Showing posts with label ducks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ducks. Show all posts

Wednesday, 14 May 2014

#BEDM Day 14 - Home Sweet Home


Day 14 of Rosalilium’s 'Blog Every Day in May' Challenge

Back in Blog Every Day in November, one of the prompts was all about your home and even though we'd been renovating and redecoating one of our four bedrooms, it still wasn't really in a fit state to be photographed.

Suprise, suprise, six months on and although you could now actually stay in it overnight, it's still not really finished. There's empty photo frames waiting for pictures, a chair and chest waiting to be recovered and trinkets that need to be added.

So instead, I thought I'd give you a tour of the place where I probably spend most of my time outside work - the kitchen!

(be kind to me please, I've never done a room tour before and it's all pictues, no videos sorry - I'd love to give vlogging a go but I'm still working out how to do it!)


Kitchen
Our house was built in 1938 and originally the kitchen was only about a third of the size it is now; the previous owners extended it so it's a long rectangular shape which stretches across the back of the garage.
 

Kitchen
This little fella sits on top of my microwave - he was a gift from my parents (I think he was an Easter present) last year. The colander I picked up from a stall at Great Dorset Steam Fair for a few pounds.
 

Kitchen
 On top of the fridge is where we store 'tuck boxes' - a couple of Wallace and Gromit themed biscuit tins (the blue one has sweets, lollipops and little packets of stuff we can throw into our lunchboxes).
The basket was from a charity shop several years ago and although I'd love to use it to go shopping down the local high street, it's just not really practical for that so instead it does a fine job as a place to store spare kitchen rolls. The chicken was a present from my parents and is supposed to be a doorstop but I think he looks pretty good sat guarding the kitchen!


Kitchen
On the side of the fridge we have a collection of magnets with vintage pictures - all of the holiday destinations are places we like or went to as kids.
 

Kitchen
I've recently whittled down my collection of recipe books - I had far too many and the truth is, I tended to use all my recipe clippings rather than the books. The metal magazine holders were a bargainacious £3 for all four at a local car boot sale and the breadmaker was second hand from a student at work.
 

Kitchen
One of my favourite things in the whole kitchen - my CD player. I often listen to 6 Music or Radio 2 or play some random musical soundtracks. The expanding box file is where I keep all my recipe clippings and the pile of household books next to it are soon to be housed in some metal magazine holders!
 

Kitchen
When Andrew first put this shelf up it was supposed to be for all my cookery books but most of them didn't fit and by the time I'd added all the ones that did fit, I was constantly worried the shelf was going to fall off the wall! So instead it's been turned into a display area for trinkets and well, 'stuff'.
The egg timer was Andrew's nan's and the silver teapot was my grandmother's. The teacups, plates, dish, flask and boxes all came from charity shops and car boot sales and the Butlins tin came from Minehead and is used to store biscuit cutters.
The tall cup has images of New York; Andrew found it in a charity shop and bought it to remind me of my trip there in 2002. In front of that there's a little shot glass from our honeymoon in Iceland and the glass bottle on the right is from one of the first times I took Andrew to see Kneehigh Theatre performing outside.
 

Kitchen
These came from the top of our wedding cake - if you look closely the groom has actually lost an ear!
The cups came from a charity shop in Weston Super Mare.
 

Kitchen
The teapot was Andrew's nan's; she used it for many years and it still does the job well now for us. The Kellogg's cups were a Christmas present from my parents last year - we've never actually used them as cups but I think they look quite nice in the windowsill!
 

Kitchen
I love this bird sign - it was from Asda a couple of years ago and it's already terribly faded on one side but that doesn't matter - it's not the side on display!
The plate came from a car boot sale and the silver tray came from Andrew's parents - it needs a jolly good clean to get it sparkling again but I think that's gonna be a job for the winter.
 

Kitchen
This is my windowsill above the kitchen sink. The ducks, coffee pot and glass jug all came from charity shops (there seems to a be a recurring theme here...), the cutlery I actually won at a charity bingo night about 10 years ago and the egg basket came from RE-found Objects a few years ago - they still have them for sale if you're interested!
 

Kitchen
 Hah, now the story here is that even though we have a fully stocked wine rack (from Ikea), I don't actually drink the stuff and Andrew only touches it on special occassions - consequently our rack has been full since we moved in back in 2009.
My collection of trays is a mix of Ikea ones and things from Andrew's nan. The cake stand and Arcopal jug all came from charity shops along with the purple Chales Rennie Mackintosh-style tealight holder in the window.


Kitchen
 The kettle and toaster I treated myself to back in the January sales (they were on offer from Dunelm Mill) and my noticeboard came from Ebay. It was a Christmas present from Andrew's parents a couple of years ago and houses my shopping list (which we add to during the week) and my weekly what's on/to-do list along with some business cards.


Kitchen
 This little flippered friend sits on the corner of my shelves asking 'what's up duck?' - he came from a place called TJ's Discount Warehouse in Holyhead, Angelsey and makes me smile every day. The lovely home heart was from a online shop called 'Home Home Home' which I don't think exists any more but I expect DotComGiftShop probably sell something similar.


Kitchen
And yep, this fella is often to be found standing at the cooker end of the kitchen!
 

Wednesday, 30 April 2014

April Happiness

Five things which have made me smile this month...
 
 
1. This sign. Found in the Students Union at Bath Uni.
 
Silly sign in the Students Union at Bath Uni
 
 
 
2. A fab perk of the job - a drinks reception here!
 
Roman Baths Drinks Reception
 
 
 
3. Seeing lots of these guys all around campus.
 
Ducklings
 
 
 
4. An lovely anniversary meal at a little cafe called Tiffanys in Llandudno.
 
Hot chocolate at Tiffanys Llandudno
 
 
 
5. This picture. I wanted a photo of the flowers we had in our holiday cottage and Andrew decided to snap me instead. It's a bit of a silly picture but I really quite like it!
 
Me with daffodils
 
 
 
 
What little things have made you happy this month?
 

Monday, 31 March 2014

100 Happy Days #8

The eighth instalment of my attempt to catalogue 100 Happy Days... :-)
 
 
Saturday 22nd March

Duck with a new haircut
New haircut!


 
Sunday 23rd March

99 Ice Cream
Andrew dashed out in a hurry only to return clutching two of these - I can't remember the last time I had a 99!


Monday 24th March

Three little presents
One of the girls in the office finished her maternity cover contract last week and on Monday morning there were three little packages waiting for us all (counting down the number of days she had left to work) - inside the bag were three different types of sweets.


Tuesday 25th March

Dewey by Vicki Myron
My blogger book swap package arrived that day - containing a fab book about a library cat called Dewey.


Wednesday 26th March

Mystery package
A mystery bag was brought home today - click here to see what it contained...


 
Thursday 27th March

Garden at RUH Bath
Andrew's dad was readmitted to hospital on Wednesday (luckily only temporarily; he was out by Friday afternoon). That wasn't a happy thing but the garden area just down from his ward was very pretty!


 
Friday 28th March

Ducks at the holiday chalet
On arrival at our holiday camping pod we have a little welcoming commitee :-)


Saturday 29th March

Crockery and vintage dress
Very pleased to have picked up some more Arcopal Scania crockery (and a retro dress) in the charity shops.


Sunday 30th March

West Somerset Railway Steam Trains
More sunshine, more steam trains!


Monday 31st March
Style at Home Magazine
Another month of my fab Christmas present from lovely friend M - it's always exciting when this drops through the letterbox!
 
 
Previous instalments can be found here...

Friday, 21 March 2014

100 Happy Days #7

The seventh instalment of my attempt to catalogue 100 Happy Days... :-)
 
 
Wednesday 12th March

Work leaving party at Gourmet Burger Kitchen
It's rather sad when two lovely work colleagues and friends leave the office for pastures new but on the plus side, we did manage to wangle closing our office over lunchtime for a slap up meal at Gourmet Burger Kitchen!


 
Thursday 13th March

Chocolate brownies
Two types of chocolate brownies freshly baked for a suprise 'leaving' tea party for the two people leaving our office.


Friday 14th March

Ikea catalogue
We've been meaning to buy a new sofa for ages and finally, we got round to doing the last few measurements and deciding (for certain this time!) what we're going to buy.


Saturday 15th March

Hot chocolate and marshmallows
After a day of cleaning and tidying, we made proper hot chocolate (just real chocolate and hot milk) and topped it off with some marshmallows.


 
Sunday 16th March

Clean and tidy kitchen
I really am getting old because having my kitchen this clean and tidy pleases me no end.


Monday 17th March

Pasta bolognese
It's Monday. Pasta bolognese is about all we could manage to make. The combination of carbs, tomato and cheese though? Delicious.


Tuesday 18th March

Tesco shopping
Along with the whole feeling old thing, managing to get 3 weeks worth of shopping for less than £60 makes me very happy indeed (and also very sad).


 
Wednesday 19th March

Book People delivery
The Book People arrived at work! The man delivers them safely to our shared kitchen next to the office and then it's a mad dash to oooh and ahhh over what suprises he's left this time.


 
Thursday 20th March

Pretty Nostalgic magazine and Spaghetti Carbonara
My copy of Pretty Nostalgic magazine arrived today and coupled with an evening meal of Spaghetti Carbonara, that made for a pretty good evening!


Friday 21st March
 
Ducks at work
We ate our lunch outside today and some feathered friends arrived to join us. :-)
 
 
Previous instalments can be found here...

Thursday, 13 March 2014

A Duck Day Out at the Poole

Back at the end of February, we had a day trip which we knew had to start in Gillingham (the one in North Dorset, not the one over in Kent...) and then end up in Bournemouth (where we had tickets to see Russell Howard).

But where to go in the meantime? We packed some leftover pizza from the previous evening (yep, we are that classy), took a flask of tea and thought we'd find somewhere in the direction of Poole.

It's an area of the country which me and Andrew used to visit a lot when we were both kids - my parents would always go shopping in Poole (I loved the charity shops and the train line right through the high street!) and Andrew's always took him to the Chimes to sit on the beach all day in summer.

One place neither of us had been to though - and I have no idea why, with the amount of times we've both driven past it - was Poole Park. It's a Victorian park, first opened in 1890 and looked like a good place to stop with gardens, parking and a cafe. It happened to be quite nice weather, albeit a bit breezy and we drove into it on the off chance there'd be somewhere free to park and eat our tasteful afternoon tea.

What we didn't realise was that the place was full of ducks!


Poole Park ducks

Poole Park ducks

Poole Park ducks

Poole Park ducks



Hundreds of them, mallards (all paired up with their beaky mates at this time of year), lots of Canadian Geese, long-limbed swans, several birds I didn't recognise and millions of seagulls doing their best impressions of a sitting duck. You could buy duck food for a small price which meant that they were all incredibly tame, although I'm not too sure about having a huge flock of geese that close round my legs...
 
 
Poole Park ducks
 
Poole Park ducks

Poole Park ducks
 
Poole Park ducks
 

 
There's a couple of places to eat in the park but the one we popped into was called The Ark, which amazingly not only contained a cafe and a children's play centre but also a real ice rink!
 
The Ark Cafe at Poole Park
 
We stopped and had a slice of cake each and a hot chocolate which was very tasty (the Lemon Cake is definitely recommended). We ran out of time to go ice skating, which was a right shame - as it means we'll just have to go back another day! :-)
 
 

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