Simple foods part 2

 Another simple meal I love to make is lentil bolognese. I make this up, we have it for one dinner and then I adapt it for a few more meals. 

All you need is

1. 1/4 bag of dried green lentils 

2. Several carrots

3. 2 tins toms

4. Dried parsley

I pop it all into the pressure cooker for 20 mins. Let the pressure release naturally then serve with cooked pasta and garlic bread. 

Using some of the left over lentil bolognese I then make lasagne. I add some extra tomatoes to the mix. Then make a simple white sauce. In the pot I put a layer of bolognese, top with lasagne sheets, add white sauce then another layer of lasagne. Repeat until dish is full. Ending with white sauce on top. Then sprinkle with grated cheese. 

Always a little more lentil mix left so I make one more meal the next day. I cook some dried pasta. Then mix the lentil mix with some passata then mix into the cooked pasta. Pop in an oven proof dish. Top with cheese and bake for 20nmins or so. Serve with home made garlic bread. 

I use dairy free milk and cheese to make these dishes so all are vegan. These meals are for two of us, you may not get as many meals out of that first portion of bolognese if you have larger appetites or a larger family eating this. 

I usually have enough left of each variation for a few lunches to take for work. 

Side note: I don't season with salt/pepper so we can do this to personal taste. You may wish to add to your meals when cooking if that is how you prefer to cook. 

Simple meals- version 1. Jacket potato salad

 Following on from my post the other day I thought I would share some of our simple meals that we have. They are low cost, low effort so perfect on busy days, or indeed if like the South of England at the moment you are in the middle of the summer week!who knows when the sun will go again so I send as much time as possible out enjoying it!

Jacket potato and salad with home made coleslaw. 

I love this meal as so low effort. I cook potatoes in microwave for around 7 minutes depending on their size, then it o the oven to crisp for 20 mins. 

The coleslaw is home made, it contains red cabbage, white cabbage, red onion and carrot. All grated. Then mixed with some mayonnaise, white vinegar and apple cider vinegar. Most of what is in this plate is from the reduced section of the supermarket, the vegetables last way longer than the supermarkets say. 

Costings for this obviously depend on how much you pay for the veggies but guesstimate this at 

Potato 10p (from a bag costing 50p)

1 carrot 2p (1kg bag reduced to 23p so prob even less!) 

Salad leaves 20p, cheaper soon when out of my garden! 

Tomatoes 1/4 bag that costs 55p so say 15p

Cucumber a few slices from a 50p cucumber say 5p worth maybe 

Olives from a jar I don't remember cost but from aldi so not a lot! 

The cheese is around £2 a bag, it's free from due to my intolerance so the most expensive part prob around 40p worth on my plate. 

So this meal comes in at around £1. It's very filling and so full of yummy goodness. 

I'll share another tomorrow. 

Our pets

 I've just updated the 'all about me' page on here. I've discovered that some of it was quite out of date. Sadly, the last of our rabbits died last year.

We do have another new addition though. I agreed just before Christmas to allowing Smudge to stud with a dog of a family friend. The lady lives on a farm and wanted to breed her good little worker and approached me as she said Smudge has good characteristics. I agreed and asked for first choice of any boy dogs as I'd been looking for a year for a friend for Smudge. His litter was born in the middle of February. We went to visit several times from when the pups were a couple weeks old. It was a tough choice as they were all little crackers.

This little cracker is Loki. He was the only boy with this colouring which I absolutely love. The other 3 boys were all goergous little chocolate dogs. 

 

We are now a proud 2 dog household! I'm pleased to report the boys get on fantastically. Smudge is very kind and gentle, Loki as expected with his name is a mischief. We are having a lot of fun with them both and our lives are definitely much richer, even if my bank is a little poorer. 

More about the costs of my babies another day! 

Low spend food shop

 I am trying to keep my spending as low as possible so that I can pay as much as I can onto my debt. One way I do this is by buying as little food as possible. I don't mean by starving any of us either! Haha

Throughout the week as inspiration arrives from many places I jot down idea of food/meals we can eat. This inspriation could be from spotting food in the the fridge or freezer that needs using, or I could see a picture of someone else's food on social media etc and think I have ingredients to make that.

This is our current menu plan. 

This week's shopping list. 

I then create a shopping list of the extras I will need. That's my water bottle next to the list. It's warm out so I know I'll get thirsty on the drive into town and then with the walk around the shop so I fill it with cold water and take it with me. It saves buying a drink out, and the plastic waste from buying a drink.

I headed off to aldi as it is cheap and stocks what I needed. I had a target of £20 in mind for this week's shop. Here's what I got:

All of this came to £20.90. There is a lot of food there for the low price, including done treats that weren't on the list. £7.30 worth of treats to be exact. I'm a work in progress, I'm not great at saving money but I save more than I have in a while.

How do you keep your food shop low? 

Debt repayment and side hustling

 I've been busy over the last 9 months or so since I posted. I've been working flat out, trying to keep up with the ever changing government guidance to ensure we are being as safe as possible at work.

At home I have been working hard at overpaying my debts to clear the credit cards. I have one completely paid off,just 2 more to go. I started my journey to clearing them with over 15k in debt, I am now under 10k. I'm so

proud of that milestone and can't wait to bring it down further.

I was accepted by my bank to transfer just over half of one of my remaining cards onto a 0% for 26 month card. This will save me masses as I'm currently paying around 23% interest. I will clear the remaining credit on the High interest card, then will clear the 0% card. This will leave me with one more high interest paying card (I'm currently paying off 2 cards) which I'm hoping to secure another 0% for when I get a bit further along with this one. It's all go!

By the end of this year I will have cleared my second credit card. That is the end goal. Lots of steps I am taking to make this happen including:

* reducing my food shop bills

* making money via surveys

*making money via receipt apps

*saving money by eating at home

 

Example of a survey I will get £10 shopping voucher for completing. 

These are all current things I am doing. Next up, I am going to start selling all the excess belongings we have in our house. This will also clear the clutter which I want to do for several reasons including making the hoen easier to clean, making it a calm space, eventually when I get a mortgage in a couple of years I will be moving and I do not want to move the old clutter with me. So I may as well make it work for me now by helping to make a little extra cash.

Where do you sell things you no longer need? I have books, dvds, clothes and toys. I'm sure a lot more once I start digging deeply! I used to sell on ebay but know there are many other choices now. What are your favourite places, and why?

A little camping break

 I am so pleased that we managed to get away this year, and with my sisters too. It was a really nice break which involved lots of laughter, walking and eating together.

We went to the Peak District and stayed on a dairy farm in Pomeroy. There was a little shop onsite, a petting zoo with goats and from the part of the field we were pitched in we got to see the dairy cows go out every morning and back in again in the evening. The children were fascinated by this as the cows just wandered through to the correct field.

We had a real mixed bag of weather whilst we were there but still managed some exploring. 

This pub was found wandering along the High Peak trail straight out of the campsite.

This was at a park in Buxton, Pup was most confused by this statue HAHA. Think he thought it was real, he stood staring for a while.

This is walking along the river in Bakewell.

View from the top of the hill at Cavedale in Castleton. I love the rainbow across the water.

It was so nice to go as a group as it meant; company for me, company for teengirl as her cousins of a similar age were there, and the younger cousins had each other too. This meant so few tantrums/silks from all invovled. It was a very relaxing week. I stuck within the budget I had set for the week, and even came home with big change!

Teengirl and I had planned to see if we could stay on for a couple of extra nights as we were enjoying it so much. However, we went out on the Friday for lunch with my sister and her family and when we got back the tent had broken. Several sections of three of the long poles had shattered. It was a very windy week and the poor tent just couldn't stand up anymore.

So instead of a few extra days we ended up driving home that evening and having two less days than we had planned. I was a little disappointed then I realised that actually given the current situation around with Covid-19 we were very lucky to have managed to get away at all. So turned that round and have concentrated on how much fun we have had instead.

Now to start saving for next year as we all want to go again. I also need to find out where I can get my tent poles repaired...

Batch Cooking

 

I try to find recipes that I like in order to batch cook and freeze. This saves me so much time and money, especially when I am in work full-time. I go back in full-time next week so I am trying to get prepared ready for the onslaught that September brings to teaching. It has also provided me with an opportunity to use up odds and ends in the fridge. I still have plenty to use up but I am determined not to waste the food we have. Some is being used for snacking- for example Teengirl has just came down and asked for the corn on the cob we needed to use, she has sat quite happily munching on that. I had a left over bit of chicken from last night's tea as my lunch with some of the wilting salad. 

My freezer is now stocked with 21 ready meals. I will use these either as quick after work dinners, or lunches. I shall be adding to these as the week progresses. So far I have made;

Lentil curry- there are 9 portions of this leftover in the freezer.

Lentil bolognese- I have 8 pots of this in the freezer.

Veggie chilli- I have 4 portions of this in the freezer.

I also found some mushrooms languishing at the back of the fridge so I made creamy mushroom turnovers- I have eaten 2 of these and have a further 2 in the freezer for a quick lunch at some point.

I love that I have so much prepped already. I have planned out my menu for the week, and will prepare next week's menu over the weekend. 

This was created with the food I needed to use in mind, so the fish fingers and chicken wraps are served with salads to use up the lettuces etc in the fridge.

The pesto will use up the bargain packet of fresh basil I got in the supermarket at the end of the day- recued to 5p! I bought 3, 2 went in the freezer for later in the term as I recently discovered how quick and easy it is to make your own pesto. I had been buying the free-from jars for around £1.50 a pot. I can make it for pennies!

What are your favourite batch cook meals? Bonus points if they are meat-free/ use store cupboard foods. We aren't veggie (see the plan above!) but I am reducing our meat consumption in an effort to save on food costs. Post your favourite meals below.

Camping

Stephanie, Smudge and I are off camping for a week on Sunday. Dylan and his girlfriend are staying home to look after the house and the rabbit. This is a week away on a budget. I have saved for the last couple of months for this, as it has been planned for a while. My sisters and their families are coming with us. We have a stay in the Peak District booked, I can't wait. I planned out the meals and things we will be eating today, based on what is easy to cook on a camping cooker and what we have int he cupboards already.

 This is what I have come up with:

The main items on this list are in my cupboard and just needed packing. The BBQ food will be taken from my freezer and pack in the cool box with ice packs to keep it fresh as will take us 4 hours or so to get there. We then will need to unpack the car, put up the tent etc etc before we eat. BBQs on the first night are always fun, especially when you meet others there as they are fun social meals allowing us time to catch up as we share.

Excuse the dog's nose- food is around so he's not far away! HAHA

I shopped through the cupboards for the meals on the plan. Then headed to the fridge:

This bits are fruit and veg that we can use for either snacks, or to enhance our meals. Not enough for the week, but once we are settled we will head to local shops/farms to buy the bits we need as we go. we won't have a fridge whilst we camp so we will buy fresh bit as needed.

This is how I keep costs down when we go away.What things do you do to keep the costs down?

Leftovers

 Do you find it hard to eat, or even have inspiration to eat when it is hot? I do. I really struggle to eat in this weather. I love the sunshine but I don't want to eat in it. I have a daughter who is the same, I end up having to find fast simple meals that will entice her to eat as much as me!

The other day I cooked a roast chicken and we had some left in the fridge that needed eating so I made today's dinner using it.

I also found this box in the cupboard.I'm not sure where it came from, I don't even remember buying it. It was quite easy to make, you dissolve the powder into a little water, coat your chicken in it and fry until cooked. Nice and easy, just what was needed today.

I coated my chicken and then popped it in the air fryer for ten minutes. I just needed the coating to crisp as the chicken was already cooked. Whilst this happened, I chopped a quick, simple salad and added some tortilla crisps which were open in the cupboard.

Plain, simple and tasty. Just what was needed on this hot day.

There was still a little of the chicken left. I decided to make a treat for the dog with it. A simple pate, if you were making this for humans you could use butter, maybe garlic and little lemon juice to liven it up a little. As it was for Smudge I kept it plain as he has a sensitive tummy and he will stink us out! Haha

Chicken and a little water and into the blender until smooth.

I should have used a little less water maybe as it was a little runny. It will be fine though as I will be spreading it onto his licky mat and freezing it as a cooling treat another day.

There is no chicken left now so I will need to decide on something else quick and simple for tomorrow's dinner. I'm thinking maybe some pesto pasta.

Dining Room Update

Ok so I have lived in this house for 5 years and have never been able to decide what to do with the dining room. It always looks dark, cluttered and uninviting. 

Then a fortnight ago I came across this awesome wallpaper, I absolutely loved it.

I found it on Ebay, thought perfect I'll put the paper in the recess next to the chimney breast, paint the chimney breast and the other 3 walls. It'll look fab. I ordered two rolls, and had £5 off voucher for ebay so cost £18. Perfect. I thought I have some white paint in the shed so I'll get started whilst I wait for delivery.

Pulled the wallpaper that was on the chimney breast off ready to paint and was left with this:

1 very untidy, needs a replaster chimney breast. Definitely not a quick paint with white emulsion job. I don't have the skills or the money to fix this, especially as this is a rented home and I plan on moving in a couple of years as I aim to buy my own home. (long term plan, details coming soon!)

This means a change of plan- I'll just wallpaper across all of the area you can see in the picture above.

I forgot to take before pictures of this room, that's how much I disliked it! In the alcove on the left of this picture is where I had my freezer (kitchen is too tiny to fit a fridge/freezer in it. The alcove on the right is where I put my dining table and 6 chairs. The opposite corner to where the freezer is, so behind me and to the left where I stood to take this picture is where I had the fridge/ freezer, then the opposite corner to the table, so on my right and behind me when I took this picture is the bookcase and my desk. There never seemed to be enough room and it was not a comfortable space to use. So the whole room ended up a dumping ground.

Whilst I was painting I came up with a cunning plan to fix this. 

All the walls that were not papered were painted white to allow for the room to appear brighter, the wallpaper has potential to make it look dark so I wanted to balance this out.

This si the finished room:

I absolutely love it. I have spent all my time in here/ the garden since I finished it. I smile everytime I walk in. I love how I have laid the space out and it feels less cluttered. I haven't taken any of our stuff out, it's just better organised.

It's not the easiest room to photograph, but hopefully that gives you an idea of how much better it looks.

I did have to buy a third roll of wallpaper, as I was one drop short after having to paper the chimney breast as well as the alcoves.

Total costs:

Wallpaper- 3 rolls= £30

Gloss for woodwork- tin £8- I used half so £4

White emulsion- I used half a of a huge tub which cost £12 so £6

Wallpaper paste £1.

I have used all of our own furniture and didn't buy anything new. I have the light fitting from a previous room decorating.

Total cost for project: £41.00

I'm very happy with that as it has given us a fantastic looking room that we are all now using properly.

Relax

I have kept myself busy over the last couple of weeks making sure I'm using the unexpected time at home to do things. I've started to feel a little overwhelmed by everything going on which comes out in frustration at things that wouldn't usually bother me. So today I decided to have a relaxing day. I got up and made some bread as we are out of it, prepped dinner for tonight, a quick tidy through downstairs then I've done things I wanted. A little weeding in the veg patch and sowed down seeds. Since lunchtime I have been laid in my favourite garden chair with a book. Just what I needed to recharge the batteries.

We have some little mining bees on our garden. Very sweet to watch them about their business.

Strange times

It is very strange in the world at the moment. I am working from home for the majority of the time, just going in a couple of days a week to care for the children of other key workers. We are only allowed out once a day for exercise so I go out for one dog walk a day and make sure Teen-girl comes with us. This means I haven't been running for ages.
The Manchild has taken himself off to his girlfriend's parents whilst this is all going on as his asthma is bad, he has had several chest infections already this winter and with my job I pose a big risk to him. It's very strange without him home.
I have spent time doing up our little house. I have decorated the bathroom, decorated the kitchen and spent time sorting the garden in the effort to have a more productive vegetable garden this year. I am missing a few seeds I would like to have planted; tomatoes, peas, green beans. I might be bale to get some the next time I head into town for food, but I am hoping not to need to do that for a while.
I have planted kale, lettuce, carrots, pumpkins, various herbs, cabbages and cauliflowers so hopefully some of these will germinate although it may be a challenge as some of the seeds I have used have been lurking in the shed for a few years. It's all a bit of an experiment.
The garden is looking tidier, still more to do on it but it is getting there.

Weeding with my helper

Some old seeds planted with optimism.

My helper laying the weed membrane.

What are you doing during this strange time period? I hope you are keeping well.

Garden

While we are distancing from the world I am working to make improvements to our home. I started today with the garden. I have cut the free grass, it was so long it took me nearly two hours but its done now.
.

I then weeded some of the vegetable beds. I built them from old pallets when I first moved here, they are starting to rot now, I'm thinking of removing them and just having them as open beds now they are quite well established. 

Once is pulled the weds out I found some lettuce, I sowed the seeds at the end of last summer and nothing happened but now I have some

Made me feel very happy to find this. 

Tomorrow I need to do some more weeding. I'd like to plant some seeds as well but I have ran out of compost so I'm trying to decide what's best to do now. 

How are you filling the days? 

Rubber chicken update

Today I made our final recipe for this week's rubber chicken-chicken and noodle soup.

It was very tasty, I got 4 portions of this which brings the rubber chicken total up to 12 meals, I'm very impressed to have got this many meals from a small £2 chicken.

*chicken, jacket potato and salad x2
*roast chicken x2
*chicken pie x4
*chicken noodle soup x4

I used every last bit of the chicken, made stock from the bones.

In other corona news it was my day off today, so I wrote myself a list as ir ealsied I had been awake for 3 hours and not moved once lol

Chicken pie, lockdown day 1

It's hard to imagine that there is so much unknown and uncertainty in the world right now when I can walk the dog, albeit once a day, to some so peaceful as this:

It was so peaceful out that we walked 2 5 miles played hunt the dummy with the dog for ages in the woods and then headed home watching the tractors working in the fields as we walked. A normal walk, in what appears to be a normal day, but isn't.
Very surreal and disturbing to think of the situation the world is in.
What are you doing to keep yourself well in this time?


In other news, rubber chicken is going strong. Tonight's tea was chicken pie

Yes I did slightly burn the crusts but it still tasted good, and there are 2 generous slices in the freezer for another day. So that is 8 meals so far, and still more in the fridge from that one little reduced chicken. 

Rubber chicken!

No, my cooking has not got that bad! I am going to see how many meals I can get out of one small chicken. It was one I bought on yellow sticker for £2 last month. I cooked it nice and plain in the slow-cooker yesterday.  Teengirl and I had some with a jacket potato and salad for dinner, we had one breast shared between us. Today I am cooking some potatoes in the airfryer and steaming some veg to go with some more of the cooked chicken. I have saved every scrap of the chicken and plan on doing something with all of it. No waste!

This is what is left after yesterday's dinner. The bigger tub is the chicken, then the bones and then the juices left in the slower cooker after I took the chicken out. I'm determined to use it all- any suggestions on any of these?
What do you do with all of the left over bits from a roast chicken?

I'll fill you in as the week continues to what I do and if I use any of your ideas.

What is going on?

The world feels a very sad place right now. I think with my job being in the most rural part of the area I live in I have been a little sheltered. I very rarely go into town, I don't like shopping and prefer to stay in the village I live. So I was a little shocked when I went to the supermarket early on Saturday morning. Of course, I had seen social media posts about the state of the shops, the lack of food, but I honestly thought it was an exaggeration. Hence standing in a supermarket at 7am holding back the tears. I'ma monthly shopper usually so as it's heading towards the end of the month and knowing the virus is getting worse in my area I transferred some of my savings to get some shopping in. Not hoarding/panic shop. Just food we need kind of a shop. So to get to the shop that early and see aisles and aisles of bare shelves just made me realise just what a situation we are in. It's real. Basic, cupboard foods are gone. I have food intolerances so what was there, I can't eat.

This is the shopping from the first supermarket. As you can see most of what I have there contains milk. I can't eat it but my children can. So had a very small amount of food for them. I started to panic when I realised this was all I could buy, and nearly cried, a lady saw me and just stood chatting to me for a little about anythign and nothing and I managed to calm down. If she had realised how upset/ concerned I was feeling at that point then it was lovely of her to take time out of her day to help me. If she didn't still very lovely to see some human kindness in the midst of the madness.

I then went across the road to the other supermarket:

A few more bits, more that I can eat and bits to make some meals with using the ingredients I have in the cupboards at home (tin toms etc). This really made me think, and worry, though about others. I am fairly young, I am fit and able, I have a car and more importantly right now a stable job.This shopping, tiny amount though it is, cost more than I would usually spend on a weekly amount of food. How on earth are others who are not in my position able to get food. The bits I have bought are of a higher price than I would usually buy (apart from those cheap, gross noodles in the first picture. My children love them. That's the teens lunch on the two days a week I am in work!)

People get a grip- stop the panic buying and think of others. There is plenty of food in the country, if you stop being selfish about it. I saw a man when out walking the dog, he drives the big trucks for the supermarkets. he said there is loads of food in the warehouse types places (I forget the real word!) but they can't get it to the supermarkets quick enough due to the way people are shopping. Even at Christmas, or when it snows I have never seen the shops look as crazy as they do right now. I get it, you're scared, we are all scared. But the actions of a few are being really detrimental to many. 

Stay home, wash your hands loads, and only buy what you are truly going to use. Then we can all get through this.

My New Journey

I've debated long and hard on posting this but I think it will help give perspective to how things are now, and the new journey I am on. I went from being a single mum as a student when I started this blog to working full-time as a single mum. I felt a lot of guilt around the fact I worked from home whilst Dylan was small, yet Stephanie had been in nursery from around 18 months old. So when I started work I wanted to treat them and give them everything which made going to work purposeful. The reality of this is, I couldn't afford to keep up with this and got myself into debt. over £15000 worth before I hit my crisis point of realising this is not going to get better/go away as things stand. I realised the I'll sort it next month, no really next month wasn't happening or helping me to make changes.
So just before Christmas I stopped using my credit cards- around October/November. Then in December I looked at my statements and realised just how much I am paying in interest, and actually just in minimum payments each month. It was time to get a grip.
I started  by saving up a £500 emergency fund so I have a buffer whilst I am paying off debt, then if something breaks I don't use credit to fix it.
Now I am using all of that knowledge about saving money and budgeting that I learnt as a single parent student to attack my debt. I am not in a position currently to transfer my debts and reduce the interest so I have to attack them as much as I can. I am using the snowball method and throwing everything I can at the smallest debt currently. Watch this space as I get myself out of the financial hole I have dug myself!

Wow!

Ok. so I am on a slightly different journey these days. I was thinking about beginning a blog to show our current life and to help me face the new challenges I have. I was googling around to see what blog websites are current as it's been a while since I started one- 10 years it seems! What do I find, that this one is still live. I had no idea!

What has changed- well I now have a full-time job and am no longer a student. I have been in my job for 9 years. The eldest (boychild) is now 21, studying, working part-time and has a serious girlfriend. The Girlchild is now in secondary and is a dreaded teenager- although currently she's not so bad!
Oh and we have pets now. One rabbit and a Cocker spaniel pup. Life is very different now with all of these changes but it's our life and I love it. Peaceful, calm and comfortable. An old friend recently got in touched and asked how life is going. When I gave that description they asked is that a good or bad thing. It's definitely a good thing. I'm happy.

I think instead of a new blog I will resurrect this one. It shows our journey, and thanks to some daft mistakes over the years some of my old habits are about to become refreshed for this new decade. Watch this space to find out more!

For now have a picture of our pup- this was a couple of months ago, he's grown a bit, as have the rest of us. I'll update some more once I've had a mooch around and reminded myself of all the fun we used to have in this little corner of the web.

Welcome back!

Beautiful bank holiday

We decided to have a day out on Friday. The children were due to go to their Dads on Saturday and spend their Easters there. Stephanie decided she liked the idea of going down to Whitstable. Believe it or not, we have never been there! It's not far from here but we have never been.

We tried to park up in several car parks but by the time we got there they were full. Eventually we happened upon a little side road parking space. It was a short walk from the seafront but it was worth it. We walked through one of the full car parks to get to the beach- at 90p an hour that would have added up as we spent a good 5 hours there.

I had heard that the weather wasn't meant to be nice so we wore lovely warm clothes- long sleeved tops trousers etc ready for the sea chill. It was a beautiful sunny, windless spring day! We were toasty warm! We found a spot on the beach and paddled a little together, explored shells then Stephanie spent some time wandering the Groynes. We ate our packed lunch, a short wander through the town before deciding actually we were enjoying the beach so we headed back there.

It was a very chilled relaxed day. We treated ourselves to an ice cream. They should have been £3 but I paid £2.40 as it was all the change I had and the ice cream man didn't want any more notes- he said he was that desperate for change I could pay him whatever coins I had in my purse! LOL

At the end of the dy we wandered back through the harbour intending to get some fish & chip sto nibble before we went home. The fish stands were all sold out and packing up and the chip stands had the longest queues we have ever seen, we both decided that we didn't want chips enough to stand  in those.

 Contemplating the world after walking 'the plank'

building a wall out of pebbles.

A stunning day out which we thoroughly enjoyed, costing the princely sum of £2.40 for ice creams, and a little petrol. The needle on the car moved  about 1/8 of a tank. I filled up just before we left from virtually empty. It cost £32 to fill the car so I make that about £4 worth of petrol. Our day out cost a grand total of £6.40.

How did you spend your Good Friday?