The weather around here has been so mild that up until a few days ago people were still wearing 3/4s!  Then it seems as if winter has finally made itself known

Ice on car roof As pretty as a bit of frost is, at 7am it’s not fun trying to thaw your car out. So I was thinking about how it’s probably time for the slow cooker to make it’s appearance and start making stew or something. Mrs Cuddly had the same idea as she has already said she’d love some stew and dumplings… I do love me some dumplings. Oh lord the cat just yawned in my face and that smells! Sorry anyway what I have always wondered about stews is how most recipes call for bay leaves. Something I have never used are bay leaves and I think I’m not the only one here. What confuses me about them is recipes say you put it in at the start but at no point do you take them out again. I always kind of assumed you did. It was either you take them out or they disintegrated into the stew. Never quite knowing always put me off, but I would really like to try. So I’ve seen lots of hubbub recently about Beef & Guiness stew. Whilst I don’t like Guiness I can appreciate that it would work perfectly with it. So when I get chance I think this week I’ll be on it. It will make a nice change to looking forward to food. Over the past few weeks I’ve been so meh about the whole food issue that I’ve mostly just been eating a sandwich here and there and not eating actual meals. This has meant that weight loss has been a bit scewiffy with a 2lb loss, 5lb gain and then a 6lb loss. Mrs Cuddly has been slowly losing her recent big gain and is again back down to under a BMI of 30 which is handy. As part of the IVF though I am now having various tests and samples but the hospital in order to get us through quicker changed our doctor/clinic. He can’t understand why I these tests etc hadn’t been done months ago instead of now. It’s quite frustrating as the goal is so close but someone else messed up and you’re stuck in treacle or something that’s really slowing you down. Ah well you can only carry on as best you can and with that in mind it’s time to sign off. So enjoy and eat yourself slim. Toodles