Surprising Lidl

It's safe to say that I'm a bit of a snob when it comes to food shopping. John and I shop at Sainsbury's normally and I like it there. I like knowing where everything is. I like knowing exactly which products I want to buy. I also like knowing what things cost roughly. 

John has been telling me for months and months how good Lidl is and I sort of refused to listen to him. Both Sainsbury's and Lidl are around the corner pretty much from where we live but I can count on one hand how many times I have been in Lidl. I like branded products for the most part and I wasn't willing to try somewhere new. 

A couple of weeks ago the old Lidl in town had been rebuilt and I was curious. A friend at work had gone on about how amazing it was and she was like me before. Now she's converted. So, John and I went in on a Saturday evening to pick up some greens for the rabbits as we'd run out and it was on our way home anyway. 

We came out with 2 bags full. Not what I was expecting. 

You can see everything we bought in the picture above. At Sainsbury's this would have easily cost us £30, if not more. We only spent £14.32 at Lidl. I really couldn't believe it. The most expensive thing we bought was some peanut butter and that was £1.25. The best thing we got was the Ainsley Harriott soups which worked out at only 17p each. John loves them and takes them to work with him so we stocked up and bought 6 boxes. I was expecting the use by dates to be quite short but they go right up to December 2016... not that they will last that long! 

Now, I won't be giving up my Sainsbury's shop completely because there are certain things I won't change but I do think we'll now be going to Lidl more especially for fruit and veg as it is a lot cheaper.

A busy week

This past week John and I have been off work. It was my birthday this week and I have never, ever worked this week in my life so I always take a week off as a holiday. Sometimes we go away but this year we have had a lot to do around the house and we also aren't ready to leave Jackson in kennels if we want to go away. 

This week I had a lot of plans, much to John's dismay. He really would rather relax when we get a week off work together but I always have loads of other things for us to get on with. We don't get time to get much done during the week so I try to make up for that when we do get the free time. 


Day one consisted of sorting out our front garden. I meant to get this done last year but money ran out and it had to wait. We'd already cleared it of all the old, horrible gravel and the massively overgrown plants and was just left with a blank space. I wanted something really simple and easy to keep nice so chose landscaping bark for the ground and then added in a couple of little trees and a potted plant! 


I love it now. Our house was the one down the street that looked shabby and awful and now it's lovely to come home to a nice looking entrance. 

On day two we carried on a bit more with the front garden and painted the wall and the windowsill. Before it was a ghastly white and stood out and not in a good way. The previous owners of our house seemed to have a thing about white paint and used it A LOT! I hated it. Now it's a wonderful shade of light green and although very different from anything else on our street, it's much nicer. As we were painting a couple of people walked by and said how nice it looked. 

Day two was a really busy day because we also put up a clock in the living room, changed a light switch and had the electrician round to put in a ceiling rose and a new light fitting. We had been waiting ages to have this done. Our house is a four bedroom Victorian property and the previous owners ruined or took out any of the period features so I'm trying to put back as much as I possibly can. The ceiling rose looks absolutely amazing and I'm glad it's finally up. 

On day three John and I went into Cromer for breakfast and so I could get my nails done. I hadn't had them done for ages and they really needed doing so that was nice. It was also nice to get out of the house and do something fun! We also had another ceiling rose and light put up in another room that we were in the middle of painting. 

Day four was a bit different as it was my birthday! John and I went into Norwich for breakfast, then to see Insurgent at the cinema and out for lunch. I had a lovely day and loved all of my presents! 

On day five we really cracked on with the decorating of the spare bedroom. The plan this week really was to get it finished apart from a carpet and furniture. I chose a beautiful ornithology wallpaper from B&Q. At £20 a roll it wasn't cheap but I wanted something with a Victorian feel but a modern look. It's stunning but a pain to hang. This was mine and John's first time wallpapering and I had to have a few breaks as I got so annoyed with it. However, we managed to get half the room done and it looks amazing. I'm so glad I chose something bold and I'm surprised John likes it so much. 

John went back to work on day six for overtime. We need the extra money especially when we have so much to do around the house. As he wasn't home I got on with some cleaning and general tidying up. Not really fun but a necessity. 

Sunday was day seven of being off work and we finished off the wallpapering in the spare bedroom. This is the first room we have completely renovated since moving in and I'm so pleased with the results so far. 

Although this week was really busy and exhausting, it's been a good one. John and I have done so much around the house and it's nice to feel like we've really accomplished something now. 

Maybe the next week off won't be quite as hectic. 

Branching out

Blogging for me all began with book reviews way back in 2010, the year I started university. Somehow I managed to blog the same as normal all the way through university. I really don't know how I did that sometimes though. I guess it helped having a job where I was able to read on night shifts or do my revision or edit essays. 

After graduating and getting a full time job as the manager of a children's play center and bowling alley, I seemed to not be able to cope with blogging any more. I really tried but I wasn't getting much time to read or to write the reviews even if I did manage to read. After a while of struggling I made a hard choice to give it up for a while. I just didn't have the energy, especially when John and I bought a house that needs a fair amount of work. 

Between then and now I also tried to have two blogs. I have no idea why I ever thought that would be a good idea because one was hard enough. Now my life is still really hectic. Not only does the house need a whole lot of work but we also have Jackson, our German Shepherd puppy. 

Before now I had lost my desire to read. I have no idea how I'm managing it right now to be honest, but I am. John laughs because I wake up some mornings when I'm in the middle of the book and I read a bit before I get a bath before work. 

Anyway, there was a time when I was really happy with having a blog just for book reviews. However, it really isn't that time now. With so much going on in my life right now I really need to branch out with my blog. I want to make it more about all of the things I love. My life with John, my house that is yet to be beautiful, my monster of a puppy, books and films. 

So, although there will still be a lot of book reviews I really want to be able to write about my life. As Jackson grows up I'm sure I'll have plenty of cute photos and funny stories about the things he gets up to. I also can't wait to write about updates on the house and things that get done. 

I hope you enjoy hearing about my life!

Garden progress

When John and I first came to look at our house before we bought it, I loved the garden but I think it was a case of rose tinted glasses. Our garden is really big and it did have loads of plants, a gravel path leading to the shed, a sunken patio and a pond which resulted in loads of cute frogs. I thought it was really cute and I was excited about finally having a garden. Below is what it looked like before, minus the workshop to the right on the first picture. The previous owners took that with them. 

Last year when my Mum came to stay we started working on clearing the garden as we discovered that it was all pretty much overgrown and dead underneath. Not quite the pretty garden I thought it was. We did a hell of a lot of work last year and went through 3 skips to get rid of all of the waste but we still weren't finished. Last year was a year of filling so many garden waste bags, giving away the gravel for free on Facebay and killing ourselves. 

This is what it looked like last summer:

Not quite the pretty garden it was before!! So, this year we are making a start on making the garden nice again. Last weekend one of our neighbours came round with his chainsaw to cut down the trees for us and get the stumps as close to level as he could which was a massive help. We've also had a new fence put in on the side we're responsible for. We've nearly got the sunken patio filled and only one area of plants left to clear as well as filling in the pond. It's getting there... slowly. Now that we have a dog I really want the garden to be more friendly towards him instead of just being a garden full of mud and not much else.

We're planning on using artificial grass and decking in the middle part of the garden. I then want to section off the back part of the garden with a picket fence and archway/ gate so I can have nice plants in there that Jackson can't eat. Also it will mean being able to have one part of the garden closed off and usable without really having to worry about the rest for a while. 

Maybe this summer I'll finally have a section of the garden I can sit in and read when it's sunny!

We're finally getting somewhere

Last April John and I moved into our very first proper home together and since then it's all been a bit manic. It only feels like we moved in 2 minutes ago though and sometimes I can't believe that we own this big, old Victorian house. The previous owners really let things go though and it needs a lot of work and a fair bit of money putting into it. John and I don't have much spare cash but we're saving as much as we can each month to get something done every year. 

Last year I spent a lot of time beginning to clear the massively overgrown garden. I got a good chunk done but I need to do a hell of a lot more this summer. I plan on making my own raised beds out of decking boards and attempting to level out the ground. Oh won't that be fun?

It's only February and we've had some major work done on two of our bedrooms. We have a four bedroom house but one room is going to be a shower room eventually and our bedroom isn't too bad right now so we started on the spare bedrooms. We have had all of the woodwork ripped out and replaced; door liners, frames and doors as well as the skirting boards. We've also had both rooms completely re-plastered and picture rails will be going up next week and then I can start decorating. I'm only going to be doing 1 room at the moment though as I'm not sure what the other one will be yet. 



I feel as though we're really making some progress now with the house even if it in two rooms we don't even use at the moment. 

We also have a new addition to the family. Jackson is our new German Shepherd puppy and he's a bit of a monster sometimes which is why we aren't doing up the rooms we do use yet. 

My first attempt at upcycling furniture

When my husband and I bought our house we didn't have nearly enough furniture for it.We moved from a 2 bedroom flat to a 4 bedroom house. We still don't have enough furniture but I'm constantly looking on Facebay for some bargains. A couple of months ago I managed to get a chest of drawers and a bedside table for £20. Below is what they originally looked like!

The drawers had some really ugly drawer handles too but I took this photo after I'd taken them off and started painting! I bought some Annie Sloan chalk paint to do these up with in Paris Grey. The spare room that I bought the furniture for will be decorated in a grey and green colour scheme eventually so I wanted something to match. Annie Sloan chalk paint is amazing because it paints on near enough anything without having to do any sanding or preparation. The furniture only took 2 coats of paint and each one dried within a couple of hours so I managed to get most of the painting done in one go. Instead of just painting the shell and the fronts I also painted the insides of the drawers.

As you can see, the drawers look completely different than they did to begin with and so much better! So far I have put on 2 coats of Annie Sloan clear wax to seal and protect the paint but I still need to put another coat on and then buff. 

One of the trickiest things with this furniture was the handles. I couldn't find any drawer handles that had the exact measurements for the holes already screwed in. I was tempted to fill them with wood filler and drill new holes but then I found a solution. In a local store I found some large round handles that are swirls. By using 2 of these next to each other it gives the impression that it is one large handle! This was so much easier than what I was going to do. The shop has run out at the moment so I still need a couple more!

I also wanted to do something a bit special with the insides of the drawers. They can look so plain and boring when they're just one colour so I decided to decopatch them. I found some really lovely flowery decopatch paper to line the drawers with. This part was really tricky as the sheets were just smaller than A4 and a pain to lay flat in one go. I also had to use different size strips of paper around the edges and some bits overlap so it doesn't look as neat as it could do but for my 1st attempt, I'm pretty happy. The drawers will be filled anyway so it doesn't matter too much I guess. From afar they look lovely though. I've added on a couple of top coats of glue/ varnish too so that the paper is sealed and has a smooth finish. 

I really love the insides of these drawers now! They really do have that something extra now when you open them.

It's taken me quite a while to get these done as I only have time on my days off to do bits to them. I can't wait to get my final couple of handles for them to be finished completely.

For my 1st attempt at upcycling furniture, I'm so pleased with the result. Now I have done these pieces I think I could easily do some more especially now I know how the products work and what to do differently next time!

A skip and some hard work

Before the clear out!

After buying an old Victorian house, I have quickly started to realise just how much needs doing to it. One of the first jobs on the massive list was to clear the garden. The previous owners were artists and the guy made his own pottery. Well, I say pottery but it was figures and things mostly. As we looked around the garden after moving in we saw so much hidden underneath bushes but it was all ruined! Every single thing we found was broken in some way or another apart from a few plant pots. We had already started to pile this up in the middle of the garden so at least it was all in one place.

Then there were the plants. The garden is about 60ft in total although a chunk of it is patio. Two thirds of the garden was gravelled but with a lot of bushes and plants everywhere. My mum came to visit a couple of weeks ago and just started pulling things up, showing me that it was all dead anyway. That led to a weekend of pulling and digging up bushes. We were obviously left with bags and bags full of garden waste but we pay to have a garden bin and that is slowly going down now.

After

The gravel we had gotten rid of a lot of weeks ago as I offered it for free on a local Facebay site as long as the people who wanted it were prepared to shovel it and take it away themselves. A couple came and took three trailers full which did clear a lot. Now we have cleared more in the skip as well as deciding to re-gravel our shared driveway with the neighbours. That already had gravel in the middle but it was looking really thin and horrible so hopefully putting our gravel there will help it to at least look a little bit nicer. 

Patio area

Anyway, yesterday we got a skip delivered and we could really begin clearing things out properly. All of the gravel in bags has now gone as well as every single piece of broken pottery. Our sort of seating area is cleared now so we can finally use the table and chairs we have. There is still so much work to be done as the back half of the garden needs tackling at some point and everything needs leveling out before we can do anything else to it. However, this is quite far down our list of things to have done now but we have loads of time to get that done before next summer.

It's so rewarding to see such a big change in our garden and although it was hard work, it was well worth it!

Windowsill planters

Although we have a massive garden now, I have no idea what to do with it. You see, I have never had a garden before. Back at my mum's house where I grew up the garden was a concrete slab at the back of the house. We never had plants or grass or trees or anything like that! So, it is safe to say that I am not green fingered. 

While my husband and I are sorting out the back garden (clearing the gravel and digging up massive bushes) I wanted to have a go at growing something myself. We have pet rabbits who should be eating grass and green foods on a regular basis. While we do give them leafy vegetables, I would love to be able to grow them their own herbs to eat. Their hutch and run is also placed on concrete slabs so they don't have fresh grass to nibble on either. 

I have begun a bit of an experience of growing things in trays on the windowsill. Our garden is south facing so the windowsill the trays are placed on gets a hell of a lot of sun. I have planted a variety of herbs and some regular grass seeds in plastic trays which are covered with a see-through plastic lid. They're like little mini tray greenhouses. I only planted the seeds a couple of days ago so obviously nothing has grown yet but I am hopeful. 

I would be really happy if even a few of the seeds worked out. I know the rabbits would appreciate the yummy food!

No longer just a book blog

When I started this blog, I had so much free time for reading. Unfortunately, I no longer have the time for reading that I used to. This is mostly due to working full time, being married and also having bought our first house together. 

The house is Victorian and the previous owners haven't looked after it very well. It isn't falling down or anything but pretty much all of the period features are now gone and the decor is shoddy, to say the least. Everything is covered in white it has no personality whatsoever. We also have a massive garden which has been neglected. There are massive bushes all over the place and there is no design to it. At the moment everything looks overgrown. 95% of the floor space was also covered in horrible gravel! We have now managed to get rid of a lot of it by giving it away for free on Facebay but there is still more underneath all of the bushes to get rid of. 

Our new home takes up all of my free time at the moment and I'm constantly finding things to do and things to potter about with.

We also have two wonderful pet rabbits called Flopsy and Mopsy who I will introduce you to in a different post. They are such characters now and we've only had them for a month. 

So, although I will still be reviewing books and films now and again, when I have the time, I have decided to change into a lifestyle blog. More of an all sorts blog actually. From now on this will be a blog for journalling the changes we make to the house and garden and other things that we get up to. I want to start trying to upcycle furniture once I buy the right paint in a few weeks so it will also be about decorating, colours and that kind of thing.

For those of you who follow for the book reviews, you'll still get to read them but also learn a lot more about me, my husband and our wonderful new home.