I’m 27.
Had a birthday 4 days ago.
It’s not the best picture by any means, but this is the ‘cake’ that I made to share with my work colleagues.
Two chunks of watermelon, separated by slices of honey dew.
Strawberry halves decorating the bottom-half … grapes forming a ring around the base of the top-half.
Slices of kiwi underneath of banana ‘candles’.
We had a heatwave this past weekend!! It got up to 28°C!!
Suffice it to say that the clothes on the line dried beautifully, and that any niggly little fruit stains that remained on Eliza’s clothes after I’d scrubbed them were sun-bleached!
We also aired out the house, though I question if it was so wise exposing what have been rather cool internal temperatures to sudden intense warmth!! Oh well.
We’ve had probably 3 weeks of rainy spring weather. Rainy but very cool. Yesterday was a sudden shock on just how quickly Spring can end, and Summer can arrive!!
I’m not looking forward much to the sweltering summer temperatures.
We started the first bunch of seeds (squash/melons, nightshades, salads and peas) back on Wednesday 6th, and I am told this morning that some of them are already sprouting.
The corn, broccoli, and cauliflower were started yesterday.
We’re hoping that some of the beds will be able to be filled next week, which will allow for me to get the root vegetables started.
If I can’t get them planted in this month’s waning moon, they’ll have to wait until next. Well, I guess they don’t really have to wait, but I am trying to plant ‘by the moon’, so I’m trying to stick to the rules.
I still need to work out what companion planting paring I’m going to use … sigh.
So much to do. It’s very overwhelming.
I was thrilled to be able to hang laundry to dry outside on Saturday.
It was a cooler day … and some of the clothes still weren’t 100% dry by the time I brought them in around 8pm … but it felt brilliant to br able to not use the drier!!
I made homemade laundry detergent on Friday using my homemade bar soap as the base.
It was runnier than I expected, but that’s probably because I didn’t use as much bar soap as I should have.
I found a recipe for a more concentrated detergent that I think I’ll used next time. I like how it calls for soap in cups, rather than bars.
1 quart Water (boiling)
2 cups Bar soap (grated)
2 cups Borax
2 cups Washing Soda
■Add finely grated bar soap to the boiling water and stir until soap is melted. You can keep on low heat until soap is melted.
■Pour the soap water into a large, clean pail and add the Borax and Washing Soda. Stir well until all is dissolved.
■Add 2 gallons of water, stir until well mixed.
■Cover pail and use 1/4 cup for each load of laundry. Stir the soap each time you use it (will gel).
People have asked me a lot recently about any plans to move back to the UK, but we’re sill working on ‘making it’ over here.
I miss the UK. I really do.
But I have to also accept the fact that I’m looking back with rose-tinted glasses.
Do I miss commuting to London? NO!
Do I miss the people traffic in London? NO!
Do I miss the weather? NO! (Well, actually, in an odd way, I do. Summers and winters both are so bloomin’ long here!! In contrast, spring and autumn are unbearably short. We still have snow on the ground at the moment! Spring doesn’t officially arrive until mid-May. So in that sense, I really do miss the fresh rains of spring/autumn.
Maybe one day, we’ll end up with a farm in Northumberland.
It’s been a strange path for us.
We moved to the US not knowing exactly what we wanted – only that we didn’t want to live where we did, nor work in London.
I had recently been doing family history research, which brought to our attention how vast amounts of wealth in Frank’s family’s past had just been thrown to the wind, so to speak. We wanted to change that and bring financial wealth back – and neither of us were under any illusion that it’d be really really tough to accomplish that in the UK.
So here we are now.
This is why I’ve been planning the garden as I have – everythnig is a very calculated step towards self-sufficiency/reliance.
We’ll see where it takes us.
Another check on the wishlist.
I’ve always loved ballroom dancing.
No. It wasn’t brought about by the film ‘Dirty Dancing’. I’ve just always loved the grace and elegance. Then again, this probably all stems back to my love for the ‘old days’ (pre-1900 etc).
Today, a former teacher of mine approached me about befriending someone my age who lives here in the US.
And, would you know it, she’s a ballroom dancer!!
So cool.
My parents flew in on Wednesday 9th.
I took Eliza to collect them at the airport, and we had dinner at the Olive Garden near Pittsburgh airport before heading back home.
Next morning, Frank and I headed out to pick up a rental car, and immediately thereafter, we hit the road for West Virginia.
My grandmother (father’s mother) turned 90 on Thursday, and my uncles/aunt put on an absolutely terrific birthday party for her.
Another something that I’ve been interested along the above lines is taking a course/courses in nutrition.
I woke up at 2.30am feeling like I needed to throw up. Sadly, I didn’t actually manage to throw up until a few hours later.
My stomach was upset beyond words.
Yes – I’m shockingly late posting these photos … but here they are.
Hmmm … maybe I should rephrase …
We were told that we get the 31st December paid off work, so that’s meant that I’m able to take an extra day off work, as I had originally booked the 31st as a personal vacation day.
So this is actually long weekend 2 of 4!!
Anyway … this weekend didn’t quite go as planned. But then, they never do, do they?
Let’s skip back to last weekend.
There was SOOOO much to do, but Eliza was teething quite heavily, so my ability to do anything was pretty much nil.
I didn’t even get the laundry done.
Fortunately, we have an over abundance of clothing, so it didn’t really create a big issue … but it did mean that I had to do double loads this weekend. Continue reading “Long weekend 2 of 3”
