Mending

Cecilia Hewett this is using a Graham Hewett mushroom! And yarn from a huge bundle bought from a charity shop, has provided many mends.

Trolls

 Just in case any of the detractors who have messaged about my post that we were using our AGA on Christmas Day, wonder why we turned it on? 

 (although, you don't seem to have bothered actually reading my post, or thinking, before you commented.)

I'm just very grateful that

We have an Aga in the first place (came with the house, we didn't install it) 

We have an Aga to use.

(It's oil fired, because we are rural, so no mains gas, as is very common in rural communities, so we have no choice but to pay for oil. If we can't, we go cold.)

, and the house came with an oil tank supplying the house, (as most rural houses do around here, only source of heating/hot water, unless there is a wood burner or fire place) , APART from the solar thermal tubes and Pv we have installed) 

We can afford to buy (within a reasonable list) food that needs an Aga to be cooked in.

(Yes, we have pensions, by working in well paid jobs which we worked very hard to get the qualifications to be employed to do, and a house we scrimped and saved to pay off our mortgage) 

We can afford to run the AGA for a few days, (we have the AGA have pensions, yada yada yada.)

We've never had a foreign holiday, have only flown twice (as part of our jobs ) abroad. 

I'm sorry that who ever youse are, are offended by us living within OUR means, and utilising a tool that exists in our kitchen/household, to make our lives more comfortable for a few days.

Shame on you for not leaving comments on my original post, instead emailing or messaging me on other SM platforms. You can just Fuck Off.

Happy Christmas!

 Happy Christmas from all at Compost Mansions

Happy Aga day!

 Compostman has been calculating.

He has done the calculations, as have I, and despite the Aga costing ~£8 for a day of cooking and heating water etc for tomorrow, putting it on tonight, using it for slow roasting the Ribs of Beef, hot cooking the Roast Spuds and Yorkshires, cooking all the veg, reheating the Christmas pud, making hot drinks, AND heating the core of the house and bathroom, providing constant hot water AND drying endless loads of washing over it (that I haven't been able to do due to wet /cold weather)

Still means putting it on is actually MORE cost effective *this one occasion* than using Electric for cooking /oil fired boiler for heating and hot water/wood burner for heating. We get little benefit from Pv or Solar at this time of year. 

So, Back to being an Aga Christmas Day (it does cook stuff SO well, we used to use it a lot in Winter/Spring in our first decade here until we really cut down on oil consumption)

Cosy night by the fire.

Hurrah! Woodburner kicking out heat, cats on sofa, now watching His Dark Materials in UHD on iplayer.

Watched the excellent "Saving Mr Banks" film earlier (along with the Victoria Coren Mitchell programme on PJ Travers, just before, which was very good)

#toocoldoutside