This Wednesday afternoon found me wandering around our local behemoth shopping mall for three hours. It's not my favourite place, so I don't go all that often, only when I have to these days, and usually during the week when it is a bit quieter.
I had a sandwich for lunch at home and then took the bus as usual to avoid paying the ridiculous parking charges and so that I could stay as long as I needed to. I thought about going on my bike, but the things I had to get there were bulky and probably wouldn't fit in my pannier bag, so the bus it was.
On this occasion, the reason I went was to pick up an on-line order from John Lewis. Although I'm on a No Spend Month, save for essentials, I ordered mattress and pillow case protectors for our new bed, which is due to be delivered sometime soon. (I hope!)
I say sometime soon, as it's almost 4 weeks now and we haven't heard a peep. I think the 3-4 week estimate we were given was a bit on the conservative side and suspect we might be waiting a while yet.
Anyhow, I considered the mattress protector and pillow protectors to be essential, as I want to take as much care as I can of this bed and our new pillows, from the start. (It does help somewhat that LB has grown up and is no longer prone to climbing into bed with us and having 'accidents' - I hope she doesn't read this).
Anyway, I digress, so the main purpose of visiting the mall was the order collection, but also to buy some yoghurt mixes from Lakeland.
I have come to realise, since receiving my mini EasiYo yoghurt maker as a gift for Christmas, that the mixes for this particular model are only available in store at Lakeland or on-line on their website (incurring postage costs). I have tried to use the larger packs that are sold in various places, but the yoghurt doesn't set when I do this. Hence, I am reduced to having to visit Lakeland every once in a while, to stock up. Fortunately for me, I'm not that into cooking/baking, so I didn't even look around the rest of the shop.
There wasn't really too much else I needed from my shopping trip, save for a small Valentine gift for OH, a birthday present for a friend and one for a relative of OH's. I took a look around, but didn't see anything that fitted the bill for the latter two, so left it as they weren't urgent. I did, however, find a couple of things for me that weren't on my list, and my good intentions went out of the window, but I did limit my spend to no more than £20, which I thought was quite restrained.
I did also buy a couple more items of underwear for LB. I have taken to buying better quality and adding a couple of items at a time to her collection. It seems to be paying off, as they wear a lot better than the ones I used to buy, so in the long run I should have to buy less.
I came away feeling quite exhausted, but relieved that I'd been pretty good and hadn't spent too much, which is always a positive. For the £20, I bought three items that I will definitely use - a pair of joggers for loungewear, a watch and a slimmer belt for wearing at the gym to enhance my workouts.
When I got home, I made us a lasagne for dinner and later found that I had an urge to do a bit of decluttering. (Possibly a tiny bit guilt induced:]) I had a few items in mind that I wanted to donate. I've decided to set myself the weekly goal of spending 10 minutes finding/gathering things that can be donated, as part of my ongoing commitment to simplifying our lives.
This week's effort rendered 30 items for donation, as I decided to donate a whole set of 20 Children's Encyclopedia Britannicas that resided in LB's room. I bought them for a few pounds at a Car Boot Sale a good few years ago, but I have to admit that she has rarely even looked at them and does all her homework research on-line or in the library. It was time for them to go, and she was perfectly happy to free up a shelf in order to 'Tumblerize' it. A few other books joined them on the pile, making the task well worth the effort.
I'm not sure what I'll find to donate next week, but I have a whole week to think about it.
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