Hey peeps. Happy May Day! We hope you are all well and not letting this lockdown get to you. We are still trying our best to stay as positive as possible during this period of widespread uncertainly. We have kept ourselves busy by supporting the NHS and others while we keep up with our daily activities. (See below for that).
I think in the end what will make the difference is that from the outset, we have made up our minds not to let the situation get us down so we try to lift each other’s spirit and accept that this is the new ‘norm’ and complaining and stressing about it won’t help. So here are some of the things we got up to this week.
Lockdown Birthday Party with a Difference
So we have got a 17-year-old in the house! She has been looking forward to her birthday so much! She has been looking forward to starting driving lessons and doing her test and has, in fact, been saving to buy her first car! At 17 years old!
I didn’t even start learning to drive until my late 30′! The kids these days have so much bravado. But I say, you go girl.
One thing she was not looking forward to is being locked in! She is quite sociable and was looking forward to spending time with her friends, but alas! This year it was not to be! We made the best of a bad situation and she did enjoy her birthday.
Of course, as usual, I made this cake according to her very particular specifications. This year she could not decide between chocolate and carrot cake so we did both! Why? Well because we can! So she had a two-tiered chocolate carrot cake which she decorated herself. That is not the norm around here.
In fact, I usually make and decorate their birthday cakes whilst they are in school and then let them have the surprise of seeing it on their birthday, but this year was different! You know what bored, miserable teenagers are like. According to her, she had absolutely nothing to do so she decided to decorate her own cake! and she did!
She did a reasonable job and she enjoyed her gifts. She got the main thing she wanted, and she had some gorgeous photos taken. The day was as ok as could be, but, yes there is a but, her friends did not get to celebrate with her! That was her big gripe and whilst I do understand, I’m afraid, it’s s a new norm we all have to get used to.
DIY Birthday Badge
Now normally we save birthday badges so as the kids grow older, their birthday badges can be given to the younger child.
Well, I am baffled because we have 2 other kids who have passed 17 so we should have at least 2 age 17 badges, but alas I could not find one and I did not think to look before the lockdown. So when I discovered that we did not have said badge, we set about making one. It was so good! And in fact, it might be part of our new norm! Watch this space!
What do you think?
DIY Birthday Banner
The birthday banner this year was made primarily from Homebase paint swatches. We chose the colour scheme, cut the cards into heart shapes, punched a hole in the top of each heart, and string them onto crotchet wool. That’s it. Bob’s your uncle! It was super cute and was enhanced by some balloons using a yellow and purple colour scheme so that was another saving this week.
So due to lockdown, we were able to make a number of savings, namely
Cake – homemade
Birthday banner – free
Birthday badge – recycled
Refreshments for party ‘comers’ – a big fat nothing!
Supporting our NHS and others
You might know that we have been sewing some kit for the NHS front line staff. Well, this week we have continued. The living room has been repurposed to become sewing, ironing, and packaging station and we spend most of our day doing that now. It is going great and so far we have made well over 100 items and are continuing to do our bit.
A few weeks ago we sent some masks to my sister who is a nurse in Florida. She was so happy to receive them and was telling us how she shared them around with others.
After finding out that she only had one left from the first lot, we set about to make her some more masks, ear savers, and headbands. The ear savers and headbands are so crucial now because nobody is loving the sore ears after hours of wearing the elastic from the masks around the ear.
This is what the ear savers look like. I think they are such a good idea. And we should all do what we can to help. Do you sew? Can you help to make anything that the health care workers in your area can do with? I am sure they would appreciate it. What else can you do to help? Share with us in the comments section below with all the ways that you are supporting the NHS and each other.
Just sharing this easy mask tutorial. It is the simplest one we’ve found and we will try those out next week. You don’t need to have a sewing machine to make it.
Gardening
The garden is beginning to look up especially since we’ve been having some sunshine followed by rainy days and nights. Hopefully, we will share some pics next week when the rain eases.
We are disappointed to say that the courgette plants that we lovingly started inside the house and then transplanted outside in the garden have all been eaten by slugs or some other creature. All except one.
So this will be it for this week. Do take care and stay safe.
We are linking up withCass, Emma and Becky in this week’s ‘Frugal Friday’ linky.
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I like the way you explain how to make masks at home.
it was very helpful, thank you!.
Is there any other way to make a mask? If there is then please tell me because I will love to make these masks these days in Lockdown
going to read other related blogs because I think this I very helpful
There is a lot of mask making videos on Youtube. Feel free to check them out.
I think it’s lovely that you’ve been helping to support NHS workers through making masks. 🙂