retro wonders

Ooh. My regular Monday trip to the charity shop came up trumps. There is only one charity shop in the town I work in, and I have set myself a routine, and decided to only visit it on Mondays and Fridays - otherwise I would be in there everyday!

Today was a successful trip. I found this fab adidas sports bag - for £1.20! There may only be one shop, but it is cheap!



I bought it with the intention of putting it on ebay, and then thought I might keep it. Having checked ebay, there is a vintage adidas bag going for £150! It's far fancier than this one, but still - crazy money.

Anything adidas takes me back to secondary school - very mid-90s. School bags had to be adidas. I always wanted a purple adidas rucksack. Instead I ended up with a navy puma rucksack - life is so unfair when you are 15.

We also made a reappearance at the pub quiz last night. We improved on our score from last time, and came third. Ok, it was only out of nine teams this time, but still an improvement. At this rate will will have won by the end of March!

deja vu on a sunday

In a rerun on last Sunday, here is how I spent yesterday afternoon.



This time the tv programme was Bones, and the cake was a scone, but still very similar.

I am very proud of this picture, as last time I made scones they came out like biscuits. So this is a vast improvement.

a strange way to spend a lunch break

I've been making an effort to get out of the office at lunchtime and go for a walk. I work in a very small town, where there isn't much to do. I'm gradually going further afield and walking along different streets.

I've been past this church a number of times, and always thought it was beautiful. And then on Wednesday, it looked like this.




Churchyards have a strange beauty, and I love taking pictures of them. The snowdrops were truly carpeting the grass, and made such a wonderful contrast to the dark stone.



I must have looked quite strange in my work clothes, crouching in the churchyard, taking pictures!

spoilt rotten

Friday was my birthday, so I am basking in the glow of lovely gifts.
S got me these beautiful kitchen scales, which will look lovely in my future dream kitchen (white with splashes of colour, and the all important red Kitchen Aid mixer - one day!).



Saturday was spent shopping in London with my lovely friends from my university days. Much fun was had, although we walked way too far and my legs almost gave way when I got out of bed this morning!

My parents gave me money for the trip, so I treated myself to this lovely CK bad. S hates it, but I don't care!

storm troopers and general knowledge

We braved the snowy countryside on Sunday for a bit of shopping. A disaster on the adult clothing front. I wish shops would make trousers in a 31" leg. I either have to show off my socks in a shorter length, or wear crazily high heels with a longer length. So nothing was purchased.



It wasn't a total wash out though. I bought this t-shirt (from Next, of all places) for my friend's son's birthday. He is going to be two, and the smallest the t-shirt came in was age three, but I couldn't resist it. It's never too early to be introduced to Star Wars. (apologies for the dodgy picture)

In the evening we went to our favourite pub for the pub quiz, along with some of S's work friends. It was the first time we have been, and only the second ever quiz I've been to (we won the first one we went to!).
We came a very respectable joint 4th out of 13 teams. I think our score was 33 out of 40. There were some very serious competitors, so I am feeling quite smug about how we did. Bring on the next quiz!

a cup of tea and a piece of cake

This is how I spent my afternoon, along with the latest episode of Pushing Daisies. Perfect.
The cake is a Lemon Syrup Cake (a Nigella recipe). It was a belated birthday cake for S. His birthday was back in October (!) and I didn't get a chance to make him a cake at the time. I have been feeling guilty about it - obviously not that guilty, though - and decided that today was the day.

Earlier I went in to town for a wander round the charity shops. Only bought this book - Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson. I haven't seen the film yet, but keep hearing wonderful reviews of the book on various blogs, so thought I woul give it a try.



At £1.69 it was a bit above my self-imposed limit of £1 per book, but I got it anyway. I have bought so many books over the last couple of years (at one point it was about 4 a week!) that there is no way I will ever catch up with reading them. Hence the limit.
There are exceptions to the limit though - I have a list of books that I can spend a bit more on if I come across them. Thankfully, most of the charity shops round here are fairly cheap for books, so I'm not actually being too strict with myself!

currently reading

Currently reading The Falls by Joyce Carol Oates.

cookie monster

Wow. Inspired by this promise of the best cookies ever, from Attic24, I had a go at the recipe yesterday, whilst off work.



Wow. Possibly the best recipe I've tried. I never seem to be able to get the all-important gooey-ness, but these had it. I think the secret is not cooking them for too long. Or maybe the golden syrup.

Anyway, I loved them. S loved them. And there are not many left.

I made sure to buy some more chocolate chips today, just in case another batch are called for over the weekend.

Can you tell how much I liked them?

snow day

A snow day! I don't think I've ever experienced work, or even school, being cancelled because of the snow before.
We were on the Meadows at 8.30 this morning playing in the snow! I was extremely proud of our giant snowman, who was taller than us. When we walked by at 2pm, he was gone - just a pile of snow remained.
I was going to post a picture to show off, but some people in a nearby village have stolen my thunder, building a snowman 30ft high!
It looks like it is back to work tomorrow though.