What I Wore Wednesday

I've decided at the last minute to join in with What I Wore Wednesday blog hop that (mostly)yummymummy takes part in (she's uber stylish and 21, ok maybe 24), so please excuse the photo I just took in the loos at work (classy chick eh?)

 

This is my autumn uniform at the moment: skinny jeans in black from GAP, purple cowl neck, ruched vest top from Banana Republic, fuschia cardigan from Banana Republic, scarf from Zara and my trusty Rocket Dogs. I know the Rocket Dogs aren't the most stylish of boots and this outfit looks much better when I wear my chestnut brown long leather boots, but they are so comfy and essential for my long commute. 

Feeling frugal

So, in an effort to make Operation Relocation happen I've had to perform quite a major mind-shift. I've had to embrace my husband's frugal ways.

No more shoe shopping. *sob*

No more coffees on the way to work. *weep*

No more mercy dash into M&S on the way home for a yummy pudding/bar of chocolate/tub of whatever. *wail*

It's lentils all the way. *wibble*

But that's ok, because we've discovered some gorgeous lentil recipes and thankfully the boys are not fussy eaters. The meal we made on Sunday night was gorgeous and so simple, so I thought I'd share it here in case anyone else was feeling frugal:

Lentil and Sausage casserole
8 sausages (Aldi have a great selection that are under £1.50 and not too suspicious)
Half a pack of salami slices (we buy salami from Aldi, it's only 99p and it's delish)
300g of green lentils
1 litre of chicken stock (we had a roast chicken last week and made stock from the carcass)
2 medium carrots
1 onion
2 bay leaves

Saute the onion in some oil until golden, chop up the carrots and let them soften in the pan before adding the salami slices, lentils, sausages, bay leaves and chicken stock. Bring to the boil and let simmer gently for 30 minutes. Serve with some lovely fluffy rice in big bowls and enjoy!

Warning: the sausages do turn a rather alarming hue of green and do remember to fish out the bay leaves before you serve.

Tip: If you chop up the sausages, this recipe can easily serve 2 adults and 2 children with leftovers for another 2 dinners and 1 lunch.

Does anyone else have any scrummy lentil recipes? Do share!

Tell me about yourself...

I'm quite excited to have received my first blog award - big thank you to the lovely Claire at http://atleastdaddycancook.blogspot.com/.

The rules for receiving this award are:

1. I must tell 7 secret things about myself.
2. I must pass the award onto 15 other bloggers.

I'm a bit rubbish at nominating people for these things, so if you're reading this and fancy joining in, consider yourself tagged! *cop out I know*

So, 7 secret things:

1. This blog is probably the biggest secret I've ever kept. None of my friends know about it and only a handful of people know I blog at all. I like it that way. This is my space to vent and rant and possibly overshare, so the last thing I want is work peeps and vague associates knowing my innermost thoughts *shudders*
2. I have an escape fund. I'm happily married and have no plans to escape anywhere, but just in case something awful happens, I like to know I have the means to whisk myself and my those closest to me away to safety.
3. I absolutely suck at being a stay-at-home mum. I'd love to do it. But I just can't. I become a horrible, lazy, un-motivated lump and resent all those glamourous people with paying jobs. Sigh, the grass is always greener I guess.
4. I'm a snob. There, I said it. 
5. Probably not unrelated to 4, but I can be a terrible judgey-pants sometimes. It's not big, it's not clever and it's certainly not funny. I'm trying very hard to stop being this way and to lock those big ugly judgey pants away in a dark closet, but sometimes they sneak out and surprise me when I least expect it.
6. I have a fear of driving over bridges. If it's a short bridge, I'm ok. But if it's as big as the Forth Road Bridge, it takes a lot of internal coaxing and reassurance from Husband to believe that I'm not going to drive off the edge. I don't know what it is. I'm not scare of height or water, but when it comes to bridges I just can't trust myself not to drive off them at speed. What's that all about?
7. I love Queen. The band, not the monarch. They rock. 

There, now I've outed myself as being a not very nice person sometimes with rotten taste in music is there anybody still there? *tumbleweed, echoes, more tumbleweed* hello? Anybody?

Now it's your turn :-)

Some crafty distractions

Today started off pretty normal. The boys woke up too early, porridge was thrown around the kitchen and we wondered aloud when we'd ever get a lie in again.

But then, the day improved dramatically with a package of Fimo from the lovely Merrily at CraftMerrily. In fact, Bigger was so excited at the prospect of modelling his very own monsters that he promptly collided with the sofa, knocking his wobbly tooth so that it protruded at rather an alarming angle. A trip to the emergency dentist ensued, but Bigger is now happily tucked up in bed clutching his first tooth for the tooth fairy.

But back to the Fimo. After all that excitement, some Fimo modelling was just the sort of calm activity we needed this afternoon.

Fimo fun

At first we did find the Fimo quite difficult to work with, but as it (and we) warmed up, we got a feel for how best to mould it into shape. The kit we tried had some ideas of what you could make as well as some step-by-step instructions, which were quite handy. 

Toothless (the dragon or the boy?)

Bigger made a dragon and I (cough. well yeah, of course I had a go!) made the Loch Ness Monster. What do you think?

Nessie in a fetching stripe ensemble

We've also got some Soft Fimo to try out, so I'll be interested to see if our modelling skills improve. I do lov doing this sort of thing, but so often end up taking over and poor Bigger ends up spectating. But I was very restrained today and limited myself to my Loch Ness Monster, leaving Bigger to model his Fimo the way he wanted to and not the way I wanted to. This sort of activity is great for fine motor skills and concentration and it's just a fun way to spend time with my boy. Winners all round.

I might just have to order some Fimo for my own personal use though. Can't have Bigger having all the fun ;-)

I don't think I'll ever be able to make this sort of thing though. I'll stick to Nessie and her mate Sammy the snake. But this site here, which is Merrily's family blog has some great Fimo ideas. We'll definitely read more of her blog before we get stuck into the 2nd pack of Fimo! Practice makes...well, maybe not perfect but hopefully I can graduate from sausage-body based animals.

Disclosure: We were sent 1 Fimo Soft Create Your Own Monsters & Dinosaurs Set and 1 Fimo Soft Basic Starter Kit  from Craft Merrily to review but did not receive any other financial incentive and the words are all my own.

Truth

 

Two of my favourite bloggers have been talking about truth in the blogosphere lately (here, here and here). So I decided to step up and share some truths with you.

I made pancakes for breakfast yesterday morning. Idyllic? No... you'd have to ignore the smoke alarm constantly going off because I had the pan too hot and look past the first few burnt attempts and ignore the 1 year old screaming because his stomach decided his throat had been cut...to get within 50 miles of idyllic.

Husband liked them though.

And what did we eat with these pancakes of perfection? Fresh fruit and a drizzle of maple syrup? Fruit compote? Nah. Golden syrup. You can see the guilty tin just edging into the photo on the left hand side. Damn they tasted good enrobed in such sticky golden loveliness though.

So what other truths can I reveal? That NaNoWriMo gig I signed up for...I've gone totally off the idea and ran out of steam 5,000 words in. 

What else? After being so determined that TV would not become a substitute babysitter with Bigger, I gleefully plonk Littler in front of cbeebies on a Friday just so I can have a hot cup of coffee. On my own. In peace.

And that's the truth.

Cold feet

What already? Surely not.

We only made the decision to relocate this week but the doubts have already started to creep in.

What if we just mortgage ourselves up to the hilt and blow all our savings on a fabulous house down here?

What if the boys end up getting picked-on because of their english accents?

What if what if what if...

But then I think about the beaches and the skies and their grandparents.

And I know that we just have to make sure any doubts we have are answered.

A fabulous house down here would mean a lot more stress and a lot less family time. No thanks.

Eating dinner every night with my boys? Yes please.

Mortgage free? Yes please.

My boys getting teased for having english accents...we'll cross that bridge when and if we ever come to it. Children are amazing at adapting and my children are, of course, pretty darn amazing.

There's bound to be doubts. Of course there are, it's a huge step. But when we first moved down here to the bright lights of London town, we had nothing. Absolutely nothing. Only the belongings that we could fit into our battered rucksacks. We didn't even have enough money to cover our rent. But we managed.

And if we can do that, we can do this.

I just need to buy warmer socks.

In search of something elusive?

So, after 24 hours of living with the idea, lots of searches on property websites and a quick sense check with the grandparents, we're still in love with the idea of relocating to Scotland.

It's funny, because I always swore we'd never move back 'home'. The North-East of Scotland can be a very drab and dull place to be at times. But then, so can South London.

So, why are we jumping ship and returning to our roots?

Well, I guess we're in search of that elusive improved quality of life. But will we find it in the town we grew up in?

Well, for a start, if we save our pennies over the next 18 months, we should be able to buy a house outright and live mortgage free. That would be a huge deal and would mean that we could both work part-time or survive happily on a single income.

Then there's the sky. In London, you only ever get to see the sky above you. Now, I know that sounds weird, but the sky in the North East of Scotland is immense. It's above you, in front of you, behind you, all around you. With very few tall buildings and certainly no skyscrapers, the horizon is a straight line in the distance rather than a cityscape. Therefore, bigger skys.

3rd up is the countryside. Where we're planning to move to is a small town in a very rural area. You can walk from one end of town to the other in about 30 minutes. Head 6 miles north and you hit deserted beaches. Head south and you hit the Cairngorm mountains.

4th on the list is family. This should probably be further up the list, but hey ho. Both sets of grandparents (husbands parents and mine) still live in the town and so we'd have a choice of babysitters, sleepover hosts and emotional support on the doorstep. It would be lovely for the boys to grow up seeing their grandparents on a weekly basis instead of just high days and holidays.

Then there's all the things we won't have to do.

We won't have to travel by train, paying horrific rail fares without a guaranteed seat, into London every day.

We probably won't need to pay for any childcare.

We won't have a mortgage (hurrah!)

These 7 things, to me, amount to an improved quality of life.

Now we just need to get on with planning the details. Like jobs.

A momentus decision

Last night, the husband and I had a bit of an epiphany.

We've been struggling since I went back to work to be honest and neither of us are happy in our jobs at the moment.

It's been a tough year healthwise with the husband in hospital for 2 months and all the worry that surrounded it. Then just when we were dusting ourselves off and getting back on our feet, Littler ended up in hospital. We're all back to full health now but I think those two episodes tipped us over the edge.

We've both been having a bit of a mid-30s crisis. We feel trapped. Our flat is too small and we need a bigger house but our jobs suck and we don't want to work longer hours, so how on earth were we going to afford a bigger mortgage?

Well, I think we made a decision last night. It won't happen overnight and it's going to take some major planning, saving and networking but at least we've taken the first step by making the decision.

*drumroll*

I think we're going to try and move back to Scotland.

Husband did some very rough calculations and it makes sense financially. It will mean a change of jobs for at least one of us, but being nearer family, having no mortgage (or a very small one) and maybe even being able to walk to work would be pretty darned good.

In theory, I could go freelance and work from home. So that would ease the pressure somewhat on the job front.

I'm rambling now, I know. But I need to write this down so we can start to visualise it and work towards making it reality.

No-one is suddenly going to give us huge payrises. We don't play the lottery. So we need to do something to turn our lives around. We have no firm ties to London and sort of ended up living here by accident. We didn't choose London, it sort of chose us....

So we bumbled along making the most of the situation, not really planning anything.

But now we have a goal. We're going to sketch out a 2 year plan and make it happen.

I'm excited and a little frightened but I also feel like a huge weight has been lifted from us. We can see a way out now.

We just need to work out the how. And save like crazy.

Home, not just for Christmas, but for good we hope

Home, where our boys can run the length of this beach every weekend if they wish

But it's all good!