Funny how being away from my home for three days out of the last seven results in an enormous backlog of domestic duties such as washing,ironing,buying food,hoovering and the like. I caught up big time today after some really lovely special occasions meant I had to be out and about instead of at home doing the usual bits and pieces.
Last Tuesday my best friend was supremely generous to have me accompany her to a pre-wedding spa day at a nice Cheltenham hotel,a few days later the children and I headed down to Bristol to see the lovely little Unitarian chapel where her wedding was to take place while the bride and groom sorted out where various people would sit and the following day was the big day itself. Actually come to think of it yesterday was pretty much written off too as I was suffering from the after effects of non-stop champagne quoiffing and not a lot to eat. I did manage to recover enough to be taken to a lovely garden centre for a Mother’s Day treat but mercifully the wind was blowing a gale so none of my border-digging,pond making plans were not able to be fulfilled.
While I worked on getting the house back in order today the kids played really nicely together,went outside in the gales to watch the wind blow bubbles instead of having to use their own breath with their tubs of bubble mixture and marvelled at how there was snow on the distant hills but none in our garden. As I washed,hung out to dry,took in and folded endless loads of laundry I pondered how one knows what the right number of clothes to have is. I realised that each room I entered had piles of clean clothes to put away,yet drawers full of clothes and yet more waiting to be folded or washed in laundry baskets or on clothes airers/radiators it is quite possible that we all have too many in our house. I’m bad at being able to give away things that have been given to me,especially if the things are lovely. How do I decide which of the 6 coats my daughter has been given by relatives (all from charity shops I hasten to add) to pass on to another charity shop?
I think the solution is to do it the ‘Flylady Way’and to set a timer for 15 minutes and just go through as many drawers as you can and weed out anything that is no longer worn,too small (kids),too tight (me),never looks nice,is too tatty/stained and bung them all into a bag. Do this a couple of times and the job should be done. I just dread anyone saying ‘Where’s that lovely fluffy jacket I gave X?’but they never would.
Today we ate:
(Kids tea) Cauliflower &broccoli cheese bake.
Cheese sauce made with cornflour instead of plain flour as I try to reduce the kids wheat intake. Loads of mild cheddar to make it gooey and some really mature cheddar for flavour. I popped it under the grill to make it look appetizing and involved both kids by having them grate cheese,stir the sauce,look under the grill to see when it was bubbling and browning. I also take the serving dish to the table for them to ‘help themselves’(aided by me) it seems to make them more inclined to eat what’s been cooked.
I saved the water from the broc &cauli for veg stock.
(Grown-ups’dinner) Lamb Hot-Pot
I found some unidentified cubes of meat in the freezer and luckily saw very faint ‘Lamb’label scrawl on the bag as I tore it open.
I chopped the meat into smaller chunks then fried it to give some colour. I remembered that I’d got the meat when wanting to make a shepherds pie recipe a while back when it seemed almost impossible to get hold of chunks of a cut of lamb suitable for stewing,made note to ask local butcher about that and to buy some more when he next has some. I then sliced an onion,a carrot,a parsnip and finely chopped some celery,added it all to my favourite brown pottery casserole dish (50p from charity shop),covered with the veg water from kids tea,seasoned it with loads of black pepper and salt. Added a couple of small handfuls of peal barley for extra nourishment and covered the thing with peeled,sliced,uncooked potatoes. Put in the oven at 160 deg for approx 90 mins. Really really nice.
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