. . . that those who write these spammy messages that pop up with boringly monotonous regularity could at least make their spams interesting, coherent, grammatically accurate and/or with correct spellings.
It would be even better if they just stopped < grins >.
Friday, 31 May 2013
Friday
The half term is nearly over. Last weekday coming up. It's been good but it will be lovely to get back to my class again. I am very aware that I will only have them for another (counting the days) seven weeks. Thirty five school days, that's all! And then they will be someone else's, not mine any more. Very sad.
Yesterday afternoon Beth and Alex came over and we set to with menu plans and shopping lists. It's going to be a challenge, right enough, and it's very tight at the moment, but maybe we can reduce costs a little bit as we shop around. I have to say that, once again, My Supermarket is proving so helpful. I just wish they did Morrison's, Aldi's and Lidl's prices too.
I am very thankful that both Beth and I are used to cooking from scratch. Breakfast porridge, veggie burgers and bolognaise (of a sort) hold no terrors for us and nice thick warming split pea soup is a doddle. I quite like the look of my draft menu for the five days too. Plenty of flavour and variety there! That's the advantage of doing Live Below The Line in a team. You can pool resources and make more of your money. One bag of porridge oats does three as easily as one for five days and costs the same. Broccoli will taste better for being fresh picked from Beth's garden as well as being incredibly better value. We're charging a nominal sum for garden produce but, in reality, the broccoli has already paid for itself and more so, really, we should be putting money back into the pot (yeah, sure!!!!!). Even so, I know that there will be things left over after the five days. Oats and tea bags for sure.
This morning I am going first to Aldi and then to Lidl, to compare prices. I need to get just a few things for next week too, so I will get them while I am there. And then home to write reports and generally tidy up before a friend comes round for coffee this afternoon. And I need to think about the Cheaper than Chips eating for the coming week - that will not stop and is going to continue before and after LBTL. I'm rather enjoying it and can see so many benefits. In fact, I can feel a ponder coming on so I'm off to Teacher's Recipes to ponder in the right place.
It's all go!
Yesterday afternoon Beth and Alex came over and we set to with menu plans and shopping lists. It's going to be a challenge, right enough, and it's very tight at the moment, but maybe we can reduce costs a little bit as we shop around. I have to say that, once again, My Supermarket is proving so helpful. I just wish they did Morrison's, Aldi's and Lidl's prices too.
I am very thankful that both Beth and I are used to cooking from scratch. Breakfast porridge, veggie burgers and bolognaise (of a sort) hold no terrors for us and nice thick warming split pea soup is a doddle. I quite like the look of my draft menu for the five days too. Plenty of flavour and variety there! That's the advantage of doing Live Below The Line in a team. You can pool resources and make more of your money. One bag of porridge oats does three as easily as one for five days and costs the same. Broccoli will taste better for being fresh picked from Beth's garden as well as being incredibly better value. We're charging a nominal sum for garden produce but, in reality, the broccoli has already paid for itself and more so, really, we should be putting money back into the pot (yeah, sure!!!!!). Even so, I know that there will be things left over after the five days. Oats and tea bags for sure.
This morning I am going first to Aldi and then to Lidl, to compare prices. I need to get just a few things for next week too, so I will get them while I am there. And then home to write reports and generally tidy up before a friend comes round for coffee this afternoon. And I need to think about the Cheaper than Chips eating for the coming week - that will not stop and is going to continue before and after LBTL. I'm rather enjoying it and can see so many benefits. In fact, I can feel a ponder coming on so I'm off to Teacher's Recipes to ponder in the right place.
It's all go!
Thursday, 30 May 2013
The Hunger Project
Copied direct from our giving page: https://www.livebelowtheline.com/team/beth-and-joy?lang=en
The Hunger Project empowers families and communities not only to feed their own children but to build sustainable futures for them. We work in Africa, Asia and Latin America, reaching twenty million people in the most rural places imaginable. We have trained 380,000 volunteer leaders in 8,700 villages who now have the confidence, methods and skills to train millions more for their own journey to a sustainable life living above the poverty line. Live Below the Line for The Hunger Project and you will be celebrating their achievements so far and giving many more families the opportunity to begin a life free from hunger and poverty.
We do things differently; wherever we work the aim is to create and leave new skills in the community so that knowledge can be transferred quickly to the next village. It makes your investment go further as one gift reaches many more people over time.
Your investment will go to women, men and children in the most rural grassroots communities – only those living on less than £1 a day. We don’t hand out food but work with people to create their own resources and meet their own needs - new skills, land, equipment and small loans to start businesses. - See more at: https://www.livebelowtheline.com/uk-hunger-project-about#sthash.xHXW3sFa.dpuf
Your investment will go to women, men and children in the most rural grassroots communities – only those living on less than £1 a day. We don’t hand out food but work with people to create their own resources and meet their own needs - new skills, land, equipment and small loans to start businesses. - See more at: https://www.livebelowtheline.com/uk-hunger-project-about#sthash.xHXW3sFa.dpuf
There's quite a lot more, well worth taking a look, I think.
Thursday: and a big challenge
Good morning! As I always start with the weather I will just note that it is wet and miserable and the heating has come on - so no change there! On Saturday it will be June. Flaming June. Maybe there will be a magical turn about and the sun will suddenly realise his responsibilities and get shining! You never know!
Yesterday was the day I felt well again. Yay! The cramps and sicky feelings have gone and things all seem back to normal. So today I am due at a friends for coffee and I can go without any worries. Excellent!
I got a phone call from Beth yesterday. Would I do five days of Living Below The Line with her. Eeeeeek! For those who don't know, it is a project whereby people spend just one pound a day on food - all food and drink - that they consume. It's a bit more complicated than that because you also have to cost in whole bags of stuff that you buy, whether you use all of it or not and no day's eating must come to more than one pound. You can buy for the week - that's five pounds for a weekly shop - and you can use seasonings and herbs that you already have if you cost in what you've used (bit of guesswork there, I am sure). You can also use garden produce as long as you cost in whatever they cost in the growing thereof (which is, in our case, not a lot).
So, after a few eeeks and oooh and a private whinge or two (because I had already decided I wouldn't get involved in this) I agreed to team up with her. One reason for not wanting to was that I really didn't want to do it on my own. Doing it with someone else makes it all a whole lot easier for various reasons.
Anyway, enough of that. I'm, sure I will have bored the socks off you before it's all over, both in here and over on Teacher's Recipes where I will be updating daily and where I will have my very first guest blogger! All together now . . . Oooooohhhhhhhh! :-)
The main point of it all is to get sponsors, of course, and Beth and I are asking people to consider sponsoring us for this. We are supporting The Hunger Project and I will copy their blurb into a separate message. If you would be so kind as to support us, the information and wherewithal to donate is over on our bit of the LBTL web site. Just follow the link, which is also on my Facebook page, for those who have access to it.
https://www.livebelowtheline.com/team/beth-and-joy?lang=en
(see - nice and big so you can't miss it!!!)
Thank you so much.
Yesterday was the day I felt well again. Yay! The cramps and sicky feelings have gone and things all seem back to normal. So today I am due at a friends for coffee and I can go without any worries. Excellent!
I got a phone call from Beth yesterday. Would I do five days of Living Below The Line with her. Eeeeeek! For those who don't know, it is a project whereby people spend just one pound a day on food - all food and drink - that they consume. It's a bit more complicated than that because you also have to cost in whole bags of stuff that you buy, whether you use all of it or not and no day's eating must come to more than one pound. You can buy for the week - that's five pounds for a weekly shop - and you can use seasonings and herbs that you already have if you cost in what you've used (bit of guesswork there, I am sure). You can also use garden produce as long as you cost in whatever they cost in the growing thereof (which is, in our case, not a lot).
So, after a few eeeks and oooh and a private whinge or two (because I had already decided I wouldn't get involved in this) I agreed to team up with her. One reason for not wanting to was that I really didn't want to do it on my own. Doing it with someone else makes it all a whole lot easier for various reasons.
Anyway, enough of that. I'm, sure I will have bored the socks off you before it's all over, both in here and over on Teacher's Recipes where I will be updating daily and where I will have my very first guest blogger! All together now . . . Oooooohhhhhhhh! :-)
The main point of it all is to get sponsors, of course, and Beth and I are asking people to consider sponsoring us for this. We are supporting The Hunger Project and I will copy their blurb into a separate message. If you would be so kind as to support us, the information and wherewithal to donate is over on our bit of the LBTL web site. Just follow the link, which is also on my Facebook page, for those who have access to it.
https://www.livebelowtheline.com/team/beth-and-joy?lang=en
(see - nice and big so you can't miss it!!!)
Thank you so much.
Wednesday, 29 May 2013
One to read.
I don't pass on many other blog things really except for foody things. Perhaps I should do more. This one has impacted on me to a surprising degree.
I've known people who have been hurt deeply by ATOS - and I've not talking about 'poor little me' hurt, I'm talking about huge, deep, very damaging, totally unnecessary and completely avoidable hurt. I have three friends who I consider good friends, vulnerable people who have been ATOS damaged.
Please, please follow this link, read the article and, if it resonates, pass it on in whatever way is available to you. It might not make any different - but it might. You just never know.
http://agirlcalledjack.com/2013/05/28/dear-atos-my-3-year-old-can-push-a-button-should-i-be-sending-him-to-work/#comments
I've known people who have been hurt deeply by ATOS - and I've not talking about 'poor little me' hurt, I'm talking about huge, deep, very damaging, totally unnecessary and completely avoidable hurt. I have three friends who I consider good friends, vulnerable people who have been ATOS damaged.
Please, please follow this link, read the article and, if it resonates, pass it on in whatever way is available to you. It might not make any different - but it might. You just never know.
http://agirlcalledjack.com/2013/05/28/dear-atos-my-3-year-old-can-push-a-button-should-i-be-sending-him-to-work/#comments
Wednesday
I can't believe it is Wednesday already. Eeeeek! Must get going with a few bits and pieces or I will have achieved not-a-lot by the end of the week and that would never do.
I've been given back a few days. Hyde Hall didn't happen, of course, and has now been rescheduled for a few weeks time. I was going to see a friend on Friday but, sadly, she is unwell so I won't be going now. And so far I haven't wanted to stray too far from a loo so that's restricted my movements too. After munching on some anti-whotsit tablets yesterday evening things seem to have now settled (fingers crossed) so you never know, perhaps I can go out soon!
Wasn't yesterday disgusting? Well, it was here. Back to cold again, heating clicked on, rain all day until the sun came out early evening and brightened everything up again. After the sunny weekend it was like a slap in the face but at the moment it looks hopeful so fingers crossed for a nicer day.
I had intended to do a bit of garden pottering but it was too wet for that so I did a bit indoors instead. When I went shopping on Sunday I saw that Sainsbury's had some 'living lettuce' - you know, the kind that are still planted. The idea is that you pull off leaves as you want them and the lettuce just keeps on growing - nice and frugal. Last year (or maybe the year before) I replanted some very sad living lettuces that I got in a sale and they went on to give me salad leaves for weeks and weeks. Given my Cheaper than Chips project (which is going great) and the cost of lettuce generally, I thought I would try that again so yesterday I replanted the lettuces (there were three different types to each very tiny pot) into separate pots and they are now sitting on my kitchen window ledge, looking wonderfully healthy at the moment. Fingers crossed!
Each pot of three cost £1.00 so if they do me for a fortnight, that is great value, considering how much lettuce I eat at this time of year. A month would be brilliant. We will see. They are worth tending . . .
After making some sausage meat and butter bean burgers yesterday which were quite nice, I've posted the recipe over on t'other blog which seemed to attract rather more visitors than usual yesterday. No idea why but if anyone strolls over in this direction, hello and welcome! Comments (not spammy ones, obviously) would be very welcome!
I've been given back a few days. Hyde Hall didn't happen, of course, and has now been rescheduled for a few weeks time. I was going to see a friend on Friday but, sadly, she is unwell so I won't be going now. And so far I haven't wanted to stray too far from a loo so that's restricted my movements too. After munching on some anti-whotsit tablets yesterday evening things seem to have now settled (fingers crossed) so you never know, perhaps I can go out soon!
Wasn't yesterday disgusting? Well, it was here. Back to cold again, heating clicked on, rain all day until the sun came out early evening and brightened everything up again. After the sunny weekend it was like a slap in the face but at the moment it looks hopeful so fingers crossed for a nicer day.
I had intended to do a bit of garden pottering but it was too wet for that so I did a bit indoors instead. When I went shopping on Sunday I saw that Sainsbury's had some 'living lettuce' - you know, the kind that are still planted. The idea is that you pull off leaves as you want them and the lettuce just keeps on growing - nice and frugal. Last year (or maybe the year before) I replanted some very sad living lettuces that I got in a sale and they went on to give me salad leaves for weeks and weeks. Given my Cheaper than Chips project (which is going great) and the cost of lettuce generally, I thought I would try that again so yesterday I replanted the lettuces (there were three different types to each very tiny pot) into separate pots and they are now sitting on my kitchen window ledge, looking wonderfully healthy at the moment. Fingers crossed!
Each pot of three cost £1.00 so if they do me for a fortnight, that is great value, considering how much lettuce I eat at this time of year. A month would be brilliant. We will see. They are worth tending . . .
 |
| It looks nice and productive, doesn't it? In the middle there's the thyme, some cut parsley in water and some cress and to the right of that are my rosemary cuttings which I do need to get into soil. The main problem is getting the blind down properly at night! |
Tuesday, 28 May 2013
Answer to question
A few days ago I asked what this was.
According to experts (aka Mum and Dad) it's a beech. Not a pot plant in the slightest but it's going to be one until it gets too big. I'm not going to turn down the opportunity to have another nice green thing in a pot in my garden. And when it outgrows the pot it can have a bigger pot or feed the brown bin, whichever seems most sensible at the time.
Free plants are good! Thank you, Mr Birdie (or whatever imported the seed).
According to experts (aka Mum and Dad) it's a beech. Not a pot plant in the slightest but it's going to be one until it gets too big. I'm not going to turn down the opportunity to have another nice green thing in a pot in my garden. And when it outgrows the pot it can have a bigger pot or feed the brown bin, whichever seems most sensible at the time.
Free plants are good! Thank you, Mr Birdie (or whatever imported the seed).
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