Food from the garden

When we need cheap dinners I often turn to rice. I bought a huge 10kg bag of it months ago and we are slowly working our way through it. This month as I am particularly tight for money we are eating a fair bit of rice.

To add some nutrition and flavour, I usually make a red lentil dahl to go with it. I chop up an onion, garlic from the garden and any veggies from the garden. I fry it all in a little oil, add some spices, red lentils, tomatoes if we have any and then add water or coconut milk if I am feeling fancy. It makes a cheap tasty dinner which will fill our stomachs and usually we have leftovers for the following day. 

Yesterday we went to a farm shop with my Mum who wanted to get some honey. The fruit and vegetables on offer were all local and they looked absolutely delicious. The price however was far too expensive for me to afford which is a shame because I would much rather support local and eat local food if possible. Right now that is just not possible with the price of everything increasing. 

Luckily our garden has done well so far this year. Our strawberries are slowing down now but we currently have an endless supply of lettuce, green beans, sugar snap peas, courgette, spring onions and a variety of herbs. Our cucumbers and tomatoes are nearly ready to harvest. 

I filled up the car yesterday too and it cost me £89 which is ridiculous. When is this all going to end? 

It's been a while

 It has been a while since I posted here but I am going to try to post regularly again. June has been my most expensive month in a long time. I ended June having overspent £78 which is unusual for me. I always have a buffer in my account for emergencies so it isn't a huge deal but I will need to make up the difference in July to 'repay' it back and keep my budget on track for the year. 

So how did this happen? 

I think partly due to the cost of everything creeping up. I paid out over £90 to fill up the car which is the most I have ever paid at one time. This coming weekend is also Arlo's birthday and she wants a party so I have had extra expense buying some food for that. We went away for a few nights camping too which was an extra unusual expense. We were invited to a child's birthday party so I had to buy a gift for that too. It all adds up and somehow I overspent. 

This month I will need to be extra careful and frugal and make sure that I don't buy anything other than necessities. I have had a slow month at work in June so my budget for July is particularly small which is going to make things very tight indeed. But we will get by. We always do. 

Surviving the storm

 I am pleased to say that we survived the storm yesterday. I was a bit worried when the wind was at it strongest at around 10am yesterday morning but I cannot really see any damage today. Phew!

We went straight out for a walk this morning and enjoyed some time on the beach. The wind and rain returned in the afternoon so we went home. I am glad that we got some fresh air as tomorrow is forecast to be very windy again. 

I do not mind most weather and generally am happy to get outside regardless but I find strong winds exhausting and miserable. I am definitely looking forward to spring now! As soon as the weather improves I need to spend some time outside preparing our garden for spring planting. 

Living in a big house

Yesterday was a work day and I had to take Arlo with me as my Mum is away on holiday. Sometimes people ask me how I manage to work and watch her. I guess the answer is pretty simple really....Arlo is used to coming basically everywhere with me so knows how to behave in different situations. She also enjoys looking around "the big houses". She knows to be careful and respectful of other people's possessions so I never really worry about her breaking anything. As a treat I usually download a tv program for her to watch on the tablet and take a few special snacks for her to eat. She normally follows me around the house chatting constantly and asking what everything is that she sees. 

We are very comfortable living in our small home. I can tidy up in 10 minutes and clean the whole place in half an hour. I would never want to live in a big house with many vast rooms. I clean lots of large houses at work and they are very difficult to keep on top of (hence people need to pay me to do it!). 

I also think that the more 'expensive stuff' you have the more stress it brings. I once cleaned for a lady who had a very pricy thick pile carpet in the living room. If you walked on it you would literally leave footprints! It was practically impossible to vacuum and looked a mess as soon as anyone went in the room. So they never did! I was the only person who went in once a fortnight or so to clean! 

After work we went shopping on the way home and I spent just under £35 on our weekly shop. I am really noticing that the price of everything has gone up. I find myself thinking twice before adding something to the trolley. Hopefully things will be easier in the summer when we can grow some of our own food again. 

We had an hour of daylight left after shopping so went for a walk in the woods. We walked 92 miles in January which was a lot more than I was expecting to be honest. I think Arlo probably did way more than that as she often runs all over the place on our walks. We are aiming for similar or more for February. 

A new year

We started the new year by taking part in a community beach clean this morning. We picked up lots of rubbish, mostly plastic food packaging and fishing line. I do not know why we are still making food packaging from so much plastic when we know the detrimental affects it had on our world.

We have been taking part in the beach cleans for three years now and today Arlo finally had the hand strength to use the litter pick! She was very pleased with herself. 

After the beach clean we met up with my sister and her family who are currently down from Lincoln and staying with my Mum for a few days. Arlo was keen to show her cousins the beach and found them both a piece of sea glass to take home. 

I wonder what 2022 will bring us. I don't really set resolutions for myself but will be working on continuing to improve my health and stamina. Arlo and I have decided to join  the international walking group run by Ilona. We have set our goal to walk 1000 miles in 2022. We walk quite a lot already but I have never kept track of how far so it will be interesting to find out. Today we walked 3.6 miles total so made a good start towards our goal! 

Christmas on a budget

Well that is Christmas done. Arlo is 4.5 years old now so has been very excited about everything this year. Luckily she has been somewhat shielded from a lot of the consumerism of the season by the fact that she doesn't attend school or see tv adverts. That said, she has lots of friends so she is aware that some families celebrate in a different way to us.

I have always tried to make Christmas more about presence than presents. We have spent lots of time together reading books from charity shops, baking cookies, singing carols and going on night-time walks to look at Christmas lights. We made a few homemade gifts for the people in our lives and donated a few items to our local foodbank. I don't see the point in buying loads of gifts when most of it will end up unwanted or unused. You only need to look into the average child's bedroom to see piles of plastic toys that are rarely or never played with! 

Arlo asked for 2 gifts this year - a bone for her toy dog and a surprise. I managed to win bidding on a second-hand playmobil set on eBay for her 'surprise' present and I made a bone for her dog out of some air dry clay. I also picked up a game of Uno junior in a charity shop and some chocolate and a set of watercolour paints for her stocking. It doesn't seem like much compared to what most children probably opened on Christmas morning but she was very happy and appreciated each and every gift. She spent several hours playing with her new playmobil yesterday. 

Arlo's present for me - a rainbow!

Christmas dinner was eaten at my Mum's house and it was delicious. After dinner we played a few games before heading home to watch a film together.

Solar problems

Breakfast by candlelight this morning. I had a friend working on our solar panel yesterday and as it was disconnected for several hours it didnt charge the battery fully. By this morning we were completely out of electricity. 

Luckily our cooker is gas so I was able to make us a breakfast of eggs on toast with our usual cup of tea. By about 7.30 I opened the curtains and it was light enough to function.

We had a busy day planned as I had lots of jobs that needed completing. Most important was to walk into town to get some fruit and veg from the market. It is about 2 miles each way so Arlo usually rides her bike and I walk/jog beside her. 

I managed to get a few bargains - some carrots for 12p, a bunch of bananas for 20p, a bag of potatoes for 30p, a broccoli for 40p and some apples thrown in for free. 

Once we got home our solar panels had done their work and we had electric again. I was very pleased as I did not want to loose the contents of my small freezer! We warmed up with a hot drink and I did some washing in the sink and hung it out to drip dry.