preparing for the month

Wow January seems to have flown by. we stuck almost rigidly to the menu plan, a few swapping of days here and there but I like that flexibility. We had dinner out 2 nights due to being held up even later than anticipated in swimming fun and secondary school opening evenings. Despite this I still had £70 left in my bank account by payday! That has been transferred over to my credit card bill. Oh and I booked a couple of nights away in a hotel for my brothers wedding in March. Not a bad month at all.

With this in mind I have just sat and menu planned for this month too. The menu plan takes us right up until the 01.03.15.

I have also been busy trying to organise our back garden ready for spring. I have been lucky enough to accumulate a couple more pallets. There was one in the shed when we moved in here, I collected 2 from freecycle in the week (well my brother in law did as they needed collecting during office hours) and as I was driving home from shopping yesterday I went through the industrial estate and passed a sign which said free wood. Next to it were 4 pallets. Now my tiny little fiesta only fitted in one of these pallets- the smallest one. So I will be talking nicely to family members with larger cars to see if they will collect some more for me over the next couple if weeks if there are still some left.

This afternoon I have been out in the garden dismantling pallets for use to make my raised beds. It's hard work- and cold but will be worth it when I have finished.

The pallets waiting dismantling

some of the dismantled wood. This is only half a pallets worth. I will build up one raised bed and see how many pallets that takes then I can source more as and when needed.