Welcome

I’ve a long history in cutting corners, from hemming up curtains with masking tape, to dusting with whatever comes to hand. Why? Because life is short and time is at a premium and I have a million and two things I want to do. If I insist on doing them all properly, I shan’t begin many of them, as they suddenly become tasks of such magnitude as to be untenable to the mere mortal that I am. Things don’t always work of course, but as long as you prepare yourself for possible failure, that’s okay. But on the other hand, you might be surprised as I was recently by this.

The Great Plastic Disaster!

How many plastic bottles are there in your house? Go on, open your cupboard doors and count… it’s not a judgement, more a why? When we know it’s not good for us or the planet – when we know it’s in our food as well as in our oceans and seas and that it endangers wildlife - and more recently that Microplastics have also been detected in live human lungs.

In a local charity shop recently I overheard, not for the first time I might add, someone complaining about the cost of an item for sale. At first thought it sounded mean, after all, who would begrudge money going to a good cause?

It’s a good question though isn’t it. The meanies, the miserable, the manically motivated bargain hunter, the in need, the less well off?

My Mother-in-Law, Freda, a very elegant woman, had a great wardrobe, based on a simple philosophy: buy the best you can, buy classic, never buy on impulse. She also knew what colours suited her and stuck to them - which meant her wardrobe automatically co-ordinated, creating multiple outfits from just a few well chosen items. A mix and match dream.

It’s that time of year again – when, in my opinion, half the world goes mad buying as much as they can possibly lay their hands on and the other half worries about it, wondering how it’s all going to end. Members of the latter group, you won’t be surprised to hear, are often viewed as party poopers - or at least as if they’re unwell, like one day last week when a neighbour shook her head sadly at me, as I told about the shocking waste of paper (approx.

Who amongst us hasn’t at some time or other been forced to become creative in a time of need? Re-using and re-purposing all kinds of things. Camping trips especially seem to lend themselves to such scenarios. Would be flying tents held down with piles of stone collected from the beach - plastic bags (soon to be a thing of the past and another problem to be solved) worn over leaky wellingtons - one pot meals that you’d never consider at home but find delicious in the great outdoors.

What can you save from the skip?

Pam continues her blog about Freegle, recycling, repair and that sort of thing.

Who's got an odd pair of shoes?

Pam continues her blog about Freegle, recycling, repair and that sort of thing.

Pam continues her blog about Freegle, recycling, repair and that sort of thing.

My Dad, bless him, was an Up-cycler Extraordinaire. Not that we knew this at the time of course, back then upcycling wasn’t even a word. Back then it was more a matter of necessity. The throw away world was yet to come.