Excuse me whilst I have a funny five minutes

So yeah, MozzyMr and I have been pretty tired recently, work has been stressful for both of us and Mozzy has really been putting in the extra hours.  Evenings consist of doing the washing up, cooking tea and trying not to fall asleep on the sofa!  To cheer Moz up I bought some googly eyes and when he was out stuck them all over the house, when Mozzy got home it was his job to find them all.  Weeeell it amused us for 30 minutes or so.

Life lately

1. Messing about on instagram; my wedding and engagement rings plus my Gran's wedding ring which I've taken to wearing recently.
2. Norway Day cupcakes, a whole load of nom but oh so sweet.
3. Eurovision party, and yes we were drinking grappa from a child's tea set.  It seemed like a good idea at the time!
4. Lovely pattern on a free notebook I received from Boden with a recent order I placed :)
5. Stickers for MozzyMr.
6. I didn't take this photo btw, but it is making me chuckle.
7. Broccoli!  In a raised bed!
8. Runner beans! In the ground!
9. Mewster looking thoroughly unimpressed with the cardboard fort I made her.  Hurumph.

1. More Mewster photos I'm afraid (sorry), (not sorry at all).
2. MozzyMr grabbling with weeds.
3. Our first pear!  Our first pear!
4. The view from the Costa at work, Marte and I regularly take an hour for lunch to sit in the sun and escape office politics!
5. My attempts at eating healthier and losing weight, cannelli bean salad with smoked tofu.
6 and 7. More Norway Day decorations.
8. Courgettes are go!  Cannot wait for the first crop, love courgette on pizza, in salad, in pitta with houmous.
9. So.. um yeah I accidentally put the runner bean picture in again.  Sorry about that, but hey it's a mighty fine runner bean so really I'm just giving you a second opportunity to gaze at it's beauty *cough*.

A month of reading

Err... excuse me but where has May gone?  Between work stresses, putting time in on the allotment and frankly doing all of those day-to-day chores that I love so much the time is flying by!  I've been using my reading time as relax-o time, and remember you can't spell relax-o without relax.

1. The Attachments by Rainbow Rowell

This book in many ways was written about my friend Charlotte and I.  Set in 1999 it tells the story of two friends who work at the same company and exchange emails, unfortunately their emails regularly end up in the flagged file of the IT department and it is the job of Lincoln to send warnings to the people whose emails get flagged, only Lincoln doesn't send warnings to Jennifer or Beth because he finds them funny and because he has become invested in their story.  I really enjoyed this book, the late nineties references and the humour of the characters.  So this week when Charlotte emailed me to say that the second of her cucumbers had germinated and now the two plants could sex each other up I face palmed as I imagined a big flashing red light and alarm going off in the IT department.  Sorry IT folk we usually email about work, but when cucumbers can sex each other up that really is news to share!  (I hasten to add that I'm talking about cucumber PLANTS no lewd connotations here thank you.)

2. The Most Beautiful Thing by Fiona Robyn

Hmm I'm really unsure about this book.  I didn't dislike it at all, and found it very easy to read but I can't really outline why I did like it.  It's a story set in Amsterdam and follows Joe Salt from early teenager to surly adult.  The story slowly unravels his family history and the secrets that have gone untold for decades, a bit predictable really and the plot twist was oh so obvious.  On Good Reads this book got really great reviews so it might just be me, but I just didn't think it was that amazing really.

3. Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher

Ok here's the thing I finished this book on the 12th May and I cannot remember anything about the story or characters or anything.  I think that probably tells you everything you need to know.

Cosmic love

Cosmic Lunar Triangle Tee by These Folk

Cosmic Wood Bangle by Voz Collective

Hubble Lollipops by Designer Lollipop

Cosmic Mason Jar by Limb Trim

Allotment geekery

1. Hardening off the pampered polytunnel plants in a sheltered spot on the plot2. The strawberries won't be far off so we've been slug proofing the plants3. Three rows of swedes and three rows of parsnips, planted, watered and eagerly anticipated4. Butternut squashes planted and under cloches just in case the lovely British weather decides to get cold and bitey again.5. Strawberry flowers galore!6. Borlotti beans finally out on the plot, last year I was convinced I didn't want to grow beans but have planted broad beans, borlotti, and dwarf (yellow and purple) so really I don't know what I was going on about?

Norway Day

I've worked with my Norwegian friend Marte for 3 years now, before her arrival in the office I was completely unaware of Norway day (17th May, apparently it's massive...in Norway).  Marte's first Norway Day in the office passes relatively unnoticed despite much enthusing from our lovely Norwegian.  Second Norway Day in the office gets more attention than the previous year, but sadly for Marte her desk is decorated with posters for British Sandwich week.  Third Norway Day in the office was not going to go past without celebrating!  The crazy woman gets into the office at 7.30am to decorate everyones desk with a Happy Norway Day flag:

She puts on a fine spread of food, my contribution being some Norwegian flag cupcakes:

To the pub to celebrate properly, taking with us some of the decorations sent from Norway by Marte's mum.  

So there you have it, a taste of Norway Day in the UK.  Apparently in Oslo there are massive parades and everyone wears their national dress and it is a massive celebration, definitely something I would like to see first hand, maybe next year?  

Life via the medium of rainbow

Allotment geekery

Yesterday was all about firsts, first properly hot and sunny day of the year, first peeks of apple and strawberry blossom, and first broad bean ever grown!  To round this bank holiday off in proper 'crossing the age line' style we're off to the garden centre in a bit then to the dump to get chicken wire to grow my peas up (yes I heard myself, and yes I know I am rapidly turning into a person of a certain age).

Look at that sky!  It was so lovely yesterday and as I type this I can hear the birds singing outside, I can't wait to get out there :)

I had never realised before we had this allotment that apple blossom starts it's life as a vivid pink, the flowers are so purdy!

* Excitement* the strawberries are coming!  The strawberries are coming!  We're going to give jam a try this year as MozzyMr is allergic to uncooked fruit and there are only so many strawberries I can eat by myself no matter how much I love them.

The only real reason I'm growing broad beans is because I saw a recipe for broad bean pesto that looked great right at the end of broad bean season last year so I couldn't try it out.  I've waited a whole year to grow these little beauties, the trouble is I have a nasty feeling I have no idea where I put the recipe....