Waffling on - 12/10/26

It was a fairly quiet weekend here.

I did my usual session at the Foodbank on Saturday morning.  Despite the fantastic amount of donations we had from the Woodford Wells Harvest service last weekend there was still a fair amount of food sent in on Saturday.  Sally one of the other volunteers usually joins me so we're usually done in a couple of hours.  

I took advantage of the sunny weather and walked home via the lake.  It is definitely autumn here now.

Saturday evening I watched Strictly (Strictly Come Dancing) which is a favourite of mine.  Some stars are better than others but it is entertaining.

Sunday was relaxing although I did fit in another walk around the lake.  Then we went to our daughter's for dinner.  Our DIL had done a nice slow cooked beef dish but she wasn't happy with her sticky toffee pudding.  Fortunately we'd taken some of the banana bread I made on Friday which went well with the toffee sauce so all was not lost.

I dropped Hubby off at an open mic on the way home then watched the Strictly results show before getting hooked into a new series here "Winter".  

It follows forensic pathologist Dr. Ethan Winter and DI Lauren Bell as they solve complex murder cases in Bristol, blending weekly mysteries with an overarching personal storyline.  

I watched the first two episodes and could easily have watched more but my bed was calling me.

Today I have given in and put the heating on.  

Shots on Sunday - 11/10/26

I did try and post a weekly photo post of photos taken daily.  Problem is I'm not very good at remembering to take a photo each day but I have found it useful to have a routine to my posts.  Anyway today I just thought I'd post the photos I did take this week and rename the post as Shots on Sunday.  We'll see how long this bright idea lasts!

This was my shopping list on Wednesday.  I only ended up getting the birthday cards for my cousin (Jill) and my brother (John).  I never really intended to get the other items so they're still up there.  I also haven't got a card for my daughter and her wife for their wedding anniversary yet.  I'll probably have to look online for that.  Or try a proper card shop rather than the supermarket.

I took this one on my walk around the lake yesterday.  As you can see the ground is beginning to be covered with leaves although the trees are still looking quite green.  I haven't been walking in the forest much lately but now the weather is cooler I'll be trying to do it more often.

This is a photo of a recipe that my son in the US requested. (Macaroni with sausage meat and carrots.) We use it a lot as you can probably tell by the marks on the page!  It's quite easy to do, freezes well and makes a change from Bolognese.

The rest of my pictures were all taken this afternoon at the lake.  It was good to see that there are still 6 cygnets with their parents and they are really big now.  Hopefully the parents won't start chasing them off too soon but there is a great local team of volunteers who will help relocate the cygnets if it becomes necessary.

It was quite sunny today but the weather has definitely cooled this week - I've had to resort to extra layers and we'll need to put the warmer quilt on when we change the bed this week.  We haven't resorted to putting the heating on yet but I have used the electric fire in the lounge a couple of times when I've just been sitting watching TV.  Thankfully although we've had rain it hasn't been too much so I haven't had to dig my wellies out - yet!

#SoCS - 10/10/26

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “familiar.” 

Linda provides the prompts for these posts and the link up is here.

I'm sure we're all familiar with the idea of familiars if you've read the Philip Pullman books or anything similar.  Linda talked about naming a spider in her kitchen Mildred.  I followed that up with naming a spider in my spare bedroom Elsie.  

Well I'm not sure that Elsie actually exists.  I haven't seen her.  My son claims to have seen her while he was staying here but she's proved elusive to me.  To be fair I don't spend a lot of time in the spare bedroom so it's not surprising I haven't seen her.  She probably a bit lonely in there all on her own.  Unless she's brought some friends in to keep her company.  I do hope not!

Friday's Fave Five - 9/10/26

Susanne reminds us every Friday to look back on the week and write about the things we are grateful for.  Then we link up here.  Thanks Susanne.

1)  The smell of fresh Banana Bread.  I brought some bananas home from the Foodbank yesterday - we had lots that were not going to last until next Tuesday's session so volunteers were able to have some.  So of course I had to make banana bread with them.  

2)  The library.  I know I mention this one a lot but it does feature in my routine frequently.  This week I made a trip on Tuesday to pick up a couple of books I'd picked out for my 52 Book Club Challenge and then on Wednesday we had our afternoon book club meeting there where we discussed Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo.  We had a really good discussion about it although personally I was not a fan of the book.  And while I was there I was also able to pick up another book I only ordered in last week.  

3)  My Hubby.  He's always got my back and you will know that he does most of the cooking in our house.  He's not so good at remembering other chores, like putting the dustbins out but this week he even remembered to do that.  After checking which bins had to go out of course. 

4)  Chocolate cake.  My daughter and DIL hosted DILs brothers and families for lunch last Sunday.  They had leftovers and I was able to go over for a cup of tea and chocolate cake to collect some.

5)  Getting back into routines and hobbies. I've definitely been blogging more and I do enjoy the interaction with other bloggers.  I've also made time for reading so that is becoming a habit again and this week I did some knitting (we had a Knit and Natter meet up on Wednesday) and I've finally finished knitting the jumper I started an age ago.  I just need to sew up the sleeve seams, tidy up ends etc and block it.  You might even get to see me model it!  (Don't hold your breath lol.)  

Have a good weekend all.