Well, it's up on line, not sure if it's on our TV screens yet as I haven't watched much TV this week. Christmas has finally arrived and there's no denying it from this point on. Yesterday, I was emailed a preview link to the new John Lewis Christmas advert and couldn't stop myself from taking a look. It's called the 'Man on the Moon', the song I believe is sung by Norwegian singer Aurora and is raising money for Age UK.
They always manage to extract a tear from my eye, whenever I watch them and this year's is no exception. Their Christmas ads seem to have become some sort of UK moral conscience pricker, which is no bad thing. I'd like it even more if it wasn't encouraging you to buy something.
(Although the title of this blog post sounds a little disgusting, it's not quite as bad as you might think, so please just bear with me.)
Inspired by Sophia's channel My Great Challenge on YouTube, I decided to have a go at tackling some of the gunk that has accummulated around our bath over the past months. Limescale builds up quickly here due to the hardness of the water here in East London.
When I clean the bathroom, one of main areas that always frustrates me is the edge of the bath underneath the shower screen. Our shower screen hinges so that you can open it out and clean reverse, which as well as preventing you having to step into the bath to clean it properly, also allows easy access to the tap/shower hose area. It makes life a lot easier, but the down side of this arrangement is that sometimes limescale and gunk accumulates underneath the screen which then requires special attention.
Usually OH has a good go at it with a razor blade and slices it off, but lately he's been preoccupied with work and we didn't have any razor blades, so when I saw it building up again and after being inspired by Sophia's no nonsense approach to DIY tasks, I decided to have a go myself. Watch Part 1 of her current bathroom makeover here.
I do like watching Sophia's channel. She has done various makeovers in her home, tackling jobs that I would never dream of doing, all by herself. In addition she posts lots of beauty, cleaning, decluttering and organising videos which also inspire me. I like the way she gets stuck into tasks that I would probably leave to OH.
Anyway, duly inspired I made a point of buying some razor blades from ASDA and headed up to the bathroom. Here's what the bath edge looked like before I started work on it.
It's very embarrassing that I let the limescale build up so badly on the outside of the shower screen/bath edge. I'm really quite ashamed. Anyway, after a couple of hours of scraping away with a razor blade, it was a completely different story. I had to be a little careful that I didn't slice my fingers, but to be honest the blade soon blunted so the edge wasn't so sharp.
Although it still doesn't look completely like new, it is looking much better than it has for quite a while. I did have to remove the disgustingly dirty rubber edge from the shower screen. (It's currently lying in soak in the bath to see if some of the dirt which has found it's way into the middle of the rubber strip will clean up - if not I may have to try to source a new piece or put the old one back on).
Here's what it looked like an hour or so later.
So much better.
Whilst I was at work with the razor blade I decided to use it to resolve a couple of other simple issues that had been annoying me. One was the scale that had built up around the bath plug hole.
Within seconds it had gone.
Finally, I also used it to remove this little bit of silicone stuck to the side of the downstairs toilet rim.
It had always annoyed me, ever since we moved into the house 8 years ago, because even when I cleaned the toilet, it never looked properly clean with this attached to it. Why neither of us had bothered to do this before now, I just don't know. Anyhow, now it's been banished for good.
Result.
Thank you Sophia for the motivation to get off my backside and do a proper job of it.
OCD cleaners watch out, I'm coming for your jobs. (As if!)
This week, I'm spending the week catching up with myself and getting back on top of things. Half term holidays, although lovely, as they offer respite from normal routines, do tend to result in things slipping backwards and the ironing and washing in particular, getting a bit out of hand. More so when we go away for a few days, as we did this half term.
Thus far, I haven't made much impact. I have caught up on food shopping, banking, sending out orders, a thorough clearing out of the in tray on my 'desk' at the kitchen table and I've made a start on the ironing. Today, I'm going to continue to slowly demolish the ironing pile and get everything put away, before emptying the bins and starting on a bit of a sweep up and general tidy round. What an exciting life I lead.
I have to admit that I am guilty of being slightly distracted by online Christmas present and holiday cottage searches, as well as catching up with reading blogs and watching YouTube videos. The cottage, however, is now booked and quite a few Christmas presents bought and the remaining YouTube videos will be watched as I iron. I just love multi-tasking. ;)
I still need to try to squeeze in an allotment visit, but the weather isn't really co-operating as it's way to wet to start digging up the ground. I'm sure I'll get there eventually.
Looking forward to getting to grips with it all. I'll report back when I'm feeling less overwhelmed.
I've got to admit that this year I'm back to looking forward to Christmas. Last Christmas was a strange one. I was called to Jury Service two weeks before and in all honesty, it cast a long shadow over the lead up to Christmas, as I was preoccupied about how it would go.
As it turned out, I only attended for 4 days instead of the required two weeks, as very few cases went ahead and I never actually got sworn in. It was, however, an interesting 4 days, in which I did a lot of reading and got an insight into how the crown court and jury service system works.
I have to admit that I was secretly very pleased not to have to sit on a jury and make a judgement in the week before Christmas. I realise it's a civic duty and all, but it wasn't one I was looking forward to, mainly because of it's timing. It was a great relief when we were discharged from jury duty and allowed to get back to our normal lives.
This Christmas will be very different, thankfully and I'm already starting to allow myself to get a little excited about it. For the first time, we're hopefully renting a cottage in Yorkshire, not too far away from family, so that we can easily visit everyone, but still retain some space of our own. We've wanted to do it for a long time, but always felt obliged to stay with relatives, so it will be quite nice to have a Christmas which is a little more on our terms, whereby people can come to visit us instead of us traipsing around to fit everyone in. (I realise there's no guarantee that they will!)
We're currently in the process of finding somewhere suitable, and it's no mean feat, as most of the best places have been let already. The fact that we'll have the dog with us makes it a little harder, as not all places accept them. Hopefully by the end of today we'll have secured somewhere. It will be interesting to create Christmas somewhere other than our own home.
In other areas, all of a sudden things seem to be getting a bit busy. I've got various appointments to attend in the next couple of weeks, an evening Christmas Event at John Lewis, free tickets to go to the Ideal Home Show at Christmas, and OH has treated us all to tickets for Hairspray the Musical on tour. (We're taking LB, as it will hopefully help her to get into her role of Tracey Turnblad for the school production)
In addition, next weekend we're heading to Dunkirk in France for the day, to do a French Supermarket shop. OH has worked out that he saves the ferry costs buying his coffee alone and as he ran out last week, it's become a matter of urgency.
In the meantime, I'm looking forward to continuing with the Christmas shopping. I quite enjoy buying gifts for others and I am hoping to get most of it done and dusted this month, so I won't have to venture out when it gets super busy in the lead up to Christmas. I don't mind going out and about and soaking up the atmosphere, but having to do the shopping amongst hoards of people, is just too much.
Monday morning and it was back to normal for us after our few days away. After cobbling together meals over the weekend, I finally got around to doing some food shopping, as although our cupboards weren't exactly bare, we didn't have all the things we needed for our usual lunches and for the meals on this month's menu plan. I could have changed things around a little, but as most of the food was in freezer, I didn't have the foresight to get anything out and defrost it. Never mind, we survived regardless.
I hotfooted it back to Waitrose to do the shopping again this week, despite the disastrous pick up a couple of weeks before, as I had another £16 off a £75 shop voucher to use. This time, however, rather than order online and collect, I went and did my shopping in person. It took a while, as I'm not that familiar with the layout of Waitrose stores, but I made sure I had a good look around, as they have quite a good selection of organic food.
Quite a few extras did find their way into the trolley, as they often do when I go to a new to me store, mainly because they had some good offers on, but most of these were things I needed in the very near future and some were alternatives that I've not seen anywhere else, so they weren't exactly non-essentials.
Although it's no longer Stoptober, I'm trying to keep to the same mindset of only buying essentials, rather than splashing out just because I now can and am no longer doing a challenge. I no longer want to be as spendy as I used to be a few months ago. Fortunately, any leftover money this month will be spent on buying Christmas presents, so once again, I won't be getting back into a habit of regularly treating myself if I've got spare cash. I will be treating others instead. I think if I can hold off spending on me until the New Year, I might allow myself a little splurge in the January sales if there is anything I see that I like or need.
(Apologies for this photo being upside down, my camera/picture folder is being a bit tempramental)
On a thriftier note, I picked up some bargain seeds in my shop, namely these 5 packets of Organic Little Gem lettuce seeds at 19p per pack. They need to be sown by 2017, so well within date and useful to put in the allotment next spring. How could I resist for that price. I bought the lot.
I made sure to claim my free newspaper, so OH was pleased to get an unexpected treat of his favourite daily.
I also picked up this recipe card for Apple and Blackberry Crumble Muffins. The ingredients seem very simple and I have almost all of them in my store cupboard and freezer. I also have lots of bags of crumble mix I got from Approved Foods and can use up for the topping. I may, however, be a bit more indulgent and drizzle them with chocolate instead of fondant icing.
And finally, I found another interesting use for crumble mix in the free Waitrose Food magazine, namely Mince Pies with spiced orange crumble topping. I may try this recipe too. I'll let you know how I get on, if and when I get around to making either of these recipes..
I'll be shopping there again next week all being well, in order to use the final voucher I was sent. I have to use it by Sunday, so I may do my weekly shopping a day early to take advantage. I'm afraid I am a terribly fickle shopper and go where any vouchers I might have can be used. Does anyone else do the same?
Well, last month after finally donating the huge pile of items that I'd gathered over the previous few months, October meant a clean slate to re-start the process of further decluttering. I wasn't sure that I'd find much more to declutter, but as I continue with the process, I am literally finding more and more things that I no longer feel I want to keep. This is very good news.
In October, I managed to find a total of 86 items to donate. Mostly clothing, scarves and belts, but a few books, audio visual and other items were also found. I had a good sort through my scarf drawer. I used to wear vintage neck scarves a lot and began collecting them, but lately it is rare that they see the light of day, so those that I no longer felt attached to for whatever reason, I decided to donate.
The audio visual cupboard also got culled this month and any dvds, cds and videos not watched or listened to, also got put in the donation box. When added to last month's running total of 1085 items donated so far this year, my current total now stands at 1171 and it feels great to still be making progress on this front.
Next month, I'm intending to go through my handbags and purses and donate a few that sit unused in the top of the wardrobe. I may also take another look at the clothes and see what else can go. I'm also finally going to take all my old cassette tapes to the tip, as I don't have a player to play them on and never get them out. Although these won't count as they aren't strictly being donated, the time seems right to me now to let go and I tend to go with my instincts and feelings when it comes to decluttering, to avoid regrets.
If there is another give and take event next month we also have a couple of bicycles that can be donated, which will clear some space in the garden and I may also take another look at my costume jewellery, which I rarely wear, and see if there are more items that I'm happy to part with. I'll report back on progress next month
Well, Stoptober started well enough, but towards the end of the month it got a bit spendy. Mainly on account of the wedding we were due to attend. I had a last minute panic about my hair and bought a curling wand (which I did use) to make an extra special effort with it and a last minute panic about my outfit and bought a top to go underneath my dress (which was sleeveless). The top only cost £15, but still.
In addition to the panic over my outfit, I had a last minute panic about LB's shoes. Her school shoes had to go into the cobblers at the last minute to be re-heeled (costing another £15 and very disappointing as she's only worn them for 2 months) and as I didn't want her to wear a pair of black jelly sandals, I had to buy her some boots. I limited the damage to £18 plus £3 for some tights, which she needed for school anyway. So things got a bit more expensive than I anticipated.
Having said that, it was worth every penny to feel happy about how we all turned out for the wedding and at least I didn't buy an expensive dress that will likely not get worn again. The one I did buy earlier in the year, can easily be worn again and again throughout the year, when I want to dress up a little and the high for me sandals that I wore, and had also bought earlier in the year, turned out to be so comfortable that I danced the night away in them. Definite result.
I did also do another small bit of Christmas shopping on my credit card late in the month and bought some more toiletries and pet care items that I was running out of. All in all, I did better than recent months, but nowhere near succeeded in stopping inessential spending. (Big Fail)
I did, however, come within my set food budget of £400 for the month. The first time I've set a budget for specific spending. It was a totally different matter when it came to the household/toiletry/petcare budget. This was set a £50 for the month, but I managed to exceed it by 150%. (Major Fail again) Some of it, I do have to admit, wasn't compeletely essential, but will get used during November and beyond.
Talking of November, I've decided to continue setting budgets for spending on food and household, etc. and keep them at the same levels for the time being. I find it interesting to try to keep within them and it helps motivate me to be a bit more careful.(Some of the time!) Hopefully, next month I will come well under for both budgets. I'll keep you posted.
