A Domino Effect

I’m currently engaged in a project to tackle the enigma that has been my living room for the past six months in a bid to make it feel more like ‘me’.  The only problem is, I point blank refuse to spend much money on it.  I mean, it’s pointless to go all out on the decorating front if I’m going to end up moving again in a few months’ time isn’t it?  I also don’t care much for trips to DIY stores.  I find these places to be full of grumpy middle-aged men and their prissy wives who do nothing but argue over light fittings.  Thanks, but I’d much rather spend my Sunday afternoon reading a book if it’s all the same.  I have therefore limited my home embellishments to a) things I already own; b) things I can buy on the cheap and c) things I can snaffle for free.  This has proved to be somewhat challenging thus far but I’m actually having lots of fun watching my vision gradually (very gradually) take shape.  Where would the satisfaction be if I could have it all done in the course of one day/week/month anyway?!

The room in question is enormous, and it’s also a really odd shape.  It comprises living room and dining area, with doors to the kitchen, utility room, bedrooms and store cupboards.  It actually has a rather disproportionate number of doors, which is good for hanging bed linen up to dry, but bad from the point of view of making the room interesting!  Living in rented accommodation, and having an extra-fussy management company watching us like hawks, means that we are also quite tightly restricted as to what we can and can’t do with the place.  There’s absolutely no scope for painting, papering or changing carpets.  Adding things like shelves is also impossible, given that holes in the walls must be kept to a minimum save we lose our precious deposit.

But against these odds, and with much thrifty perseverance, the room is gradually coming together.  Here are some of the more exciting ideas I’ve put into practice:

• Converted an old home-made curtain into a wall hanging to bring some colour to otherwise bare white walls.  Cost: nil
• Wound my own white fairy lights around a metal shopping basket I found in the street to make a kitsch and brightly-lit magazine rack.  Cost: nil
• Replaced a burnt and mouldy lampshade with a funky green Ikea number.  Cost: £7
• Added a blue and green checked rug found in a charity shop.  Cost: £3
• Gave life to the dining table with a vintage tea tray which holds fruit bowl and placemats.  Cost: £3
• Covered a scabby side table with some flowery material I had in my own collection.  Cost: nil
• Hung up a slightly tacky yet totally retro disco ball to reflect sunlight.  This was a present from a friend.  Cost: nil

I’m perpetually on the hunt for a bargain pair of curtains which I’m hoping will lift the room completely to life once and for all.  The current pair are threadbare and a dingy shade of off-yellow.  A part of me dies inside everytime I have to look at them, which unfortunately happens at least twice a day – I need to replace them for my own sanity.  I’m also planning to finish off a patchwork quilt I started *ages* ago which I can drape over the couch which is black (who buys a black couch!?) and desperately in need of some warmth.  Finally, I have a bright red easy chair waiting for me at my parents’ house which I am going to try and recover some time for extra seating and a good splash of colour.

Tiny baby steps I’m sure you’ll agree, but I’m moving in the right direction.  I also haven’t had to make a trip to B&Q yet.  Happy days!

Image above from Flickr – bekkchen.

Lent Lesson 2: Need versus want

I’m actually really thankful that I’m into the last week of Lent.  I don’t think I have a single pair of black tights left that don’t have at least three holes in (I think they waited until Lent began before they started sprouting ladders all over the place), the black pumps I wear in the office everyday are threadbare and falling apart and the wicker bag I carry with me everywhere has bust a strap, thus rendering it useless.  Oh despair!

For the sake of the challenge, however, I’ve managed to get by.  I’ve been wearing trousers to work slightly more than usual, I’ve dug out a replacement bag (free with a magazine several eons ago) and I’ve walked around the office in my stocking soles thus avoiding having to wear the shoes of eternal scruffdom (I prefer the tattered Cinders look anyway).  Sounds a bit drastic I know but I just plain refuse to break Lent after having come so far.  As of Saturday, however, I will no longer be able to churn out the old ‘but it’s Lent and I’m not buying anything’ excuse.  I must accept my fate blog readers – I’m going to to make a trip to the shops.

Lent has got me thinking about the idea of needing things.  What do we actually need in life, and what is simply a case of want?  It occurs to me that the lines between these two ideas have become, for many of us, extremely blurred.  When money flows, life becomes more than a case of simply surviving from day to day and our evaluations of what we consider really necessary change dramatically.  No longer is it a case of food, warmth and shelter, but shoes for every fathomable occasion, bed linen for every conceivable type of guest and a different serving dish for every type of cuisine to come from the kitchen.  How often have you heard someone justify buying something frivolous on the basis that they ‘really need it‘?  All the time, right?  I’ve done it myself.  Many shoppers are plagued with the notion that it’s OK to spend a fortune on something as long as they can somehow say they needed it.

This bugs me.  Why do we do it?  I think the answer is pretty simple.  Deep down, we know it’s unnecessary, we know it’s over-indulgent and we know the money should really be going towards something better.  ‘I really need it‘ is an age-old excuse, and it’s churned out on high streets up and down the land every Saturday afternoon without fail.  Of course it’s true that sometimes our lives would be considerably easier if we had certain things, and it’s for this reason that I’m going to buy new tights and a bag this weekend, but that’s not the same as really needing, is it?

Lent has reminded me not to misuse the word ‘need’.  It has reaffirmed to me the idea that I don’t actually require very much in life that money can buy me.  I have somewhere to sleep, food on my plate and more clothes than I could shake a reasonably-sized stick at.  My other basic needs are the things that can’t be bought (well, not in the mainstream, non-creepy sense anyway): friendship, love, time and peace.  I’m going to try my best to remember that when I start buying again.  When so many people in the world have so little and really do know the difference between need and want, I think it’s more than just slightly shameful that so many of us have yet to grasp the big picture.

Image above from Flickr – incurable hippie.

Check out this recipe for leek and smoked cheddar tart (found via the Guardian website).  Doesn’t it look amazing, and utterly perfect for Spring?  I’m sorely tempted to scrap tonight’s dinner in favour of trying this out – cheese, leeks and pastry…what a combination.  I think I’ll resist, however, until next week – I’ve got big plans (and most of the ingredients) for carrot and coriander soup and another cheese-laden pizza tonight.  I also don’t think I have the right kind of baking tin to attempt something like this with any recognisable degree of success.  So it’s with a heavy heart that I have to say beautiful tart, you do look delicious, but sadly you will just have to wait.

Anyway, it’s a pretty dismal Thursday here in Edinburgh – it’s raining, but it’s that kind of wishy-washy drizzle that I always find difficult to deal with.  Give me big, fat, voluptuous drops over this anyday!  It’s one of life’s little conundrums – on the one hand you feel like a berk holding an umbrella because the rain is so light but on the other, if you are umbrella-less you somehow still end up completely drenched.  Nothing is ever simple is it?!

Nevertheless, contrary to most other rainy days I’m actually quite open to this one.  I’ve been teetering on the brink of finishing my current book (The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver – reviews here) for a few days now and this type of weather provides the perfect opportunity for going home after work, indulging in some hearty comfort foods and several cups of tea and settling down to nothing but a few hours of uninterrupted page-flicking.  I’ve been reading constantly for the past few months but nothing has really captured me in the can’t-put-this-down sense for a while (with, perhaps, the exception of Yann Martel’s Life of Pi).  Although it took me a while to get into The Poisonwood Bible it has turned out to be a remarkable and beautifully-written story about postcolonial Africa, the Belgian Congo and the devastating destruction of an entire family.  Sad, but incredibly poignant nonetheless.  I’ve no idea how it will end (perhaps I will tell you tomorrow) but I’d highly recommend a read to anyone wishing to learn a little about Africa’s complex but intriguing history.

Also, as the conclusion of Lent appears on the horizon I’ve thought of a couple of things I’d like to get my hands on once I’m free to spend again.  All non-frivolous purchases, of course!  First off, I’m going to invest in a three-tier steamer for cooking vegetables and potatoes and almost anything else.  I don’t know why this idea hasn’t occurred to me before but I have used a friend’s steamer several times now and I have to say that they are totally genius inventions.  They save bucketloads of energy (think one hob instead of three) and they are also a much gentler way to cook.  I’m sure I read somewhere  that steaming allows vegetables to retain more of their nutrients than boiling does.  If you’re going to be good enough to eat the darn things in the first place you might as well get the full benefit of them!

Second and third on my wish list are a proper pizza tray and a roller-type cutting device which will both, hopefully, help to further my currently infantile pizza-making expertise.  I can’t seem to achieve all-out crispiness of the base at the moment, which I’m putting down to the trays I’ve been using having no holes in the bottom and I’m also having some difficulty hacking the things up with a bread knife which I think a proper cutter might solve.  No longer will I be serving half-mangled doughy slabs but perfectly crispy, even triangles which you might be forgiven for thinking came straight from Italia herself.  Here’s hoping anyway.

Roll on Good Friday!

PS: As a follow-up to yesterday’s post about breakfast, this morning I had a raisin, apple and cinnamon bagel with lots of cream cheese and a glass of pineapple juice.  Different and interesting!  I’ve decided to canvass Lidl on my way home later for interesting cereals and some Deutsch-themed pizza toppings!

Image above courtesy of Flickr – tworm.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote what I thought was a rather cheery, chipper post about Spring and why we should all love it.  I talked about nature and daffodils and post-work strolls in the late evening sunshine, playing tennis and eating salads and wearing white linen trousers after eons of trudging around in thick tights.  It all sounded so wonderful and really, it is, but there’s just one blot on this perfect, cloud-free horizon that rears its ugly, money-guzzling head around this time of year.  That’s right, it’s the winter energy bill.

I received my gas and electricity bills for the past three months in one, horrible, blood-sucking go this morning, which has had an intensely dampening effect on my Monday mood.  Essentially, we are being charged around £300.  Although this is between the two of us it has still come as a bit of a blow, and not at the most perfect time either.  I do have surplus cash kicking about owing to Lent, but the bill itself nonchalantly dropped through the letter box midway through the month, and on the same day as my rent fell due!  Oh the woes of 21st century living!

There’s nothing I can do about this particular bill now – it’s clearly accurate as we’ve had the heating on pretty constantly over the winter months and some of our appliances have been in use much more as well.  I don’t resent paying for energy at all, and it has been an extremely comfortable winter on that front (in my student days the heating only went on in dire straits – the rest of the time we wore jumpers and drank more tea) but now that the evenings are stretching out a little and the weather isn’t quite so dismal it’s perhaps time to start thinking about ways to cut costs for the Spring quarter.

The biggie will obviously be adjusting the timer on the heating in accord with the weather but there are also a number of smaller things I can do that will add up slowly over the course of three months.  I’m generally fairly good with the whole ‘turning lights off when I’m not in the room’ thing and I don’t tend to do more than two loads of washing in a week (usually at 30 degrees too!).  But I guess there are some residual grey areas where little energy-saving changes can still be made.  For starters, I’m going to stop making a hot water bottle each night and I’m going to take my electric blanket off of the bed (I mean come on, that’s just a luxury!).  I’m also going to begin leaving my hair to dry naturally some mornings as opposed to blasting it ferociously with the dryer and then attacking it with the straighteners.  I much prefer the natural look and it’s better for my hair anyway (yes, Cheryl, I’m worth it).  I also shouldn’t forget that Springtime naturally lends itself to reduced energy bills anyway – having more cold meals – salads for one – gives the cooker a bit of a break and spending increased amounts of time outdoors means that things like the radio and the TV are less in use as well.

I’m not going to be too draconian about it, but I really despise having my Monday morning ruined by fat-ass bills like this one.  The only way I can prevent it happening again is to change the way I do things, as far as that’s possible.

Hate Mondays, hate bills, HATE parting with cash when it’s not necessary!

Image available from Flickr: ladybugbkt.

There was a brilliant fashion spread in the Times Magazine on Saturday just passed called “A Season in 20 Pieces”, which I mention today because I only just got round to reading it on Tuesday during my lunch hour.  I’ve been trying to find it online to share ever since, but it’s doing a good job of eluding me at the moment.

I don’t usually have much time for glossy fashion spreads and tend to flick speedily through them with a glazed expression on my face.  I find that I’m capable of appreciating the clothes well enough, but I’m much more of a ‘show me how this would work in real life’ type of girl.  I’d much rather look at affordable clothes shot in real life scenarios than the latest catwalk offerings photographed in artificially lit studios without a gust of wind or even a single rain drop in sight.  I also find fashion an extremely personal thing, and feel quite stubbornly averse to having some fancy-pants designer dictating both what I should wear and also how I should attempt to wear it.

This article, however, I found really quite inspiring from a creative point of view. It featured 20 staple pieces of clothing and accessories, all on trend for Spring 2010, worn in 20 different ways by the same model.  While many of the clothes featured were a tad too summer-like for February (think flip flops, open-toe wedges and floaty floral skirts worn with no tights(!!)) the styling (by Amanda Bellan) was utterly amazing.  I honestly would never have thought, having looked at the pieces in isolation, that they could be molded into so many completely unique outfits.  Almost every piece featured at least three times, and there wasn’t one combination that made me think the stylist was really scraping the barrel to come up with something new. To take one example, a simple long-sleeved mini-dress was worn a) with flip flops, bare legs, an over-sized bag and a trilby hat; b) over skinny jeans and flip flops and under a silver sequinned waistcoat, cinched at the waist with a chunky black belt and c) underneath a sleeveless, floaty top, again with the belt, bare legs and a serious pair of platform wedges.  Everytime this dress appeared I was completely taken aback as to how different (and great!) it looked.  It just goes to show how far a little imagination and a good measure of confidence can take you.

The whole piece was incredibly impressive, and it got me thinking seriously about the idea of versatility, and the extent to which some of the items in my own wardrobe (which I can assure you boasts considerably more than 20!) might, with a little creative thinking on my part, take on a completely new lease of life.  Were we all to experiment a bit more with our clothes and to make the absolute most of every single item it stands to reason that we wouldn’t have quite the national shopping habit that we do.   In theory, at least, we would be more content with having fewer clothes because what we did have we would be able to wear in dozens of different ways.

So I’m now toying with the idea of choosing a set of Spring staples from within my own ranks (not buying anything new of course) – a project to go hand in hand with my current home-improvement bonanza which is progressing swimmingly on these cold dark evenings.  Over the last couple of nights I’ve washed, ironed and re-hung my bedroom curtains, raided and re-jigged my pyjama drawer and one section of my wardrobe for charity donations and begun the mammoth task of sorting through several boxes of paperwork in a bid to create a half-way respectable filing system.  I’m also reading a book by Cath Kidston on vintage style, which is providing me with copious amounts of design and home inspiration.  On with the New Year projects!

Image courtesy of Flickr: Ed Yourdon.