mittens keeping me company.  A very mundane existence!

Waterlilies take it as it comes, maybe a good lesson for me to learn

However, life still goes on.  I currently have one sister-in-law (I have nine altogether) seriously ill in hospital.  She is in her late 70s and has been told they cannot do more for her than hope to keep her comfortable.

I would love to go and visit her, but have been told to stay away – she is undergoing chemotherapy and the slightest risk of infection would be disastrous.  Thankfully we can still have phone contact.

On the home front, this morning I did clean out the pantry and sort things out a bit.  It seems to need it occasionally as things get put away hurriedly and in the wrong place.  And crumbs seem to appear in the most unlikely places and need to be wiped up.

It has been a good day for drying washing as well.  Cloudy but warm and a good breeze blowing – makes the dried clothes smell nice and sweet.

Remember a smile makes less wrinkles than a frown 😊

Margaret

Isabella Beeton

 

“As with the commander of an army, or the leader of any enterprise, so is it with the mistress of a house.  Her spirit will be seen through the whole establishment, and just in proportion as she performs her duties intelligently and thoroughly, so will her domestics follow in her path.”

I have the good fortune to own a facsimile of Beeton’s Book of Household Management that was published in 1861 by Isabella and Samuel Beeton.  It is a fascinating book, reflecting the daily lives of middle-class citizens in mid-Victorian England.

A large portion of the book is devoted to recipes, with many side notes about where different foods originated, how they were historically used, when things were seasonable, how much the recipe would cost and so on. 

Many of the recipes were plagiarized from previous cook books, or copied from those sent in to her husband’s monthly publication, The Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine, but are considered a reasonably accurate representation of what was actually being cooked in middle-class homes at that time.

Although the recipes and their side notes make for good reading, what I find enthralling are the notes on how to run a household.  There are detailed descriptions of what would be the responsibility of each particular servant, how a mistress should conduct herself, tips on how to raise healthy children, and different fashion hints.

A comprehensive section on first aid shows what it was like before the advent of our modern drugs.  It includes the use  of such amazing compounds as ‘precipitated sulphuret of antimony,’ cakes of opium, ‘sweet spirits of nitre,’ and ‘antimonial wine,’ as well as the more usual items such as calomel, Epsom salts, castor oil, and whiskey.

By Maull & Polyblank - National Portrait Gallery, Public Domain,

 https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=45334839

Isabella herself had an interesting life, even though she died at the young age of 29 after the birth of her fourth child.  Wikipedia provides a comprehensive biography about her (see here).

Our weather continues to be sunny and warm and I have been finding the evenings especially pleasant 😊

Margaret.

The Book of Household Management

By Mrs Isabella Beeton

Published originally by S.O. Beeton in 24 monthly parts, 1959-61

First published in a bound edition, 1861

And reproduced in facsimile by Jonathan Cape Ltd, 1968

This edition published in Australia by Thomas Nelson (Australia) Ltd, 1977

A Load Of Rubbish

Our local council is introducing a new rubbish collection system, to come into effect in a couple of day’s time.  Today was our last day for the old collection system.  The black plastic bags are being replaced with two wheelie bins (one for recyclables and the other for pure rubbish) and a small bin for compost scraps.  The current blue recycle bin will then be used solely for the collecting of unbroken glass.

This was the sight at our road gate this morning – and it is not all our rubbish!  This is from four households.

We had a little sunshine during the morning but this afternoon has been filled with squally showers.  The sort of weather that makes the cats dislike going outdoors – they sit at the cat door looking out, with a decided frown on their face, before finally making a dash for it.

I overdid it in the garden department yesterday and have been rather sore today, so the bit of rain made a good excuse not to do too much.

Japonica always reminds me of my maternal grandmother as she always had a plant growing in her garden.

Stay happy 😊

Margaret

A Comical Disaster

I can see it is going to take a while to live this one down – mum sat on the loo and it went through the floor!  I got such a shock when the whole unit suddenly lurched over to one side and partially sunk into the floor, ripping apart the seat and breaking the flushing system. 

Son has been in touch with both plumber and builder this morning, and it appears either a house pile has collapsed or the floor has rotted through.  We had no warning of anything being wrong, so it is a very unexpected disaster and is not going to be that cheap to fix either.

It looks like we will be without this basic bathroom facility for at least a week, if not two, until everything can be fixed up.  Grand-daughter can stay with her mother so that is no problem, leaving just son and I needing help. 

A quick look online, a visit to a camping shop, and we now have a portable pottie in residence.

I am really getting a bit old for all this sort of stuff J

Margaret.

Firewood

There is nothing more comforting during winter than a cosy fire in the evening, even if it is not very cold.  Looking back, it seems we have installed a log burner in almost every house we owned.

Son ordered us a load of split pine to top up our firewood reserves.  I felt a bit sorry for the delivery man as our driveway is a reverse down a shared drive then a sharp turn up a hill.  He did well to get it as far as he did.

The two guys unloaded the trailer by hand, which never took them very long and resulted in a lovely pile of firewood sitting in the drive for son to take care of.  It must have been recently split as the smell was divine!

Then the race was on to beat the weather as showers were beginning to arrive, after the last couple of days of cheerful winter sunshine.

The wood was all wheel-barrowed up beside the shed to clear the driveway.  It was rather nice to be informed that my help was not required and I could be on coffee-making duty instead.

Son then neatly stacked it beside the garage wall and a put a tarpaulin over it to keep it dry.

Next summer, he hopes to build a designated firewood storage area to keep the wood sheltered from the elements.

  

We have lived in this house now for ten months and are slowly getting things organized to how we like them – although it is son’s house so my “advice” is not always relevant!

There is great joy and satisfaction to be found in changing your home to how you like it J

Margaret.

Our First Home

Our first home was an old tiny rental cottage on a farm about ten minutes’ drive from the nearest town.  I drove past here last year and the place has now been demolished and replaced with paddock.

The cottage was small – it had a tiny kitchen with a bathroom off it, two very small bedrooms, and a living room with an open fire.  Attached to the house was a porch area with a wash-house and toilet.  There were no locks on any doors, even the external ones. 

The chimney used to leak every time it rained, and occasionally I would find toadstools growing in the carpet beside the hearth!! 

 

But it was our first home and we loved it.  We planted our first garden, both vegetables and flowers.  Along the fence line we had dahlias – the best display of dahlias we ever grew. 

We also got our first pet, a Chinchilla named Misty, who loved water.  When we watered the garden, she would lie in wait behind the lettuces and dive out at the spray of water.  Here she is sitting beneath a dripping tap.

We lived here for eight months before moving on.  We were young and life was an adventure.  We were happy there, but now I like to have a bit more comfort in my life! 

Keep smiling J 

Margaret.

LINKED TO Timeless Thursday