Visitors.

My oldest son visited today with his wife, we met in the local pub and enjoyed a roast dinner, My son had beef, my daughter in law had lamb and I had chicken. A very enjoyable meal and it was lovely to spend time with them. They came back home with me so they could see my bungalow and how comfortable I am. Like my daughter, they too said how much better I looka now I'm living alone.

Beano has had an upset tummy but I took his favourite blanket to the pub with me and he mainly slept while we ate. He had lots of fuss and cuddles with my son and daughter in law, and seems to be feeling better now.

Homemade soup.

I often make soup, it's quick and easy and cheap. I also always keep a couple of tins of soup in the cupboard, usually Baxters which is around £2 a tin.

When I regularly cooked a Sunday roast I'd make soup with the leftovers, my kids used to refer to it as stoup, half way between soup and stew.

In the interests of economy I've made a pan of soup this morning, enough to last 2 or 3 days. It was the first recipe I learned on a vegetarian cookery course I went on about 45 years ago and I still make it.

I have no idea how much it costs to make but it is cheap, a packet of broth mix is £2 for 500 grams, I use a very small handful. I soaked the broth mix overnight and changed the water twice. 

I used one potato, one carrot both approximately the same size, one onion slightly smaller, all these were chopped into smallish dice. You can add herbs or spices to your taste, I usually add pepper and curry powder. Bring to the boil then turn down to a simmer until everything is cooked through.

I brought mine to the boil whilst I was making my morning porridge and then turned the ring off. When I went back to the pan after breakfast everything was cooked, once it's cooled I'll transfer it to plastic boxes and store it in the fridge.

I need to top up my savings.

I think I've spent what I need to now to have a comfortable standard of living, I started with just a bed my son gave me and a few boxes of belongings.

I've purchased 2nd hand furniture and some new bedding and curtains, a fridge freezer, blinds, a whirly washing line and a selection of mops and brushes etc. The bungalow has two built in cupboards in the bedroom but neither of them had hanging rails, fortunately my daughter had a large wardrobe that was no longer needed so she gave it to me. She also gave me a small TV and a mini oven that sits on the work surface. A friend has given me a DVD player.

 A friend of Cass's brought round a chest of drawers and my other daughter finally managed to collect the last box of stuff and my standard lamp from Steve, unfortunately it came with six boxes of crap that he insisted were mine. I'm hoping to contact an ex work colleague who does regular boot sales to see if she wants the stuff I don't want.

I'm now hoping to start saving money again, I'm still going to go out to the Autumn group and the pensioners lunch but I'm hoping that if there are no more large items to purchase I should be able to save some money. I want to be prepared as I think there could be problems on the horizon with Steve.

I've managed to stock up my kitchen cupboards and I buy Beano's food online, so I'm now only shopping every two or three weeks, apart from bananas and fortunately the local shop sells them in three's

Next step.

When I left Steve he kept back some of my belongings, just one small box but there were things in there that meant a lot to me.

I know he didn't expect me to leave but I had already asked him to help with some things that I found difficult as my eyesight deteriorated. One of the things I asked for was help walking Beano as I was finding it difficult to cross the busy road outside our flat. He refused to help, claiming he wasn't well enough, this didn't stop him crossing the same road many times a week and catching the bus into town to spend the day in the pub drinking. 

He developed a habit of smirking whenever I found a task difficult to manage and I found this extremely irritating. Especially when he claimed his Dr had said I needed to start cooking for him again and take better care of him. I doubt the Dr said anything of the sort! Especially since Steve was refusing to eat any vegetables and wanted only fried food.

One of my daughter's collected the box from Steve a short time ago, unfortunately as he'd had plenty of warning of her visit he gave her 5 or 6 boxes full of stuff he didn't want. He did this for two reasons, partly so I'd have to spend time getting rid of the rubbish and partly so he could tell the neighbours how unkind I was, taking his belongings away from him!

Mothers day.

One of my son's visited on Saturday and bought me a box of chocolates, he was on shift on Sunday which is why he came the day before Mothers day

My other son is visiting next weekend as he was busy this weekend.

I've already been out with one daughter as I wrote in my previous post, Forty Elephants.

 That only left  one daughter who visited y'day and brought with her a cream tea. It included a couple of mini quiches, two scones with strawberry jam and clotted cream. There were also two tea  bags and two squares of cake one each of Millionaires shortbread and one Bakewell slice.

Waking in a panic.

I started waking up in a panic sometimes. 

A couple of night's ago I woke up suddenly, I was convinced I'd overs-spent and that I was about to go in the red.

I grabbed my phone and logged in to my online bank, I wasn't overdrawn. But I really must get to the bank soon as I know that Steve can check one of my bank accounts. We used to have a joint account for paying household bills but after a while Steve stopped paying in to that account and started to pay some bills himself.

Last night I woke again, this time I thought I'd missed a Drs appointment, then I realised that the appointment is later in the week.

I wonder what the next panic will be about?

A meal with Forty Elephants

Bovey Belle, that's a good idea, I will get one next time I'm out shopping. 

Today I had an early mothers day treat, my daughter took me to lunch at a restaurant that was running a theme about the Forty Elephants.

The Forty Elephants were a gang of female shoplifters based around the Elephant and Castle, the were operating from the 1830's to 1950's.

At the restaurant we were given clues about a murder with each course and we had to decide who we thought had committed the murder. It was very entertaining and enjoyable and the food was good too. Lots of small dishes so we didn't end the meal feeling stuffed full but we definitely weren't hungry.