Blogging it...right here

Central heating

Amy — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:00:47 +0000

I find this quite interesting. Having just moved from a flat with no real decent heating, into a flat with central heating, I have always been used to putting on more clothes rather than wasting money on electric for the heating (as was in the old flat).

I’d be interested to know how many people rather walk around their home with t-shirt and heating on, rather than just put more clothes on? The environmentalist in me screams that it’s bad to use too much water, gas and electric, so I am on the side of putting more clothes on rather than whipping the heating on.

Have to admit though, the last flat was too cold, even with multiple layers on it was still too cold…the wonders of central heating…hello gas, goodbye night storage. Hoorah.

Bircarbonate of soda

Amy — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 07:38:40 +0000

Well, this week I’ve started going through cupboards in the flat, and found a couple of coffee stained thermos’ and thought what the heck can I do with these they’re ruined! Certainly couldn’t put anything in them now except coffee. So I ventured into that lovely world called google and found out that bicarbonate of soda works enormously well for stains like the one above. So I bought some and gave it a go and I can’t believe it. All these years I have invested money in chemicals to clean this that and the other and it turns out that some of the most simplest solutions are best. I also used the bicarb on my (metal) coffee maker jug at work which I’ve been trying to de-stain for ages, and after a little extra scrubbing has worked a treat. Also when you put the water in with the bicarb it makes a rather entertaining hissing fizzing noise. Cool!!!

I want a home remedy descaler now.

Growing herbs

Amy — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 11:31:01 +0000

I grew some herbs this year, from seeds. Year on year I try and they always get to a spindley looking stage and die. Not this year!!! I’ve had them on the spare room windowsill and they love it there. I’ve watered them a bit and left them to it, and they’ve grown like weeds! Well they can carry on as they please, they’ll look nice in the new flats kitchen.

Electric Mayhem

Amy — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 10:53:32 +0000

Madness reigns at the moment. We’ve got a lot going on hehe. We’ve got various family and friends events coming up and we’re organising a wedding for next year and trying to move.

We’ve opted for a lovely flat, which is a definate upgrade on the one we are currently in. It’s got double glazing and gas, a balcony and a garage amongst other perks!!! It’ll all be worth it in the end! We have had a provisional agreement now from the landlord, which is excellent and now the estate agents is dealing with the paperwork we’ve sent in. Good thing that this estate agents doesn’t seem to be inept at all. We had a very bad experience moving with our last estate agents and so far I am {shock} quite pleased with them. Seeing as we have to hand over a small fortune it’s nice that they’re working for they’re money.

We also have sky points in the new flat so Graham has been looking at the best and cheapest way to get the tv, telephone and phone line. That in itself has been fun {sarcasm}.

Given we’re so busy (and spending money like it’s water it seems - we paid our hotel deposit for the wedding last month too) I’ve sat down with calendars printed from MS Publisher and set out how many weeks we have before we move, any birthdays, family and friend events, hols etc and set out in black and white with how many weekends we have to pack and prepare. Not many it seems.

Last time we moved, we only moved. This time, we’re moving, have loads of various events going on and wedding plans are in the pipeline, which as it happens I have to make progress with soon too. It’s stressful but I think we can definately do it all.

Another thing I have done is excel spreadsheets with the money stuff on. This all costs dosh too! It’s fun being us at the moment! It is going to be hard, once we get into October to relax, but it’s going to be worth moving.

Oh and we signed our wedding hotel contract last week. Signing our lives away at this rate. LOL

Not sleeping well

Amy — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 07:41:07 +0000

I have been known to sleep walk - and when I started doing it I would say to Graham to just tell me to go to bed, and it would work. Anyway, last night was a new adventure. I managed to get myself out of bed - jumping out I reckon and then hurt myself really hard in various odd places on a bed side drawers and a free-standing radiator. This morning I am not such a happy bunny. I’ve managed to hurt my ribs, underneath my arm (the bruise is purple..eek), my leg, my foot (opposite side to the bruise on my leg….heaven knows how…), and to add insult to injury I managed to knock over a glass of dilute juice onto a cream carpet which I had to scrub out at 2 in the morning, oh and get the juice also ALL over my side of the bed. It’s not my week I’ve decided. Hopefully the weekend will be better.

Rainbow cake! Wow

Amy — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 14:57:55 +0000

I bow to the pure genius of some people.

http://www.omnomicon.com/rainbowcake

{bowing right now…yuuuuup..} I have a friend who tried her hand at multicoloured cakes but this one blew me away. Good stuff!

Inspiration

Amy — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 13:08:15 +0000

I am trying to find a new bead loom project - something really challenging that perhaps I could hang up and it would look pretty, perhaps as a gift for someone…I don’t know, but it never occurred to me to look at adapting cross stitch patterns for bead loom work, not at all. What a fantastic idea. So now I’m spending my lunch break hunting for ideas.

Geek cross stitch

Amy — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 13:02:54 +0000

This is the funniest thing I’ve seen in ages! It’s a cross stitch pattern of the Mozilla Firefox logo - brilliant stuff!

http://radicalcrossstitch.com/2008/07/10/firefox-pattern/

Smarties jigsaw

Amy — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 20:10:14 +0000

I’ve been doing this fantastic jigsaw lately which Graham bought me called ‘The worlds hardest jigsaw’ - it’s taken me ages to do - I think I’ve had it out 5 or 6 weeks and I’ve been spending odd evenings doing it. Well, I’m good at jigsaws of all types but this one was a challenge. It was only 529 pieces but is a double sided picture of Smarties.

Sailing - Nearly!

Amy — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 13:12:29 +0000

After a huge meeting one day, a boss at my place decided my group should go on one of the cruises on one of the organisation’s ships for a few days. Excitin’ stuff huh?

So in a matter of a day or so we had safety kit on order, medical appointments and a ‘Sea survival’ course booked. Good job I learned to swim in the last couple of years. The sea survival course was…ermmmmm…interesting. I jumped in a big pool from quite a height and amongst other things learned how to put on a life jacket, get into a life raft, and right a life raft. If someone had told me 2 years ago I’d have learned to swim in the last year and how to use a life raft I’d have told them to ‘bog off’ to put it politely hehe. Tell you what though - you never want to end up having to be in one of these rafts though - it’s last resort of course but ooooh errrrr from what the trainers were saying it’s an awful experience.

So anyway - after spending £££££s at the dentist I was then sorted. Only to find out a week before the cruise that my groups attendance was unfortunately scrubbed for various reasons….DOH!!!

Better luck next time…word is I’m on the list for another cruise on the more modern ship this year….fingers crossed all goes well. It would be good to see what it’s like at the very least. As a web programmer it’s not something I’m required to do as part of my job (and I’ve not done in the last 2 years of my job), but at some point I need to meet the people and see the processes that go on on-board.