Au revoir, Violent.

Violet (Violent) died last night.

She was one of three girls we kept from our 2018 hatch (Violet, Elizabeth, and Bott).   She was the offspring of one of the Welsh Black  All 3 of them were very assertive and bossy girls, and I ended up calling her Violent because she really was.

The three of them were part of our allotment flock (pre covid) but we never had the chance to breed from them.   Their Dad was Bertie, our Vorwerk.  Her Mum was one of the allotment girls. She (and Bott) had a flat comb, rather than the pea comb that the original Welsh Black (and thir mixed offspring) had.   I'd always assumed her Mu, was Phyllis or Dilys, because they also had flat combs (but that was just a lazy assumption).

Most of the lovely girls we bred had the nature of the Australorp (or going back to Roo) part of their heritage.  These 3 were not the same.  Maybe it was the Vorwerk influence.  

None of the three of them liked to be handled, and we never forced them.  She would eat out of my hand,  but that was it.

Violet would go broody, for a long period, each year, and this provided a respite for the lower ranking hens. She was a gorgeous looking girl,  her black feathers had the irridescence of her Australorp heritage

Her death was quick. 

She was a bit off colour a couple of days ago, and was definitely off colour yesterday.  Her comb and wattles weren't right, but she was still a good heavy weight so hadn't been hiding an illness.   I gave her some Nutridrops, and checked her over, and she just looked like she was on her way out. I offered her mealworms. She ate one, but refused others,  She took herself off to the Cube very early,

I wasn't surprised to find her dead in the coop this morning.  

She was coming up to 6 years old, which is a reasonable age.#

I will miss her. 

 

Fail

Last week, I decided that this week I would do a few embroidery projects.

I'd started to keep a notebook of  things I wanted to make (both sewing and embroidery) so that I could try and keep motivated.  It's worked quite well for sewing.

I had a few things to sort out yesterday (Monday), so I set aside today to Make Something.  It was even better that DH was going to be out, as that would give me a clear run.

It's now 3.45 pm and I have done nothing but procrastinate.  Even now, writing this blog entry, I'm procrastinating.

Earlier today, when I realised what I was doing,  I thought seriously about calling it a day.    I don't want to rush in to selling my machine,  in case it's a temporary aberration.     The thought had crossed my mind before, but I'd dismissed it.  

Now I'm thinking it might be the right thing to do.   It would free up a lot of space.  It's not just the machine,  it's the threads, the stabilisers, the peripheral stuff.

I will try again later this week to do something.     If I get started, I might get re-enthused. I just need to get my motivation sorted.

 

 

Just for One Day

My best friend Y and I went to see Just for One Day on Monday. 

Normally, we'd take an afternoon but I wasn't sure how I'd be.   I was fine on the train, and walking to the dinner.  The meal was fine, we just had some pizza - no starters, no puddings, no alcohol.   At the theatre, I had a hot chocolate.   I was then felt a bit unwell.

Before the performance started I decided I'd have to go to the toilet, just in case my queasiness turned into something else.  Good job I did.

I felt better afterwards.

The show was very enjoyable.   It reawakened a love of the music of my teenage years.   I really enjoyed the story.  We talked about what we remembered from the original day.

The train jounrey back was straightforward, and I slept well when I got home.  It was so lovely to spend an evening with my lovely friend,  and the train journey is such a great opportuntity to catch up.

Every time DH is out, I've been putting on something from the late 70s/early 80s.  I've just bought some of the Now collections for some of the years.   

I expect it'll wear off. 

I made a thing!

I made something!

A new skirt. To replace the one soaked in blood and thrown away.

I actually wanted to make a skirt with a black background, but I couldn't find any suitable scuba in my stash.  I had to chuckle at that.    

I went for something funky instead.

I actually attempted to make 2 skirts, but I found an unfixable fault in the second lot of fabric.  Good job it wasn't the first lot of fabric, as I think I would have just given up at that point.

The skirt needs hemming, and I might post a pic of it properly when that's done.

Hear, hear

I had my ENT appointment today.

The consultant thinks I've just gone deaf in that ear. 

He checked my ears,   did a test with a tuning fork (which I failed, but I did find the room quite noisy). and he put a camera up each nostril.

There is a 6 week window when steroids may help with possible nerve damage.  I'm outside that window now,  and the steroids won't help.

He's requesting an MRI to check my middle ear, just in case.    I've got a hearing test scheduled for early next month,  but I won't have had the MRI by then.

Throwing in the towel

The overlocker is still on the big table in the kitchen,  and so I decided to do something to repurpose a towel. 

Not very exciting, perhaps,  but I'm quite happy.   

I made a small pile of flannels, all the same size.  I made a couple of washing mits, with twill in the corner so they can be hung up,  and a few finger things (with hangers) which are designed to make it easier for us to clean the cats eyes.   I've still got plenty of towel left over, but my back was starting to ache.

The 6mm cotton twill, which  I've been using to make the hanging loops,  is a bit wide at 6mm.   I've placed an order for some other stuff which is 2mm and 3mm wide.  I was restrained, and only ordered 10 metres of each sort.  I'll buy a full roll of whichever ones turn out to be the right type.

 It's the first time I've used a good towel to make things, usually I use an old towel.  This was much more satisfying. 

I was also pleased to find that the finger things also work really, really well for cleaning the seal on the washing machine.   I wipe it every time I unload the machine,  and up to now I've been using kitchen towel.    I think I'll make some more finger things for this specific purpose, and this time I will use an old towel rather than a good one.

If I can find any old towels in the cupboard. 

I've just remembered,  I vacuum packed a load (along with loads of old sheets and duvet covers) and sent them to Monkey World!  I'm not sure I've got any left!

I expect I'll find something. 

Making Hay

On Thursday I decided to batch cook a selection of curries, using my Mrs Balbir Singh's spice mixes.  I defrosted various packs of meat.     It was a long old afternoon,   but I ended up with:

• 4x 2 people portions of Mutton Rogan Josh
• 4x2 people portions of Shahi Pork Massala
• 16 individual portions (we use them as shared side dishes) of Beef Keema Massala
• 2 x 2 portions of beef Goan Vindaloo
• Many falafel sized pieces of lamb & pork kebab "meatbal/kebab" type things

The stack of Lav glass  lidded bowls  and the small bowls from Costco last time I went, really came into their own, as they helped me keep everything organised before cooking.  I have the recipe cards laminated, and I stood the bowls of ingredients on the relevant cards,  helping me make such a large number of dishes very smoothly.   They were worth the money!

I also made that evening's dinner:  a Keralan Coconut Curry, with fish!   I used some cod and some barramundi from the freezer.  The flavours of the spices cancelled out the fishiness of the fish, so I was able to eat it.

I had intended, but failed, to make  Chana Massala and Daal.  I couldn't find the chickpeas, and I didn't have the energy to make Daal.    Probably just as well,  as I don't think I'd have had the energy reserves for that too.

I felt like I'd achieved something!

Yesterday, we put the mega mutton joint on to cook.  It was the first time in months (maybe longer!) that we'd cooked anything in the oven.    Our airdryers and pressure cooker normally do the cooking.

My lovely brother arrived, to accompany me to Costco.   I've been struggling to make myself go on my own,   and I'd started to run out (or had completely run out) of a few things.

I bought a lot while I was there,  only a couple of extras from my list.

I bought 5kg of potatoes, a load of garlic, and some pre grated strong cheddar (yes, I know it would have been much cheaper to buy a block and grate it myself).  When I got home, I peeled 3kg of potatoes, pressure cooked them with one and a half peeled heads of garlic. While they were pressure cooking, I melted 500h of butter, added in the other half head of garlic, crushed), and left that to infuse, then put in a tonne of black pepper.   When the potatoes and garlic were cooked,  I Masha'd  them along with about half of the melted butter/pepper/garlic, then added 1kg of cheese and the rest of the melted butter.  The Masha was fantastic as always. 

I ended up 4 and a half kilos of Aligot mash, which I portioned up for the freezer (keeping a couple of huge portions  for dinner). 

The potato thing was all very quick,  and I'm so happy to have it in my freezer.    I need to do the rest of the potatoes, and I'll try and do something today before the enthusiasm (or capability) wanes.

Chest Freezer inventory

We've been meaning to do it for months, and today we finally did it.

We have an upright freezer in the kitchen which is always rammed.  I will try and learn to not fill it up so much, eventually.    Generally, most of the contents are well rotated, because I keep stuff we actually use in it.  It's also home to the cats' raw food (they have a whole drawer),  and we have a whole drawer for "ready meals" which are from my habit of cooking in bulk and freezing.

In the summerhouse, we have a fridge freezer.  The freezer part was originally going to be for ice cubes, drinks, ice creams,  froozen fruit for drinks, and other summer stuff.... but it's ended up being storage.

The chest freezer is smallish (not the smallest size), and was designed for cuts of meat, potato products, and a stash of frozen vegetables.  It's not a frost free freezer, which means the food keeps better in it.  The stuff in here is stored in bags of similar products,  so it's easy to hoik out and put back in when searching the depths.  It was this one which needed inventorying.

We did a quick check of the upright freezer first, and pulled a few bits out to bring into the house.   Then, as I emptied the freezer, we moved a few things intot the upright.  And more things into the bag to come into the house.

In fact, it wasn't too bad,  nowhere near as bad I was expecting.  The bags idea had worked brilliantly.  

Right at the bottom, we found a mahoosive shoulder of mutton, 4.6 kg, which was labelled and dated July 2020.

We'd had half a sheep, and this joint was earmarked for a big family get together which never took place. We looked at it, looked at each other, and came to the same conclusion.  It had to be eaten.  So, that’s on the side defrosting, and we'll aim to cook it on Friday.  We can freeze some for an impromptu mutton roast, as long as it tastes good.

While the freezer was empty, I decided to scrape it down, using a Scrapr and a jug.  It didn't take long, it wasn't nearly as frozen up as I expected.   One of the advantages of having a full freezer is that ice is less likely to form. 

I then started to put stuff back.

The medlars, which are waiting for me to have the energy to make medlar jelly, went at the bottom.  Then 2 joints of pork which we might turn into sausages,  and a stack of pork bellies, went in.  A bag of chicken quarters (our own chooks); and then the smaller stuff.   The small bag which contained our sausages,  another one with some pork mince,  and another one with some mutton mince.   Then a large bag containing "potato products" (sweet potato fries, one huge bag of french fries, some waffle fries, some hash browns, and some croquettes).  Underneath the basket went the ice cream products.  And finally, the spillover frozen vegetables went on top (they have their own drawer in the upright freezer, which was packed).

And it was done.

There is space at the top, which I am resisting filling.    I'm planning a big batch cooking session, and I'll need to rearrange the freezer in the house to fit everything in, which means some
things may get sent to the chest freezer.  Once that's done, I'll think about what would be helpful to stock up on.

Quick sew

My overlocker is on the big table in the kitchen, where I'd left it after coming back from the embellisher course.    

On Saturday, I decided I'd make DH a new cover for his foot quilt (3 years ago I made the original).  We had a duvet cover which had irreparably torn.  It was a brushed cotton fabric I really liked, (we actually have 2 of them so we can have one aon the bed all the time during the winter)

I decided to try and repurpose it, and i wanted to make the mini cover as efficiently as possible.

And I did!

I even remembered to make the opening down the long side, so SH doesn't accidentally catch his feet in it.

No mistakes!!

Actually it was really easy because I used one of the originally stitched sides, and the bottom which already had the buttons attached.  All I had to do was cut it correctly, sew 2 sides and reinforce another, and it was done. 

I didn't take a pictur before putting it on the bed.   It's taken me a few days to remember to fold the duvet back and take a pic

I know it's a tiny thing, but it made me happy.

Stacking up

Clever DH made me some stackers for the mini Le Creuset casseroles. 

I bought a set of these on a whim, when I saw them on FB marketplace.  When I got them, I thought they were quite cute, but I couldn't imagine what I'd do with them - certainly not 7 of them. 

They turned out to be one of those serendipitous purchases.  They are fantastic in the airfryer for heating  and then serving meals.  I found I could fit loads of them in the Versazone, which was particularly great when I was doing home made curries. It meant I could put main course, sides, and all sorts in at once, andthen just serve up in the dishes.

They don't stack well in the cupboard. Originally I was storing them with the lids inverted, and then stacking them on top of each other.  It was OK until I went to get one, and another one slid onto the flor and smashed.   I bought a preloved replacement, and that broke immediatelty.   I started stacking them without the lids, and I put the lids in a cardboard box.   That was better, but I could only stack them 2 high to avoid catastrophes.

Meanwhile, i found I wanted a variety of colours.  Not (just) because I wanted a variety of colours,  but I thought a variety would be helpful when using a lot at once. One colour for the main course,  and a different colour each for the various sides.    I searched for ages on FB narketplace, but some the ones that were inexpensive people woudnt post,  and the ones that were expensive were too expeinsive once pst was added.  

By accident, I happened upon the Le Crfeuset website on the last day of their sale, and I bouight a set of 4 different colour ones, for about te same as I would have been paying preloved.  The new nes are particularly lovely, and I was worried about breaking them.

I had some ideas for putting them in a kind of mug stand, but I couldn't find one that was the right size AND would work with the two handles.  Then I had a look for 3D printed ideas, and found a chap who had had exactly this problem.  He'd made something which seemed like a good idea, had got feedback, and then had made something completely different.

I showed DH and asked if he would be able to print these for me.   I wanted something which would let me stack variable numbers, and which wouldn't get in the way if it wasn't being used.

He was happy to, but wanted to do his own design (building on the shape that chap had used).   He made one, which took forever to print), and then he refined the design further and printed another one. The revised design "only" took 3 hours to print.  

I'm really happy with the design, and DH is going to print more. Pic shows both v1 and v2. V2 is upside down in the pic,  you can still see that the band is much narrower, and it is shorter, which is why it takes less time to print.

A moment of self pity

Yesterday I went to Baby Lock UK to do a 1 day workshop.  It was for a machine I'd bought, on a whim, in January 2021.  

On the journey there (vile driving conditions),  I found myself thinking about why it had taken me so long to do this.  I worked backwards.

I'd had a course booked for October last year, which was cancelled because of lack of interest.  I'd booked that around January 2023, I think.   So why had it taken me two years to book it?  

I remembered that I'd had trouble finding a course....  and then I was overcome a wave of self pity as I realised that when I bought the machine,  on impulse after seeing an online demo,  I was well.  And then I wasn't well,  and the being unwell and trying to manage it all had taken over my life.  I hadn't been able to do anything.

I really did feel sorry for myself.  I felt sorry that I was such a shell of my former self.  That I was reduced celebrating such tiny achievements. 

I shook the sensation off before it settled too much.   No point in wallowing, and many people would be happy to have only my problems.

I reminded myself that  I was well enough to drive myself to the Workshop, do the Workshop and drive home... and a year ago,  that wouldn't have been thinkable, so I should be grateful for the wins.

This morning, I again thought about before  all this started.   I decided I need to push again to try and get some help identifying what is actually causing the problem, and I'm going to the surgery to try and make an appointment (rather than phoning, where I'll be told to fill in a econsult. which is hard to do when I', taking about an issue which has been ongoing for 2 years and 7 momths now.

 

A stitch in time

It's been a trying week.

We spent 6 hours in A&E last Saturday,  getting home at about 2.30am on Sunday morning.   I was due to travel to see my Mum on Sunday,  and my brother arranged to come later than we originally planned to gave me time to try and sleep (and to see how my leg was).  DH had an event  booked for Sunday, but he had to cancel: there was no way he could manage the early start.

We had arranged to spend three nights with my Mum, and she really needed it.  We were able to help her with a few things that needed doing,and we took the dog to the vets while we were there to get a problem sorted.  We were a bit worried that it would not be good news, but we were lucky.

It was Mum's birthday while we were there, and this was one of the reasons we chose this time to visit and to spend so long there.  We went out to dinner,  with her best friend.   Mum had a few hours where she was able to think about something other than my Dad, and to just have a good time. It did her the world of good.

The no-attendance cremation was on Wednesday.  We should have picked a time where we would assume Dad had been "done", but we didn't think of it.    Wednesday night Mum had a better night's sleep than she'd had for ages, and that was probably because the cremation was out of the way.  The next Thing will be for her to collect Dad's ashes.

I found I wasn't able to do my recommended exercises, because they all pulled on my stitches.  I also wasn't able to shower, so I had to have a strip wash each morning.  On Sunday morning, before my brother arrived to collect me,  I'd cut a towel into 4 large flannels, and overlocked the edges. They worked well.    (The overlocker wasn't very well though, so that's got to go in to be looked at next week). 

We came home Wednesday evening, and I was surprised at how tired I was. My brother had, as usual, done all the driving.

Thursday was the Dentist, and we only just got there in time.  Except it wasn't, I had the date wrong. 

I also had a hair appointment, which was much needed.  

Friday was the day I'd been told to have the stitches out, and I had an appointment booked with the Nurse.   I think it was too soon really, Monday would have been better.

The Nurse taped over my wound, right angles to the gash. She then covered it with a clear waterproof square, so that I  could have a shower.  I spent ages in the shower on Saturday morning, soaking my aching back and shoulders.

I had to drive from my stitch removal straight to my Physio  and I really, really needed it.

Today we had to get up early (relatively speaking) as I had booked an Ocado delivery and we had Paul coming to do some work in the garden.      I'm off to a birthday party today, and I really don't feel like going anywhere.

 I'd like to just go back to bed.

It's another "busy" week next week, so I hope the leg improves,