How Not to Be a Right 'Nana.

 

How are we all doing? Keeping up the resolutions? Good, good...

 

I have to say I am feeling pretty proud of myself so far...  firstly, I did the very first Parkrun of the year even though it was tipping it down with rain!! As a 'well done' I was allowed entry to a competition to win a place at the Virgin London Marathon. Maybe I'll do a marathon this year then? Or not... Oh Cripes; hope I don't actually win...

 

Then when I got in, I noticed OH had accidentally opened a letter for me from the bank. Apparently I'd gone over my overdraft limit and they were going to charge me £10. TEN SQUID! I was livid!

 

I have signed up for a text alert so I get notification if I am nearing my limit within £50 or so. I can then go into my account online and pay in money to my account before 3.30pm to make sure I don't get charged. On the day in question I got the alert because I was close to the limit. So I went online, made sure I wasn't actually over, and then checked again at various points through the day. So I knew darn well I hadn't been.

 

Most people would just shrug their shoulders and eat more chocolate at such news. But I work hard to earn every tenner and I'm not going to put up with a charge like that. I mean a tenner - that's a round!

 

I decided to call in at the bank in person and sort it out. If you are ever going to do this, you must remember the golden rules of (cuts both ways) customer service:

 

• Remember the person serving you is a human being; never be aggressive or rude. Keep your eyes friendly, your voice calm.
• Use phrases like, I understand why you have to say that, but; I appreciate your position on that particular issue, however. Basically, soften up before you say 'but'.
• They do have to be a gatekeeper and say no, but be persistent. And persistence shouldn't become aggressively persistent. If you reach an impasse, pause before going back to an earlier point.
• A good way of getting them to understand where you are coming from is to ask questions. "If these transactions were done overnight, shouldn't I have seen them on my statement in the day?"
• Don't argue about anything you know you are wrong about - you will trip up. They've seen it all and can spot chancers a mile off.
• Remember to say thank you - a lot. Thank them for checking the facts again, looking things up for you, and thank them after they have helped.

 

And, dear reader, you will be pleased to know after a bit of persistence, I got my money back. And then the same person was an absolute lovely and helped me bag up my post-Christmas piggy bank change so I could bank it.

 

It's worth noting that when you sign up to an overdraft facility it's at the bank's discretion. But they look at the long-term benefits of letting you have access to services like that (because they can make more money) and as long as you don't become a credit risk or a bit of a banking lemon, it does them more good to keep you on side. Hence, going into my branch  - often - works for me.

 

And then I ate the chocolate anyway.

 

So, week 1 of 2014 and I'm making the most of what I can get, which this week was bananas. I picked up a bag of 15 for 19p. Some of them were still good eaters, but there were a couple turning very brown, some black. This is the state people think chuck/banana cake, but we wanted to do something a bit different. I had a special request from OH, who doesn't really do breakfast, but wanted some energy bars to help fuel morning exercise. I adapted this recipe from one in an old, old Weightwatchers book to do the business:

 

Banana Energy Bars

 

Yes, they're full of sugar, so have limited claim to actually being 'healthy'. But they are full of all natural ingredients and you get slow release energy from the oats as well as fast release from the sugar.

 

Ingredients and facts:

 

 

• Preheat your oven to 180 degrees C, Gas mark 4. Line and grease your tray (about 17 x 25cm - I used a lasagna dish).

• In a saucepan, slowly melt together the 100g spread, 50g sugar and 50g honey. When it's all melted, set aside to cool down a bit.

• Sift 100g self-raising flour and a pinch of salt in a bowl, add the 125g oats, 50g sunflower seeds and 40g chopped dates.

• Mash the bananas together, mix in beaten egg. Add this to the flour mixture.

• Stir in the syrupy mixture.

 

• Pour into the baking tray/lasagna dish/whatever you have, and bake for 25 minutes or so. It should be firm to the touch and golden brown.

• Let it cool for a bit, then cut into 10 bars.

 



 

Of course, this didn't use many of the  bananas... tomorrow I will let you know what I did with the rest. Nothing rude... just another recipe thing.

 

In the meantime, listen to a creepy story read by creepy old me. It's live now on Pseudopod. I read The Violin Family by James Douglas, which won second place in the Escape Artist Forum's Flash Fiction Contest 2013.

No Brownie Points for Drake



Hello! It's 2014! Happy New Year and all that... and a big welcome to my new followers; hello Sarah @ A Frugal Wife and Angela.

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and Santa brought you things you are grateful for.

I got a book by one of my favourite writers:



I also got a onesie  - believe it or not, I actually asked for one! I have to spend long hours in my office, editing books. It doesn't involve much moving about and I like to feel cosy. Admittedly, I did say any colour but white as I was thinking of practicality. So OH got me a sheep.

People have been asking whether I've become a furry. Er, no...

But imagine, dear writers: when I am working on your novels and am deep in character as Evil Editor, this is what I look like. 

Baa Humbug!



OH and I got other lovely presents too, and this was one of our favourites from my brother and sister in law, who looked after us brilliantly on Christmas Day. It's a wonderful hamper of goodies, including my favourite raspberry and chili tea-bags, some sloe gin (ours is still brewing) homemade hazelnut chocolates, mulled wine spices, and - Josh Widdicombe's double nemesis - homemade jam and apple and mint jelly! Annie is an awesome cook, as you can see from her web page.

So, when we were invited to spend New Year's Eve with lovely, lovely people, I imagined trying to do something similar... and as my lovely friend can't eat gluten, I thought I'd do something coeliac-friendly.

I have a poor history of offering gluten-free comestibles to Kim: my wedding cake had a gluten-free chocolate layer especially for her - she didn't get any; I took snacks for her to my birthday party - they got buried under the presents and no one could find them. At least this time, I would put them in her hand, and they would be in her house. Problem solved!

For the basket, I chose one of those Top of the Pops records that always duped you into buying a load of covers because they couldn't afford to use the real versions.

Phew! It's not really Gary Glitter!

For the recipe, I thought I'd avoid any controversial celebrity association.So, I went for this recipe by Nigella Lawson, because you can't go wrong with Nigella. I used hazelnuts instead of walnuts as I had those, and that bit about proper quality chocolate? Yep, used basic. Good job I did...

Ah - they smelled gorgeous!!!

A liberal sprinkling of special white powder icing sugar.

cling-filmed for the journey, with a pretty bow.

Being flourless, they were lovely and squidgy. They needed liberating onto a plate after the journey to look presentable. I liked 'em... and success - my friend did get to try some. Huzzah!

However, she didn't get to try too many before Drake the Labrador took advantage of turned backs to jump up and scoff most of them off the plate.  Doh!

Good job it wasn't the hard cocoa stuff- not terribly healthy for dogs. Luckily, he wasn't ill after all that. Or the cat food he'd stolen from the cats just after.

I looked into his big, sorry face, and said - right, you're going in my blog. He wagged his tail. I think that was tacit approval.

So, the 'make your own booze' aspect of the year's resolutions (try saying "New Year's resolutions" without sounding just a little bit pissed) is going well, as we have slow sloe gin and this strawberry thing on the way. We had to throw a lot of elderflower as it was practically pure alcohol.

But laying off the booze for a bit... not feeling brilliant after NYE, when OH did an accidental eyes-closed disco punch in my face and made my nose bleed. It was a bit Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon.This was post knocking my wine glass flying, and he finished the manoeuvre with a removal of dangly appendages from the ceiling light. I don't think he'd do too well on Strictly.  On the plus side, I now resemble one of my favourite French actors.

Sexah!

Secret £7 Food Challenge. Challenge Within a Challenge.

Yesterday I blogged about a weekend of decadence... and here's a photo of the stash of bought and blagged books and things from Brighton and World Fantasy Convention. Unfortunately all the red velvet cupcakes are in my belly already...

...which reminds me, there was a sweet moment at the launch of Colder, Greyer Stones, when Tannith Lee asked me what my "Cake Pigeon" tee-shirt was about, and I explained it was a Sarah Millican joke. It involved me doing some cooing.

Anyway... the cupcakes are gone. Life has returned to post-convention mundanity. I have paid for a cinema treat at the end of the month, and am building savings up by making cutbacks. We've gone a bit off-plan and need to get back on track with big, scary bills of the present and future. But I want to make sure OH doesn't feel deprived. He's got to have an operation and take time off work. He has plenty of books to get through while he is recuperating, at least.

So, when I say I am taking on Stacey at Mortgage Free Journey's £7 food challenge, my challenge will not be including OH. He can wander off the plan with impunity. However, I will be budgeting his meals into the plan and hoping it's satisfactory for him. I'll be using up some of the things from our chest freezer to make the budget stretch. Bear in mind, we have lots of tins and things in, but hardly any fresh stuff left at all!

Anyway, I'm 2 days in, so here's what I've managed so far.

Day 1: Breakfast: me, wheat biscuits, maple syrup, milk - already bought. Him - nothing, he rarely eats breakfast.
Lunch: both of us, egg and salad cream sandwiches, Satsuma/plum. already bought.
Treats: me, someone brought in leftover Halloween chocolate.  OH made himself a fried egg sandwich in the afternoon.
Dinner: Smoked Salmon spaghetti. This was made with smoked salmon trimmings from the freezer, a small onion, clove of garlic, half a small tin of sweetcorn and some Elmlea single we had to use up, slightly thickened with cornflour, seasoned with nutmeg and parsley, and served with spaghetti.Yum!
Shopping: cucumber 40p and fish paste 25p

I didn't buy any bread. Made my own, nur!

I made this. Mmm. Arg.

 Day 2:

Breakfast: porridge and maple syrup. I make my porridge with water and just add a splash of milk at the end.

Lunch: fish paste and cucumber sandwiches - with homemade bread!

Treats: a handful of chilli crisps and more sweets left over from someone's party

Dinner: Pork steaks marinaded in maple syrup, lemon juice, garlic and rosemary, grilled. Served with potato and swede mash, with a bit of nutmeg, gravy made from stock/cornflour and veg juices, steamed carrots and leeks (I steam the veg above the potatoes - saves energy as well as retaining the flavour better). Sorry, the brown nature of my kitchen gives everything a sheen of the 70s. It was very tasty. However, OH wanted pudding so I made pancakes, served with homemade blackberry jam.

Shopping: Poor pickings in my local Asda. I only bought onions, 29p. Off to Aldi tomorrow.

 

 

Total spend this week: 94p.

Anyone else tempted to join in?

 

Beautiful and Wonderful Things in the Post -BSFA magazines

I felt a huge surge of pride when I opened the post on Monday and saw I had received copies of Vector and Focus  - the magazines of the British Science Fiction Association, of which I have been Chair since June. 

Fantastic cover art by Kev Rooney

Of course, I've always thought the magazines were pretty ace; Vector is the association's critical journal and features some great articles and critical analysis concerning contemporary and classic science fiction - mainly in literature. I sometimes write reviews for it, but haven't got anything in this issue (in the next one I have). I'm particularly looking forward to reading the features on Adam Roberts' and Stephen Baxter's work... picture me later with my feet up and a pot of Lady Grey on the go and some Elizabeth Shaw mints to nibble (rescued from a party... nobody wanted them. Nobody wanted delicious minty chocolate!!! What is the world coming to?).

I've popped Focus foremost in the piccie though because I'm particularly proud to have had the chance to be involved with the editorial work. Guest editor this issue was the fantastic writer Kim Lakin-Smith (my Matron of Honour at my wedding this year!) and the cover features a plate illustration for a new edition of her gorgeous first novel Tourniquet. The artist, Kev Rooney, is from Northampton and is a creator of beautiful gothic artwork and stories. I quite honestly think it's one of the best writing magazines out there, and the current issue focuses on writing groups.



My byline! Mostly Kim's...

Kim, Kev, Shana, Alex, Steve, Clive and all the contributors to the magazines... awesome job!

In frugal news:

• I went to my brother and sister in law's house to deliver a birthday present and came home with two courgettes from their allotment and boxes of raspberry and chilli tea. OH and I are now fighting over who can grab the most tea. We love this tea! Thanks, bro!
• I made an amazing pie from the free apples I got from said same allotment the other day. I used a Good Housekeeping Dutch apple pie recipe, but used almond essence instead of vanilla as I'd run out of vanilla. Looked ugly as it exploded from the glut of apple filling, but was very yummy.
• Getting ready for Christmas... used my Cokezone points which were going to expire on 15th to grab a sporty present suitable for a young nephew. I had been going to get makeup, but they'd stopped the offers already. Too bad as I smashed my foundation and blusher on Saturday by accidentally dropping them. I endeavoured to rescue as much foundation as I could, only to realise I was smearing tiny little particles of glass onto my face. Not recommended. Best thing about the Cokezone points - they were mostly gained through picking up litter in my messy street. I am a litter-picking hero! You threw money away fools! Almost as good as  the time I saw a guy deliberately throw an unwanted receipt on the floor of a petrol station - only it wasn't a receipt, it was his tenner change! You didn't want it, I'm having it, foolish man!
• Number of homemade birthday cards made this week so far - two.
• After a discussion about blogs at the weekend, I promise never to waste time or resources on bunting. Sorry if you like bunting.
• Trigger warning! Also, apparently people can become enraged at the sight pictures of food, so sorry for the below, which is indeed of my lunch. But I made it myself out of very cheap ingredients: olive oil bread was made using Carrs breadmaker (I don't have a machine; I am my own breadmaker) brown bread flour - currently on offer in Sainsbury's at 80p for 2kg, which works out at around 15p for a 1lb loaf. Quite yummy too - just switch olive oil for your fat in a regular quick wholemeal bread recipe, and knead in oil instead of dry flour, and it picks up the lovely, rich olive oil flavour. That's served with carrots and a yummy mushroom and bean pate. This is using up beans left over from another recipe. I know brown sludgy stuff isn't everyone's idea of yummy, but I like it. It's basically half a tin of black-eyed peas, drained (currently on offer 4 for £1 at Sainsbury's), plus about 1/4 pack basic mushrooms, chopped in large chunks and cooked down in a pan (97p punnet), 28g of cheddar (offer 800g for £5.00), and salt, pepper, sage and parsley to taste. Whizz together in a food processor until slightly coarse. This makes 4 good portions for 35p. Whole lunch here cost around 16p!
  
  

Paper plates make lunchtime feel like a party - yay!



Ooh - and I may be able to do a bit of copywriting using Textbroker as I've been accepted as a 4* writer. Cool!

We Can Be Heroes

I would have gone to see Stewart Lee at the Derngate last night, but I'm absolutely blooming skint. But, I am so glad I didn't pass up the opportunity to go and see the very funny Robin Ince, whose show - The Importance of Being Interested -  was the very first gig at NN Cafe this week. NN is the brand new cafe for the fairly new contemporary art gallery - NN - in Northampton's cultural quarter, and just happens to be run by my friends Tamsyn and Alan. It's very groovy in there! Loads of brilliant stuff going on - and they're showing the film Amelie today (gorgeous!).

Robin Ince - explaining.

I acquired a DVD of Nine Carols and Lessons for Godless People, which I've always wanted to see. I got the one with Alan Moore in it. Keeping it Northampton!

Also this week, I travelled to that there London to go and see m'friend the author Gareth Powell interviewed by his editor, Jonathon Oliver of Solaris for the BSFA meeting at The Artillery Arms (free event).The evening was well attended, and it was lovely to see peeps I've not seen since my birthday - or even before! Quite a high number of people who go to these things are writers (like, ahem, me, Paul Cornell, Gaie Sebold, Rebecca Levine and Lavie Tidhar), so it's a great thing to go to if you would like to meet published authors, editors, publishers and other knowledgable types, drink nice beer, and have a jolly good time.

We got to hear all about Gareth's writing career so far, and the success of his Ack-Ack Macacque series. If you fancy chatting with a monkey then you can reach him on Twitter. Apparently lots of ladies like flirting with the monkey. Alternatively, you can speak to Gareth instead.

Audrey Taylor opens proceedings. There are the raffle prizes!

My view of some of the audience. You can't see Gareth Powell, but Jonathon Oliver is clearly inspired by Paul Cornell's presence and casting a weirlight. Magic.

Ah - now I can see Gareth Powell's face!

Afterwards, I did a bookswap with Jonathon Oliver, so now have more free things to read. Also something else came in the post yesterday - a copy of Tony Ballantyne's Dream London. I get a free copy in exchange for a review.

 How gorgeous does that look? Another beautiful cover by South African artist Joey HiFi.

In frugal news this week:

• The bread I made last week was fine. I'm sure you're all relieved.
• I haven't made the pie yet.
• My dad has given me a load of tomatoes. He has advised me to keep the seeds as they're not F1. That way I can grow my own lovely tomatoes for free next year!
• Yesterday was my nephew's birthday. Fortunately, I bought his present ages ago (space books), but I made him a card. He was actually pretty impressed  by it - relief!

Honestly, he is impressed. Just distracted by a game of Minecraft.

•  OH has been given a load of cycling gear for nowt by a mate. It's very bright, but he now has stuff to practice in!

Does not come with bananas.

And today, I am cheering him on as he does HIS VERY FIRST TRIATHLON!!!!. I have cowbells - free present from Chain Reaction bikes! He's just cycled off and I have to get the bus in a minute. We'll be able to see his results here later.

Neil - you are my hero!

This week, I've still been battling my wounded knee, so I took a break from Parkrun to do a bit of volunteering. I handed out the tokens at the end. It was good fun, and I get points as if I won the race! Yay - points! I don't know what they do, but I like getting points anyway. Here's my volunteering face. Proof that not all selfies are necessarily flattering.

And this is me on Unseenn radio this week for those who have been waiting for it.

I have my phone back!

It's been a week of positives and negatives.  I've been feeling down as news from friends has been sad. I've missed my mom, but I have been able to spend time with my family and friends and that has been lovely.

This weekend I went to a science fiction convention in my native Wolverhampton and also celebrated Father's Day and my sister's birthday with my family.

This is what I made my sister.  It's a jewellery box made from upcycled cardboard and decorated with sixties fashion icon decoupage.  The lid has been plasticoated and the upper tier fitted with a ring holder in funky purple disco fabric.

Really busy with work at the moment so going to carry on with that.

A Cool Thing From USA

I'm back from my travels, having caught an overnight flight, landing at 10 this morning. I'm very spaced and woozy and have had to have a bit of a kip this afternoon, but I've made myself get up and about, or I'll ruin my whole weekend with crap sleeping patterns.

I did manage to get out one of the nights while I was in New Jersey, and went to a sports bar where I got to order a burger 'medium rare' - I thought it would be lush, but it was very so-so. I have to say, not a patch on our local Buddies diner-style restaurants here in Northampton!

If I had a few more days in New Jersey, I would have liked to go visit the newly opened boardwalks down on the shore. Of course, I'm a huge fan of a certain TV show set on the Jersey shoreline... nope, not Jersey Shores - my IQ is in triple, not single figures, thank you. I meant this sweet bit of moonshine:

 New Jersey was of course hit very hard by Hurricane Sandy last year. I've heard stories about the storm surge being so huge that trains got derailed and picked up by the water, to be deposited on the highway half a mile away. The media is showing the face of optimism, as coastal businesses hope to get NJ families to celebrate Memorial weekend locally, and tourists to visit the shores to spend a bit of much needed cash.

I'm also a bit sad I missed the cicadas. When I have said I wanted to see them, people think I'm mad. But they are just coming out now around the East Coast, and they won't be seen again for another seventeen years. I won't put any pictures in case anyone gets freaked out by bugs, but they are weird.

So, not too many photos to show you. I was intrigued by the mystery of grown-over buildings on a road featuring hotels and offices that isn't on some sat navs, it's so new.

I was also a bit shocked to learn I've gained about 4 pounds this week, despite eating mainly Lean Cuisines. Mind, I suppose breakfasts like this don't help...

I only had giant waffles the one day - honest!
And despite not being able to travel to New York this time, my colleagues mad sure I came away with a souvenir.

Now, you might not guess what that is at first look, but it's a model of the Chrysler Building and it's very, very, very cool.

Behold - my very first thing made using a 3D printer! My colleague made it just for me.

It's extremely light, and you can see how the printer has applied the layers of plastic, printing round and round, like you might crochet something, which is quite apt for a home-crafted object!

So, that's my cool thing.

Wedding Crafts: Look what I did!

Wedding craft progress so far:

Due to a couple of completely independant crises - all involving completely independant episodes of crafting - my Saturday night of girlie crafting turned into just me, a packet of custard creams, some rosé wine and a box set of Ashes to Ashes. Gotta love Gene Hunt!

Here, table planner in progress, stage 1. The place cards are all done and so is the box for cards. My place cards all feature an eminent Victorian or Edwardian and something associated with them and are stamped on the back with a wedding glasses stamp that we had bought for another project. I found a pack of A4 cards in Poundland for  - £1 (duh). Plenty to last for other crafting projects.

In fact Northampton's infamous variety of cheap shops have helped enormously.  Thanks to a tip off on Money Saving Expert I picked up a pack of CDs for a quid in Poundland for recording our ceremony music.

Here's the table planner a little further on (not quite finished). Some of the spaces have now been cut out for a red background to show through. Yet to be added are more devoré bits, trailing fronds and liana picked out in gold and (if I can find them) stick on bling.

Can you spot the various themes? Hardest I imagine will be the one for the top table, which is the actress Ellen Terry, who was a bit of a muse for Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw, as well as a friend to Lewis Carroll when she was a child, and later again after he deemed her respectable enough company (she ran away from the aging, stuffy husband that she was married to aged 16, the painter George Frederick Watts, and ran away to live in sin with Edward Godwin, who designed our town's beautiful Guildhall!). See theatre stage light scalloping, chains (representing her character Margaret in Faust) ending in pigtail-like tassles, cherubim, a Puck, and a couple of little frogs, of which she was quite fond.

 

Red gift wrap covers a free cardboard box to collect our cards. I hunted high and low for suitable paper and couldn't find any in the pound shops, so went to the reliable W H Smiths. For two large rolls, this cost £2.99, but I only used half of one roll. You can pay £5-8 for plain boxes that still need to be decorated, and some people pay a lot more, so this is a much more frugal effort.

 





 

 

A long time ago in a galaxy far away, I started making the favours. This is part one - A New Hope - or, strawberry white chocolate stormtroopers - just a few drops of strawberry essence in basic white chocolate. As you can see, the force is not strong with some of them. Due to time restrictions, and only having 6 stormtrooper moulds to work from, I also made use of old chocolate trays, which produced some unusually shaped chocolates. The truffle ganache ones will be made later this week as they will involve cream and will need to be kept refridgerated as long as possible. I sourced some cellophane wrap and ribbon which would have only cost about a fiver to package the lot, but OH thought he would help me out a few weeks ago and got proper boxes from Hobbycraft, which, as all crafters know, is more about the 'hobby' and less about the 'craft', and not so blooming cheap either. Still, he got to try one of the rejects and pronounced it "Mmmmmm delicious!", so that's all good.

 

 

But now we really have run out of money... everything else we still have to pay for is going to be on plastic. Austere times ahead...

 

And so phase one of frugaldom proper begins... to be continued.

The final countdown...

Reader, I am marrying him in 9 days' time!

...and money is running out (what's with the present participle there - it's gone!). Luckily, I have some wonderful friends who are helping me to achieve what will be a wonderful wedding day - undoubtedly!

I'm also using a bit of money savvy.

I'm going home tonight with a bag of orange and white packaging for making handmade chocolate favours this weekend and next week (got to make the ones with cream a bit closer to the day).

Sorry cocoa purists... but I'm adding a bit of froo froo to the basics so it should all be wonderful anyway.

For the table planner and name cards, I'm taking inspiration from a number of emminent Victorian and Edwardians, and keeping it elementary:

 

 

 

And for the card post box, I'm going a bit Blue Peter! Can you still buy crepe paper anywhere? I may have to settle for newspaper and a small pot of red gloss...

While my OH is out being a stag this weekend, I'm opening up my house to friends who wouldn't mind popping in for biscuits, tea, and cutting and sticking things. There's a lot to do and I really would appreciate a hand.

Alas, I've let the fitness slip a little as I've been so busy, so no parkrunning this week...but maybe next week for their first year party.

Feeling Crafty

I've had a busy old night, writing and editing. We took a break to watch the fabulous Utopia on channel 4, during which I got on with my tea cosy...

This came in a free kit from Clipper tea, along with packs of English Breakfast and Earl Grey teabags. Looking good so far, but I need to get it finished as I have a couple of gift knitting projects that I'd like to start and finish before the end of February.

A short while ago, OH came to join me in our little office to design some photo gifts on his laptop.

Yes, spot the homemade wine... unfortunately, I don't believe it's any good, so we'll have to have another go. OH makes a particularly good dry cider - just from basic juice and champagne yeast! We got the basic recipe from Downsizer.

We've had a really good week of budgeting and planning for the wedding. We decided the shopping budget was a little tight for us, but I'm going to handle the budget as it is for all groceries, toiletries, cleaning stuff and cat food, and  OH is in charge of stockpiling bargain meat for the freezer. In fact, he went shopping today. He did quite well, within budget and stuck to multipack deals and stickered bargains, but I meanly gave him a very middly 6/10 for his efforts, because I'm a stickler about what I consider to be a bargain. For example, 2 quail for £3.45 - yes, cheaper than normal, but you could probably get better value from something else. That said, I haven't tried quail before, so I'm looking forward to that meal.

The Joys of Thrifting and Gifting

As we save up for our big day, I am determined to make sure that we make our celebration as unique to ourselves as possible, while trying out new things.

My other half was very impressed by the card I made my nephew for his birthday (his birthday is today, but it was his party at the weekend). Ash liked it more when I pointed out that Eeyore was Winnie the Pooh's best friend.If I'd tried to make one of Winnie, I'd have had to use yellow-green instead of yellow foam. It would be as though Winnie had eaten too much honey made by the bees around that French M&Ms factory.

He also seemed to like the 'hitting sticks' we got him - a set of children's golf clubs. He is set to be a very sporty little boy indeed! Or a violent one...

The clubs were originally a present for me... dare I say I'm very short, but not that short.

I wore my latest craft project to the children's party - a thrifted jumper, bought back in November, that I jazzed up with an applique tartan stag's head on Friday. Bang on trend for £2.99! Unfortunately it got 'nephewed' before I had chance to take a picture as my 8-year old nephew, my little Genius, deceived me with a hug before using my clothes as handy chocolate-removing napkin.

I do believe this year my OH and I are going to be revisiting crafts with a vengeance. He has borrowed a pattern to make dashing waistcoats for his outfit, and if I have time I may be making dresses myself. I'm also going to be attending a chocolate-making workshop next month, run by my sister-in-law, an extremely talented cook and food-writer. She makes gorgeous chocolates, and if I can aim to reach her standards, I'll be making the favours for the wedding.

Don't these Baileys truffles look yummy?

www.annie-ko.com

 Plus, they will make marvellous Valentine's Day gifts.

Other good things this week - I got a new personal best time at Park Run: 5km in 30 minutes 53 - go me!

My First Handmade Thing of the Year (not the ransom note)

It's gone ten already, N is still scrabbling in the loft and I am looking round my office with a sinking feeling. We need to make an appointment with the registrar and our documents have gone walkabout. It's most definitely time to sort out the potential bookalanche in here.

So far, N has found a graphic calculator (with book), some coffee BBE September 2008 (which he says he'll drink now), a CD of Fugazi by Marillion, a Sony Walkman, and by the sounds of it, a wooden recorder.

Also a bizarre ransom note...

I know where the last smerfs are. Put £5 million in Boobys bank or I'll send you all of their heads. Nice.

We keep scribbling over our wedding budget. It goes down when we get a great idea, it goes up again when we realise we can't do what we thought we could.

But we are committed, and it means saving money wherever possible.

Hence this evening, I made a birthday card for my nephew who is having a party on Saturday. It's made of blue card and various bits of craft foam left over from an old project.

 I would have done Winnie, but I've used up all my yellow foam. I prefer Eeyore anyway, myself!

We are going to cheer ourselves up before bed with another grim episode of Boardwalk Empire, which N got for Christmas and which is fab.