TARRAGON & THYME

We had a good trawl around the charity shops.  Cancer Research had a lot of lovely new items in on Christmas decorations as did many of the others.  Here is the link for the Cancer Research website: https://shop.cancerresearchuk.org/christmas-gifts/christmas-homeware-decorations?page=1 It is worth poking your head in to see what they have.  A lot of them are doing new items for sale in their Christmas ranges and they have a lovely selection.  I went into one of the charity shops and found a lovely wooden and painted advent calendar for £20.  Shall certainly look for that again next time we pay a visit. We also nipped into M & S and they have their decorations out too. I am afraid I am going more and more towards home made stuff much more unique and different although I cannot resist a decent set of glass baubles! My mum when I was a little girl always had a ballerina with a golden crown with a yellow net dress which crowned the top of the tree...

I am sorry I did not get to blog yesterday however real life got in the way again. I had a fantastic day out with my friend and a good mooch around the Antiques Centre. Lots of lovely stuff could have found itself home with me yesterday. Found some wonderful Kitchenalia items in there yesterday.  Some really unusual ones.  Hope they still have them shortly.   We had a lovely Sunday lunch courtesy of the King's Head in Maiden Lane   https://www.kingsheadstamford.co.uk/ (a haunt from when I was a teenager); had roast beef and all the trimmings and it was delicious.  We had a good recce around the charity shops as well although there was not as much in this time around.  Will see what a difference of a week makes and see what there is this weekend to come.  After our meander around Stamford I went back to my friend's home for a little while for a good chat and of course a pot of tea.  Something I am very partial to.  As I was late...

Well the first Saturday working has now been completed.  I must say this side of the new job is taking me some getting used to.  OH was supposed to have worked overtime today but unfortunately he has a kidney infection  so he popped me into work and then came back and spent sometime in the warm at home.  He came to pick me up later on. When I get my head down time soon passes, but I still feel very slow with what I am doing.  There is a lot to learn as well.  Will see how it goes in the greater scheme of things. I am tired, as I have been all week.  I think part of it is down to not having seen much sunshine this week as well  This last summer has been a good one for me in that I have been out and about in the sun more than I have ever been and I think that is why I have had such a good summer comparatively on the pain front. When I got home I was intending to go into the bedroom again.  I did manage to get some stuff done yester...

Well the fruit I have is more Clementines than oranges but even so they will be useful either to dry whole or in slices.  I have never done this before so I really am sticking my head in no man's land with this.  They came from the veg shop at £1 per bowl.  Initially I have bought £3 worth = 3 bowls. I intend following a tutorial from here: orange slice garland It gives you details on how to dry the oranges and how to build up the garland.  I already have some hessian in which can also be added to the garland cut into little strips and also a nice homely string. The orange slices will also be useful for adding to fresh greenery decorations such as door wreaths and also to the Christmas tree and also garlands. They can also be used in making up mulling spice  packs to add to a bottle of wine which again makes a useful present. And for making into a nice fruit drink There are therefore many uses for these fruit slices....

This year I have found an idea for a Christmas stocking which upcycles and uses a crochet lace mat to embellish it.  I love the simplicity and resourcefulness of this particular project and I think it looks very glam and very lady-like. There was no tutorial per se but the image above but I did locate a free pdf for a Christmas stocking which can be used. the link for that is here: https://www.arkathwyn.com/blog/free-pattern-classic-christmas-stocking   from arkathwyn.    There are many others on Pinterest though. Being as I have one or lace two mats in-house I thought that this might be a nice project to make to give to a friend - especially if I can find an old green velvet curtain.  I can then chop this up to make the body of the stocking and then embellish individually and stuff with little tiny presents or some preserves or some home made soaps or candles.  Would truly be a home produced pressie then which is kind of ...

You know how it is when you get a new job.  You are trying to follow instructions but somewhere along the line things don't go right and you end up making yourself look a right utter pratt.  Well you have guessed it, it has been one of those weeks for me.  Not from anything am doing but more from real life conspiring against me and things not happening as they should.  My immediate line Manager as a result has serious concerns about me! Generally speaking I think that I am one of these people who works out parameters by actually doing stuff wrong.  It does not help that we have several sets of passwords to access different things - passwords have never been my forte and I regularly have to update the ones I do have in order to access whatever it is I am trying to get into.  At home that is not so much of a problem but at work the whole purpose is to keep that information secret so it is not as easy. Perhaps I am trying a tad too hard and with all the s...

I am not very good at time management and am on a steep learning curve with this both at home and at work.  Oh well tiz only the depth that varies and I am either up to my neck or something is rattling around my ankles. I have not stopped since I got in.  I was late away from work this evening as I had taken a call last minute and cleared this up before leaving work with the assistance of some very lovely and helpful work colleagues.  I cannot face half jobs first thing of a morning. In any event I had already decided that this evening I was going to do some more work on my scripts titivate them a bit and make them a bit more me whilst keeping in the professional obligations of the company and it is now 22:49 and I still have to type up some of the bits of bobs.  Will have to complete the rest tomorrow but I want it a lot more free flowing than it is at the moment more people orientated as it were.  So I shall be commencing that in a few moments.  ...