Saturday, 10th May 2014

Blah, blah and one more blah! That is all I can say at this point in time. I am typing this on Friday afternoon, the 9th May (after another wonderful bank holiday yesterday – VE day) while sitting in bed feeling like crap. Not sure what is wrong – is it a bug, is it too much eating of fodmap foods – who knows all I know is that I just don’t feel well – and yes I’m drinking peppermint tea.

Apart from me not feeling well, we have had a lovely week and a productive one. The veggie patch now has six tomato plants (they were cheap), an aubergine plant and a yellow courgette (zucchini) plant. 5 of my corn plants are now on their way (I still have hopes for the 6th one) and I have lots of lettuce and all four cucamelons have developed into seedlings. So that is good. We also have Greek basil, chives, parsley and citrus thyme (along with the mint which has been removed from the garden) all in pots. It is really nice to be starting the veggie self-sufficiency plan. It may take a few more years but we have at least started.

Pat has also ordered our chest freezer (due Saturday) so that we can freeze our various produce and buy meat in bulk and take advantage of some of the specials that occur. Pat has also fitted a sink in the toilet downstairs (it’s a great idea, the water from the sink passes into the cistern for flushing). We have also sorted the door for the downstairs toilet. I’m not sure if I have mentioned this before, but for those of you who don’t know, the downstairs loo had a lovely 1970’s style brown plastic concertinaed door. It was hideous. The top of the stairs in the house had a glass panelled door, so we decided to move the glass panelled door to become the toilet door. Now before you all start thinking that we have some level of weird fetishes with having a glass door on the toilet, the plan was always to turn the door into a photo gallery. This was achieved this week – the temporary curtain was removed from the door and the photos put in. These will be changing over time, but we like the effect (see photo). The door itself will eventually be painted white.

This week I have also been busy, I’ve had my sewing machine out repairing various bits and pieces and also attacking a couple of t-shirts that I wanted to modify – I also attempted my first button broach, it is ok, but not great. But my main job this week was getting the new (well 2nd hand) kitchen cabinet ready for hanging in the kitchen. I’ve been sanding and painting all week, but I’m really pleased with the way everything is turning out. I’ve painted the melamine (not for the faint hearted even with special melamine paint) and it looks ok, just need the final coat to dry and then it can be put up on the wall. The cupboard doors also look really good, gone is the 1980’s wood stain and they have been painted white (grey trim) and I’ve also started on painting the front of the drawers on other cabinets. Thankfully the doors and drawers are all wood, so much easier to paint. We will hopefully have the cupboard up on the wall this weekend, which means a few more bits and pieces can be put away.

We also unfortunately have not yet got to meet our French teacher; our meeting has been delayed to this coming Monday. However we are both working hard with our French and we are feeling like we are slowly improving.

We’ve had typical spring weather this week, one day it’s glorious, the next it is not. Despite this Wallace still appears to be in heaven. Along, it seems with part of the local mouse population. So far this week we have had 4 mice (thankfully dead) deposited near the back door. Wallace was even practicing his French as one of the mice had been decapitated! Monsieur Guillotine would have been proud. Thankfully so far he has avoided the birds and since we have a pair of blue tits nesting very close to the house I am thankful for this; let’s hope it stays this way.

So that is our week. It’s now Saturday, I’m still not feeling great, but I’ve been able to have a slice of toast with scrambled eggs which was nice (oh and of course a cup of coffee).

A bientôt.

Our new photo frame