Getting rid of stuff and a new boiler

Three things put on Freegle and safely collected. The person who responded to my email about the 4th thing - a metal fence post holder - hasn't responded to my email offering it to her.  Bit of a pain as I had today off and took some things to the PDSA shop and that could have gone too, but am keeping it for a few more days in case she responds.

My boiler is 14 1/2 years old and my handyman who does the maintenance has said it could last a few more years or could break down at any time.  Safest to get it replaced while it is still working, so had the plumber who replaced a friend's boiler visit to give me a quote.

I was worried about condensing boilers as a colleague has one and the pipe kept freezing in the cold weather. The plumber said some installers keep the outlet pipe at the first narrow size instead of changing to a large size, and some boilers dribble condensation all the time (I am paraphrasing here) but the Valiant boiler he will quote me for is a German make where winters are colder so they have thought of this. The condensation collects and is vented about a 1/4 pint at a time. It doesn't guarantee the outlet pipe will never freeze but makes it unlikely. Plan to have the work done in June. Expensive, but should be more economical to run.

Found a home for spare flower pots

I am always surprised with the frequently seen money saving tip of turning yogurt pots etc into flower pots. Unless you grow everything in your garden/allotment from seed you soon collect an awful lot of particularly small flower pots.

I knew someone who used to bring pots of plants to sell on the local green party stall and the local organic gardeners stall at events, so I eagerly offered her my spare pots. She had just taken over a shed with loads of pots in so declined my kind offer!

Some on Freegle asked for pots, as the charity she works/volunteers for sell plants to raise funds; so I have got rid of 3 carrier bags of them.

I have some things to put on Freegle, but not looking forward to it.

Tomatoes

Yesterday lunchtime I transplanted the tomato seedlings on my office windowsill into small, individual pots. Even discarding two very small seedlings and 3 growing so close together roots were likely to be damaged separating them, I still have 13. They are all looking good this morning.

I got a packet of alicante tomato seedlings free with a catalogue. I put them on the "freegle" intranet forum at work and someone has been very pleased to take them. I don't have space for 13 tomato plants in the garden so will put surplus on the forum as well to find good homes.

Freegle frustration

I put 4 things onto Freegle I didn't think a charity shop woiuld take 3 weeks ago.  Two things easily got rid of, one a little hiccup, but the third has been offered in turn to 3 people who wanted it before it was finally collected.  It is so much easier to take items to the charity shop that are acceptable and small enough to go in the shopping trolley that I am surprised so many people on Freegle offer stuff in that category.

At least in my list of "in" and "out"* I have been able to add 4 things to the out list.

*the lists don't count food, toiletries, cleaning products and books.

Knowing I will have to write down what I buy does make me hesitate before I purchase and that occasionally means I decide I don't need something afterall!