Charity shop haul

Just thought that I should show you the result of Saturdays charity shop expedition. The lace jacket (to cover up the tops of my arms where age has definately taken it's toll, when I wear a sleeveless dress) it cost me £4 at the Help the Aged charity shop and I love it. The video "Miracle on 34th Street" a Christmas favourite 49p and the Mary Jane Staples paperbacks £1 each also from Help the Aged. The football books are a present for my son and cost £5 from our RSPCA charity shop. The purse and Tenko club paperback £1 from our Hospice shop. The butterfly coasters, which look great in the conservatory £1 and the candlestick £1 which will join the rest of my Christmas candlestick collection were found in the Cancer Research charity shop.



I found this amazing clock in the first shop for £3 and on getting it home we discovered that it plays various bird songs on each hour. This could get annoying later but we could take the batteries for the birdsongs out if that happens, in the meantime it is fun watching Penny trying to figure out where the noise is coming from! Even Mr C agreed that it looks good high up on the conservatory wall.


Total spend £19.49 - I put 10% of housekeeping and pocket money by into a charity shop fund so out of this month's £35, having already paid out on dd's to 2 local charities we support, I have £7.51 left to spend. Last month I had £27 left so will roll it all together (£34.51) and hope to get some bits for Christmas hampers next time.

Home made yogurt

Hooray it worked! I used to make yogurt on a regular basis when I had the time and energy so thought as it was a regular buy that I would try again. Out came my trusty wide necked thermos (50p at a charity shop) and with it my dog eared copy of "Shirley Goode - The Goode Kitchen" cook book. This recipe makes up 1 pint of lovely creamy yogurt.

Home made yogurt (Shirley Goode recipe)

Ingredients:-

1 pint (570ml) milk

1 tablespoon dried milk powder

2 heaped teaspoons bought natural yogurt (I used Yeo Valley organic) remember to take it out of the fridge well in advance to take the chill off it.

Method:-

Heat the milk to boiling point and boil for 1 minute, remove from heat. Cool slightly and stir in the dried milk powder.

Cool to 100F very slightly above blood heat (blood heat is where it feels neither hot nor cold so just above that) Put the yogurt in a warm basin and add a little of the warm milk and blend together. Add the rest of the milk and stir well.

Pour into the thermos, cover and keep in a warm place (I left mine on the kitchen worktop) and leave for about 8 hours (overnight). Once the yogurt has set place into a bowl and keep in the fridge.

We like to serve ours with some home made fruit jam stirred in, turns into that fab pudding "Eton Mess" by adding a little crushed meringue (I make micro meringues if I have a spare egg white - great fun).

Cost to make 30p (max) for 1 pint natural yogurt using mostly organic ingredients.

Lemon Kisses

My daughters favourite biscuits are lemon Kisses from the Jif lemon cook book. I have mislaid the book but luckily still have the recipe for these. The dough is very forgiving and can be rolled out several times. Very good for cooking with children, I used this recipe many times when I worked at the creche.

Lemon Kisses

ingredients:-

4 oz (100g) butter or margarine

3oz (75g) caster sugar

1 egg

1 tsp lemon juice

8 oz (200g) plain flour

method:-

Cream the butter and sugar.

Beat in the egg with the lemon juice.

Fold in the flour and form into a soft dough.

Roll out the dough on a floured board and cut into shapes.

Bake for 10 - 15 minutes at 375F/190C/Gas mark 5

Leave until cool and then ice and decorate. We make a glace icing using lemon juice instead of water and it is delicious!

I am going to make some more of these next week when daughter is here, she needs a bit of spoiling as she hasn't been very well recently. She had a scan yesterday and all is ok and treatable thank goodness! I also had an all is ok result appointment at the drs so plenty of reasons to celebrate, which we did, Mr C took us both out for dinner! £30 spent as we just had main courses and a drink and that came from our entertainment/fun/treats allowance so the housekeeping budget remained untouched for another day! I spent £3 at the charity book stall at our local MS centre so out of £35 for charity spends I have £28 left (£4 goes out every month to local childrens hospice) I now have 4 more Agatha Christie paperbacks to add to my collection, I find them great to read when I am having trouble sleeping. I also found some ladybird books for my "friends grandchildrens fun box" and 2 very good condition Lilian Harry books for a friend of mine who is chronically ill and unable to get out and about. I can't count yesterday as a "no spend day" but there is nothing spent that makes me feel guilty either, a good day!

Awash with plastic

I bagged another piece of pyrex yesterday from the charity shop, it had some burnt on marks around the side but these have lifted off in the dishwasher. It has a lid which, although not a perfect fit, will cover the lobster patterned dish I rescued on sunday from an unwanted "stuff"
pile.

The top photo shows I have been reading my dog eared copy of "Tightwad Gazette" and wash out my "baggies" ready for re-use, including some of the super lakeland "stay fresh" bags (next to the bag of soapnuts) which really do work.

I do feel though that we are becoming a bit too dependant on plastic, we probably all have some tupperware in our cupboards and freezers and they certainly do stand up to the test of time, but I do worry that so much plastic around our foods may not be such a good thing, chemicals can leech from the plastics and when the item is no longer required or good for it's intended use it goes into the landfills and causes problems there. Plastic bags can only be washed and re-used so many times (not at all if wrapped around raw meat) this adds to the cost. I need to look into the alternatives. Tupperware was just coming out when I was a child and I do fondly remember the pastel coloured tumbers for our squash, but other than that there wasn't a lot of plastic in the kitchen. Food like sandwiches and cheese were wrapped in greaseproof paper or brown paper bags, cakes were mixed in earthenware or glass bowls and casseroles were cooked in pottery casseroles or pyrex. Maybe a trip back in time would be better for our health and wealth. Any excuse to add to my pyrex collection.!

Puppys first year!

It's was our puppys first birthday yesterday! She celebrated with a charity shop stuffed fimble toy (doubt it will last the week! don't worry though i do check it's condition several times a day for safety), a new tug toy and a pigs ear. How quickly that went by, and how she has grown. Her coat is just beginning to grow back towards the typical cockapoo teddybear like appearance after a very close clip to get rid of some tangles. Regular brushing and trips to the groomer should stop the tangles but it isn't cheap, however this cuddly pooch is definately worth it.