Weekly Diary - W/E 3rd July - Part One - Including a Re-organisation of the Sewing Room.

This week has been quite a productive one, so for a change I've divided my Weekly Diary into two parts.

On Sunday, I picked as much ripe fruit as we had in the garden (gooseberries and blackcurrants), and made a pot and a half of jam. It always feels very satisfying to grow and make your own food. Later the same day, I accompanied OH to the allotment, to weed the paths around our plot, as inspection day was looming at the beginning of the week. Another satisfying job done. (The inspection went well and the Allotment Society were very happy with the state of the site in general, which was good).

On Monday, I felt inspired to reorganise the furniture in the sewing room. I decided that I would utilise the desk that LB no longer wanted as a sewing station. As soon as I got up, I got to work and moved everything out of the corner, so that I could get the desk in. OH helped by putting the legs on it and I was very happy with the results. I now have a view out to the garden when I'm sewing in this room. 

I forgot to take a before picture, but the room or rather the corner in which I sew, now looks like this:

I really like this configuration. I have a different chair too, it's one that we've had for probably 15 years or so and which also used to be in LB's bedroom. Rather than throw it out, I made loose fabric covers for the seat and back and I will use it as a sewing chair. In the course of the re-organisation, I made a matching mat for the desk top, to sit my machine on. 

Arranging the room in this way, has made it much easier to reach everything, i.e. my sewing books, tools, etc. and has made good use of the desk, which was previously just cluttering up the landing. Although the room is still more cluttered than I would like, it is an improvement and might just inspire me to do more machine sewing. I will be getting rid of the old desk, which used to just fit in the alcove under the shelves and I will be putting it out on the street along with a few other bits and pieces, for someone to take if they so wish. If there are no takers, I will take it to the tip.

Whilst carrying out the re-organisation, I also went through a pile of items that I'd put aside in this room, ready for the next Give and Take (not sure when it's going to be, if ever). I managed to condense it down a bit, taking a few bits out to donate to the clothing bank and the Little Free Library. (I dropped these things off later in the day) It's still taking up precious space in the room, but there's not much I can do about it. 

After finishing up in the sewing room, I spent the rest of the day running a few errands locally. I needed to take something back to Primark and exchange it for some new bras, which I desperately needed. I also needed to drop into the Building society and update my pass book, which hasn't been done in a couple of years. That was a nice surprise, to see the increase in my balance. (I get share dividends paid directly into this account). I also did a small top up food shop whilst I was out to get us through to pay day. 

When I got back, I washed and hung out a load of laundry, completed my monthly finances, cooked up some offal for the dog and then headed out with her for a walk. It felt like a super productive day. Hence, I went back to work the following day feeling that for once I'd achieved something on my day off.

On Tuesday, I was back at work. A lot of donations had come in the day before, so I spent all day processing the Gift Aided donations, which takes quite a bit longer than non-Gift Aid ones, as you have to apply a bar code to every saleable item. On a normal day, I get these donations bar coded and then I have time to price some other items to put in the shop, but not so today due to the high volume. I'm not complaining here, as we are always very grateful for any donations.

On Tuesday, LB was also working at her job in a pub restaurant in Central London. It was super busy due to the England vs Germany match as many fans were watching it in the pub. As a consequence, she was late leaving and then got verbally sexually harrassed by an older man (I use the latter term loosely) on the bus home. I was very upset to hear this, as she's only 18 and should not be made to feel fearful of catching public transport in and around the capital.

Wednesday this week was payday, and my day for doing the first big grocery shop of the month. There were a lot of things on my shopping list, so I needed to spend quite a bit this week, but it will mean that next week's grocery shop should be a lot smaller and more of a top up shop. I bought most of the items from Lidl and qualified for a £10 off voucher, as I had shopped there a few times during June. I now must make sure to use the voucher, before it expires in 7 days time, so I'll need to top up shop there early next week.

Whilst shopping in Tesco, I had £9.50 in Club Card vouchers to use, so I used them to buy a couple of under bed storage boxes to house my collection of vintage bed linens. I'd bought a couple during the last Lockdown, but still needed two more, so now I've finally got around to getting them. They are easier to use than the quite flimsy under bed storage bags I bought on eBay last year, which seem to rip easily.

When I got home, I unpacked the shopping and then did a bit of online shopping, as I needed to order some more of the skincare that I bought a while back. Luckily it was on offer at 20% off, so I bought two of each item, to keep me going over the next few months and added a different moisturiser from the same brand to try as I'm not 100% sold on the original one I bought. I topped up the order with a few other things that I use regularly, in order to get free postage, as the postage cost over £6 which was quite expensive. Everything will get used in due course and two items I bought as a gift for LB for Christmas. A bit of early Xmas shopping never goes amiss.

My final expenditure of the day, was on a smallish ASOS order, in which I bought a couple of pairs of canvas slip on plimsolls to wear to work, a new watch and a vest top. Once again, I made sure to spend enough to get free postage. My current slip ons are getting very scruffy, so I'm going to relegate them to dog walking only and keep the new ones for work. I'll post some pictures of what I bought in these orders once all of the items arrive.

That was enough spending for one day. I shouldn't need to spend much money for the rest of the week now. I'll just need to put some money on my Oyster card for getting to and from work.

The remainder of this week, I'll cover in Part 2 of this post, as it would make this post way too long to continue here.