Half Term

 This means I actually have access to the computer!  It's been a crazy six weeks but worth it and Pip has really enjoyed her lessons, as well the online interactions with her teachers and peers.  She has had homework assignments to complete this half term but with prudent planning she is making good progress.

Soda Bread for St Brigid Day.

Pip's protest art concerning the exploitation of children in the cocoa industry.  She had originally wanted to use this piece, but her challenge is to make at least a two layer stencil and we realised this would be too difficult to achieve.  It was back to the drawing board and so she came up with this revised plan:

Thanks to a You tube video she was able to learn about lettering and with the help of squared paper planned her design.  Pip has had a go at cutting out some of the letters but her finger joints pop out of place due to the pressure exerted and therefore Dave or I have been helping.  I think I've seen finger splints online and will be giving them a go to see if they will help.

Since we are in lockdown 3.0 and Ben is currently not in college, we have had to find various household projects to keep Ben busy.  He has installed an outside light, re-pointed the paving slabs on the patio, replaced electrical sockets in several rooms and has painted the new bike/tool shed before he pieces it together.

A little purple bike and tool shed, who knows there might even be room for a fold up chair for me (I do miss my 50th Birthday Shed which was left behind in the move two years ago) Either way, I'm sure it'll be decked with some crochet bunting cheer :-)

Dave and I are enjoying the break and aside from having a well earned rest we are managing to catch up on various admin and cleaning jobs in the home.  It's also the start of Lent and whilst I was enjoying a read of Eva's Lent posts, she reminded me of the Lent Calendar.  It has been years since we did one of these and I had great fun putting ours together for this year.  We are using The Church of England, #LiveLent resources this year as we always do well when we have a focus to work towards.  In addition St Nicolas Church are doing daily prompts and today's was calculating your carbon footprint and ours is 31st May ... insert horrified facial expression!  We do recycle, compost and our energy is 100% renewables but alas a car is a necessity.  However we can make changes with regards to meat consumption and excess packaging.

A Valentine treat for Ben and Pip

Shrove Tuesday pancakes, savoury and sweet.

Live Lent thankful feet.

Our carbon footprint result and our pledge as a result.

Thanks Eva for the timely Lent reminder and a chance to journey with you and Jesus this year x 

 

Lent Challenges

Yesterday's challenge was about period poverty.  It is sad to read that young girls are missing an education as a result of being unable to afford sanitary protection.  There are lots of websites offering washable pads that are not only good for your purse but the environment too.  However given the fact that many families who attend food banks are also struggling to wash clothes and heat a home, I cannot see that re-usable pads are a realistic option.  Change.org have several petitions on their site calling for an end to this problem.

As a result of the challenge I actually bought items in plastic because God calls me to love my neighbour aswell as his earth:

 In the shopping basket ...

... and safely ensconsed in the food bank shelf.

Today's act is making a generosity jar.  We had already decided to use our coffee trip money as a form of almsgiving with the exception of the odd visit to Wesley's coffee lounge.  Wesleys is a Christian establishment so in supporting them we are in a way making a financial donation to the Methodist community in the town.

The rest of the day has been a mix of cleaning in stages and making meals and I even had the house to myself which is a rarity! After breakfast, Dave and Pip made the 40 minute bus journey back into our old home town; they had a lovely day together. They did some shopping and had an all day breakfast for lunch.  On the way home they stopped off into the village to meet Ben at work and then all three of them caught the bus home, a mere seven minute journey.  Travelling by bus has really revolutionised our family and most importantly given Dave his independence which is precious. 

The blog housekeeping has been a bit of a headache.  Dodgy websites aside we are now trying to find a way to save the blog content because we are not sure if some posts will be deleted once Google+ disappears.  For the last few years I have been using that platform to upload posts and so potentially they could disappear.  I'm sure there is an answer somewhere :-)

 

 

Shrove Tuesday And Other Stories

 Shrove Tuesday

Purple corn pancakes were the order of the day for our breakfast; very liturgical and very nutritious!  The dried purple corn powder was a gift from our French friend Fred, who came to stay last October to help unpack the house.

 A Broken Scaphoid Bone

We had some unseasonably hot weather recently and it was an opportunity for Pip to meet with some of the local youngsters in our area.  She met with a really lovely group of girls and was enjoying riding her bike and having a race when she collided with another girl and landed awkwardly on her hand.  I initially thought that she had sprained her wrist and so did the usual ice and compression and painkillers.  However it did not work and I was disturbed twice in the night when she was complaining of pain.   So after breakfast off we went the local A&E department and an x-ray confirmed that the scaphoid bone at the base of her thumb/top of her wrist was broken:

 Pip will be wearing this cast for the next five weeks.  She is scheduled to attend an activity weekend courtesy of the National Deaf Children's Society but thankfully she can still attend.  There will be some activities that won't work but there are still plenty of other activities that she can try.  We have also found a fully water proof cast cover which means that she can resume her swimming lessons on a Monday evening,yay!
DH STOP PRESS:-after speaking with the clinic where she had the cast fitted, as they have advised against this activity, it now looks like we will have to cancel it after all!

St David's Day

We remembered St David's Day and made our customary Leek and Potato Soup and Welsh Griddle Cakes:

 Daffodills For St David

Volunteering Saturday

We were all out of the house on Saturday morning and scattered in various directions.  Pip's guide troop ran a pop up cafe from 11am-2pm, so I was able to drop Pip and her dad at the edge of town and they walked/wheeled to the guide hut.  Ben and I volunteered at the Mustard Seed/Wesley's Coffee Lounge.  Dave then met us back at Wesleys for lunch and we enjoyed a yummy baked potato and salad.

I did however have an interesting start to the morning when I realised that I was minus some much needed muffin tins!  Pip's patrol were contributing cakes for their stall, so despite being up at 7:30 to make the cake batter, I was dashing to Barton Grange just before opening time to buy the muffin trays!  Phew :-)

   

 Lent Challenges

As per the last three years we will be doing the 40 Acts challenges and in addition we have also decide to adopt the Lent Plastic Challenge 2019.  For a good while now we have been buying our fruit and vegetables loose and where possible we buy other items in tin and glass.  However it is all to easy to be complacement and so we will be doing our best to be more intentional about our shopping habits.

We completed a food shop this evening and did quite well, we found our favourite washing brand in powder form aswell as a boxed alternative to bleach in a plastic bottle.  I knew that bin liners were going to be troublesome but thankfully found some that were compostable, although I'm really hoping that we won't have to use too many of them.  The young man behind the cheese counter was also very helpful and our purchase was packaged in greaseproof paper :-)

 My last mug of treat tea courtesy from Fred. 

 We will be using up our other supplies of fruit teas that are minus individual wrappings and this should give us time to find plastic free alternatives.  Hoping to document our challenges here on the blog and over on Instagram.