Lockdown Catchup

I haven't posted for a while about what I've been getting up to, mainly because life in Lockdown has just been trundling along like being in the film Groundhog Day, with nothing wildly exciting to report. This week, however, seems to have passed remarkably quickly, which I'm thankful for.

At the weekend, OH and I got a bit more painting done in the upstairs part of hallway. I'm hoping we might finish it this coming weekend, which would be good. There's still work to do downstairs in the vestibule, but choosing a colour is still an issue there. Why is it so difficult?

On Saturday, the sewing machine that I wanted for Christmas came back into stock at Argos, so OH bought it straight away and it got delivered that night. Very good service from Argos, I have to say. I haven't tried to use it yet. I need to work out how to thread it first. It's slightly different from my old one, as it's a different brand, Brother this time. Reviews seemed to be good. It's not all singing and dancing, but does have more fancy stitches than my old machine. It also comes with a 3 year warranty and an instruction DVD which is good. At least it will give me more choice in terms of things I can get on with during Lockdown now. Here's a picture of it:

(Sorry, not a great photo as it was backlit on a dingy wet day)

I did a big food shop at the end of last week and didn't intend to food shop at all this week, but with the weekend approaching we had run out of milk and due to the fact that I had a Lidl Plus £10 off voucher to use by today, I decided to venture out and stock up on a few things.  It wasn't a great experience, usual story with regard to people not social distancing and the store being just generally too busy with no one way system, but it's done now. At least the rate of infection here in London has dropped considerably in recent weeks, so it's less risky than it was a few weeks ago. I shouldn't need to venture out food shopping now until the end of next week at the very earliest.

I placed another Cherryz order this week, mainly snacks and things that we eat/use regularly. I may post a haul when it arrives.  I've decided that by placing an order with either Cherryz or Approved Food once per month, it gives me the excitement of receiving a parcel of stuff that we need and use, rather than spending time online shopping to generate a parcel of things that I don't need or use. It's working reasonably well so far, although I do still sometimes buy the odd other thing online. I don't really enjoy online grocery shopping, I get frustrated by the lack of delivery slots, but will do it at a push if am really forced to, otherwise, this would be something else to look forward to. Instead, I still physically go out food shopping. It gives the car a run out at least.

This month, I finally decided to buy a litter picker and a hoop for holding a plastic sack open. They arrived today. I'm yet to christen them on a litter picking dog walk. If nothing else, the dog enjoyed playing with it this morning when I got it out of the packaging and I can see that we might have fun on dog walks as I'm trying to use it and she's trying to wrestle with it.

OH's Marshall's seed order came this week too, well part of it at least, we're still awaiting the shallot bulbs. There weren't actually many packets of seeds in it, as we still have quite a lot from last year to use up, but he did get some potato tubers, which are now chitting in his basement office.

Our kitchen bin broke this week. The spring in the lid broke and it doesn't close properly now. I need to buy a new one and sourced one on Argos, but I was having difficulty paying for it with my credit card. In the end, I had to ring up the bank this morning to find that my card had been stopped for some reason, not sure why.  At least it hadn't been used fraudulently, which was what I was dreading. I think it's back up and working again now, but I'm a little reticent about trying to use it, so I haven't yet ordered the bin. I may persevere with the broken one for a week or so, as long as it doesn't smell too bad.

I picked up another fiction book to read this morning, it's quite a well known title that I've seen around for a while. It was recommended by a friend and has been sat on my bookshelf for a year or so. It's called Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine. I'm only a few chapters in, but I'm enjoying it. I'm quite getting back into reading fiction for a change. It's quite relaxing.

I was very sad to hear that Captain Tom had died the other day. Very sad news. For some reason, no one in the street was out clapping, so I clapped inside at home instead. Maybe people are no longer following the news that much and didn't know much about it or maybe it's too cold and wet at the moment to stand on the doorstep clapping. I was glad to see lots of people on the news out clapping for him. He raised an awful lot of money in the first lockdown and inspired a lot of people with his amazing indomitable spirit. RIP Captain Sir Tom. (Not sure which way round his titles should be written.)

On a brighter note, I bought myself some spring flowers last week whilst grocery shopping, just a cheap and cheerful bunch of daffodils and tulips for £2.89 altogether. They filled two small vases and helped to brighten up the house a little. We all need a bit of a pick me up sometimes. 

I also bought a shrub for the garden from Tesco for £2. I thought it was very pretty. and had lots of bright green leaves shooting off it. Here it is in a pot in the garden:

This is just a temporary home until it's less wet and muddy in the garden and I can decide where to put it.  It's hard to resist anything that promises new growth and pretty flowers.

Last week, I treated myself to some dahlia tubers that were being sold in a local shop. They were £5 for three tubers, so I picked a few different ones to plant in the garden. OH and I have decided that we want to try to grow more flowers this year, so I'm going to take over one of the raised beds in the garden to grow dahlias in. (Slugs and snails allowing) Here are the three I chose:

A bit of a pink theme going on, but these were the ones I liked most from the choice that there was on offer. I do have some other dahlia tubers that are orange, that I dug up and dried over the winter. I have divided the mass of tubers into three clumps and  I hope to eventually plant these alongside the new pink ones for some nice cut flowers later in the year.

Finally, the amaryllis that I bought from Tesco before Christmas is finally just beginning to flower. It sprouted just one flower head, but no leaves to speak of, which was a bit disappointing. It's not grown very upright either, but that's possibly my fault. Let's hope that the dark pink flower on it's own makes up for the distinct lack of foliage.

Not much else to report this week, but I hope that you guys are all having a good week and staying safe. At least with all the vaccination news, it seems like there might be light at the end of this dark tunnel. Talking of which, I went on the online vaccination calculator the other day. It says I can expect to get vaccinated in May. Bit of a wait yet, but who knows it might come sooner.

Take care.