Visiting Lundy Island- part 1

If you've been following my budget blogs then you'll know that in June we took a little trip to Lundy Island as part of our joint birthdays and anniversary celebration.  As it's on our bucket list of places to visit in the area, mainly for the puffins, it seemed like a very good place to celebrate.

The shortest amount of time you can book to stay there are four days (three nights) so that's what we went for, though I have to admit we both ended up wishing we had booked much longer. We went for the camping option as it was the cheapest option available and would allow us to give our new tent a test (so far so good on that front).  We also drove up the night before as the ferry was leaving at 7.30am and the idea of driving across Devon that early in the morning wasn't a pleasant one.

The ferry trip to Lundy takes about two hours and on the way out, along with the rocking, there was quite a bit of fog which made us a little worried we wouldn't actually get to see Lundy as we sailed in.   However, the fog lifted as we reached the end and we got a great view (the older man standing right in the way regardless of everyone else notwithstanding) with blue skies and Common Dolphins leaping beside the ferry.  I didn't really take any photos as I just wanted to enjoy the view.

Understandably, it takes a little while for them to unload the bags from the ferry and take them up to where everyone is staying, so you need to wait a bit before you can settle in.  We had had to cram our hand luggage more than we would have liked so the idea of walking the whole of the island that day was not a compelling one.  I'm also really not a morning person and the hour we had to wake up at to catch the ferry meant that I was very fuzzy for most of the day, and not in the mood for a long trek.  

So instead, we decided to take it slow, enjoying the heat of the sun, get some lunch from the Marisco Tavern (bake potato and a beer), and wander around the south part of the island.  First, we headed down past the church and had a look around the outside of the castle (built in 1244 for Henry III).  We decided not to actually go to the South Lighthouse but instead followed a small trail that curved along the south of the island and up the west side towards the Old Light lighthouse.  

This lighthouse was built in 1819 but turned out to be far too high with the light regularly being hidden by the fog that seems to regular cover the top of the island, but not at sea level.  It was replaced by the South and North Lighthouses in 1897.

We then cut across the field, heading back into the village to check out the shop, have an ice cream, and a little nap in the sun.  By this point, our bags had been delivered to the campsite and we were able to set up the tent with all our sleeping gear.

We had decided that the first night would be the night that we ate at the Marisco Tavern as it was actually my birthday, which was a lovely way to end the first day.

Day two was the day we had decided to properly explore the island.  After enjoying a little lie-in we headed off north along the main central (though mainly eastern) path.  As the sea birds were mostly nesting on the cliffs on the west side of the island we decided to use this path to quickly get us to the North Lighthouse, taking a little nosey at the Old Hospital remains on the way, before slowly meandering back along the west path.

There were quite a few steep steps down to the northern lighthouse, which unfortunately you can't look around, and we did think twice about heading down.  However, we ended up being very glad that we did as we not only got to see puffins bobbing around in the water but also saw a couple standing on the cliff beside us at pretty easy viewing - with binoculars.  We sat there for quite a while watching them and the guillemots, razorbills and seals there, with the area all to ourselves as many people seemed to be put off by the stairs.  

After dragging ourselves back up the stairs we headed down the west coast, stopping now and then to have a look at the cliffs to watch the seabirds nesting, mostly herring and lesser black-backed gulls, and look at the land just above the cliffs in the hope of seeing more puffins.

We lucked out just south of the Halfway Wall where we saw a lot of puffins all along the top of the cliffs where landslides had produced lots of burrows for them to nest in.  It was amazing to just sit there watching them flying in and out, popping down into their burrows and interacting with each other.  We actually spent so much time sitting there it was well after lunchtime before we set off again back towards the village, with an idea of returning there again before we headed home.  The plan to visit the Battery on the way back was put to one side as I was way too hungry.  So instead we headed back to our tent to eat and enjoy an afternoon nap, but not before getting a glimpse of a Peregrin Falcon on one of the cliff tops.

Once the temperature cooled back down we headed back up the field to have a look at the tiny cemetery on the island and then walk up the Old Light to get a really good view of the island as the sun lowered.  By the end of the day our birding list included Puffins, Razorbills, Guillemots, Shags, Oystercatchers, Herring Gulls, Lesser Black-backed Gulls, Great Black-backed Gulls, Peregrin Falcon, Stonechat, and Skylarks.  Not bad really and the view from the lighthouse was a great way to end a beautiful day.

We had two more days left on the island and on the second evening we planned what we wanted to do over the last two based on what we had already seen.  When we checked for we left for the island the weather had looked good for these two days, so we had high expectations.

Making a Nightie: from one I love already

I have a nightie that I love.  I love the style, the shape of it, and the way it sits on my body.  The only problem is that the material is synthetic and, whilst that means that it flows nicely, it's very hot to sleep in and I really dislike being hot in bed.  So, as I wasn't actually wearing it as much as I wanted to, I decided to take it apart and see if I could make a pattern from the parts to then make the same nightie in cotton.

I wish now that I had taken a photo of what this nightie looked like before I cut it up, but it didn't occur to me until after I had started that I might want to write a blog about this process.  I have chosen a slightly odd fabric to use, cotton Harry Potter-themed fat quarters I found in Aldi, but as this was mainly me testing out the pattern design I was making I decided to go with something fun.

The first thing I did was take apart the nightie and then laid each panel onto greaseproof paper, which I used as I don't actually have pattern paper and this was the closest thing I could find in my home.  I then traced around them loosely to get an idea of the shape, before converting it into actual curves and straight lines.

There wasn't enough space on the greaseproof paper to actually draw the whole front panel, so instead, I folded it in half and just made a pattern for that.  Any future nighties I make from this will need to be made by folding the fabric in half first.  In the end, the pattern pieces I now have are one front piece to cover half the front panel, one back piece to make two back panels, one front lining piece for the top front half of the nightie, and one back lining piece for the top back half of the nightie.

As the fat quarters weren't large enough to cover the whole panel I decided to sew them together first using French seams so that they wouldn't rub me when I slept.

A French seam is where you line the fabric back sides together, sew along the seam.  Then you trim down the seam, turn the fabric front sides together, iron them flat, and then sew along the seam again enclosing the raw seam. 

Once this was done I cut out the panels I would need using my pattern pieces and sewed the back and front sides together.  As the work I needed to do to make the fabric pieces big enough for the panel basically meant sewing the two back panels together already I didn't actually need to do that step here.

At this point I just pointed the back and front pieces together using a basic seam stitch as I hadn't decided how I actually wanted to finish this section off.  I did do the seam around the leg slits on either side though.

It was then time to move onto the inner linings, which I joined together and then did a zigzag stitch all along the lower raw edge as I don't have an overlocker to finish these raw and I've read that using this type of stitching works pretty well.

I then joined the top edge of the lining to the top edge of the nightie front side to front side, adding in the front straps and strap loops at the back as I went along.  To make life easier for myself I had decided to use the ribbon that the fat quarters had come with instead of making the straps myself using fabric.  The lining was then folded back over to the inside, ironed down and top stitched along the top of the nightie to hold the panels in place.

Then it moved to trying the nightie on for the first time and that's when I realised two things.  Firstly I had had to make a slight change with the straps because I had accidentally sewn in the ribbon off-cut as one of the straps and had had to cut the other one down to size.  When I tried it on I could see that, when folded over, it was way too short so I just opened it up to its full size and sewed it straight onto the back rings.

The second issue was that it turned out to be slightly too tight.  I was expecting the fit to be a bit different as I had gone from a synthetic material to much stiffer cotton. However, I realised that in this case, I just didn't have enough material in the back panels.  When I went back to the pattern pieces I noticed that I had made this panel 5cm too short along the bottom edge.  I drew up a new pattern piece with this extra width for future use, but for this current project, I decided to just add a triangle piece on each of the lower side seams.

It then came to deciding how I was going to finish these seems off and I went for a run and fell seam due to it's strength and the fact that it gets used a lot of clothes that get a lot of wear and washing.  To do this you trim down one of the seams (usually on the back edge), then fold the other side seam around the trimmed seam and pin it flat.  Then you sew along the folded edge creating what is hopefully two rows of parallel stitching.....hopefully.  

And that's it, I now have a new nightie.  It's much stiffer than the nightie I made it from and doesn't quite have the same fall, but I've already been sleeping in it and the material has softened up considerably.  It's also a lot less hot to sleep in, which was my main goal and I now have a pattern that I can use to make this nightie again in the future.  As an additional plus, I also used the remaining fat quarter fabrics, a ribbon I had in the craft box for a stupidly long time, and the now scrap fabric from my old nightie to make my partner a Harry Potter themed project bag with a matching pouch for all his tools (I took the photo before I had put the zip into the pouch as I hadn't realised you should do that first - quite a learning curve that turned out to be).  He's a big Harry Potter fan so that was a win and I really love the combination of the two fabric patterns together and am now slightly jealous. 

June 2021 Budget

This month didn't quite go to plan, but then there were a few things happening that did throw us off a little.  One was planned - our joint birthdays and an anniversary trip to Lundy Island - and one not planned - a funeral in the Cotswolds.  The way this month worked also meant that we ended up having two rents and other household expenses come out in one month. 

On the positive, our credit cards are still at zero, but the issue with the household expenses meant that my partner had to take some money from his emergency fund to put into our joint account to pay the rent.  We will be paying that back straight away in July in lieu of the rent, but it did make me glad that we had sorted out our emergency funds.

Even with that, we have still managed to put money into our Christmas and car sinking funds and managed to put a good amount into our four months saving fund, mainly due to one of us getting a nice tax refund.  This means that we are on track for reaching our financial goals by the end of 2021.  

And, in case you were wondering, we moved the money into the savings account before we realised that the second lot of home expenses were coming out.  As we had already decided that any money we received from things like tax returns would go directly towards our savings and pensions we decided to just leave the money where it was.

I'm very happy that I was able to put money towards my pension again this month.  This has definitely become a priority for me now for the rest of the year so, no matter the consequences, this will be paid in every month.  My future financial health depends on it.

Our spending on groceries and takeaways is definitely higher than what it was in the last couple of months, but I'm not going to worry about that this month because these expenses are mostly connected to our trips to Lundy Island and up to Cirencester.  Food is definitely where we spend most of our budget as we love food and, at the moment, it's not putting us into any debt which makes it difficult to see it as an actual problem.

Our joint personal spending has also remained the same and is still quite high and, whilst we mainly spend it on items for our crafting and other hobbies (and it also isn't putting us into debt), we could still probably reduce this.  Especially if we're wanting to complete our goal of having four months expenses put aside by the end of this year.  We've also done quite a bit of spending on birthdays this month.  This isn't really anything we would change but we do want to keep an eye on it so that we have an idea of what we want our birthday sinking fund total to be next year.

All in all, it wasn't a bad month apart from the slight miscalculation of when the rent would come out.  We do still have the slight problem of spending when it comes to food and hobbies, but it's so difficult to pull it in when we know it's not putting us into debt.  It also probably doesn't help that I have lived in a situation where I had to be very careful with my money, and now I don't have to be it's difficult for me to keep to that mindset.  I'm just not entirely sure how to break the hold, probably a little bit of research into that is needed and will be something I look into in July.