I’m sick of no one filling up the water filter so yesterday I went & brought a Brita filter tap, I thought I may as well buy a new kettle whilst I was at it & I picked up a Russell Hobs 75% quieter jobbie, all I can say is wow, how the heck did I manage to live with the noise of the old one for so long? It sounded like a jet fighter taking off in comparison!
Anyway I just thought I would share, what silly boring household appliances have made you happy?

Cheers.

Au pair.

au jus.

I like noisy kettles. Turns tea-arrival into an event, like a drum-roll.

Mine – battery motion-sensitive lights up our drive. Stops the missus falling over all my junk as she tries to get in the door from work.

For me it is the Quooker hot tap. A complete an utter indulgence, but now i’ve got one I wouldn’t be without. To think I used to have to wait for a kettle to boil! What a waste of life!

To a lesser extent a seperate beer fridge. No more arguments with the missus over beer realestate in the fridge.

I just bought some LED bulbs for the front room. Woop.

Remote control pugs sockets. £15 to save my reaching behind the sofa every night to turn off the lamp. Also very useful for the tree lights.

new roof and rebuilt chimney – should now be water tight this winter. Not appliances but I’m getting to the point where thinking about the progress is important 🙂

Yep, quooker…. fair do’s its way too expensive to buy but wow its handy!.

Dulux bathroom paint – significantly better quality than the Homebase version.

We bought a house. Us and the bank, anyway. Now looking at all sorts of grown-up stuff like hedge species, lawnmowers, garage doors, sofas, woodburners (obvs), and marine ply and climbing holds for the garden office possibly cum bouldering wall.

A Halogen fryer. Cook ‘proper’ chips* without having a coronary, as it only uses a teaspoon-full of oil. It hasn’t half had some hammer 😀

* It cooks loads of other really nice stuff too, but the chips are awesome. And who doesn’t fancy a chip butty when you get in from a night ride?

iKettle I thought it was just going to be a gimmick, but it isn’t!
Slow Cooker… OMG why did no one tell me about these things when I was in my 20’s!?

carpet and sofa for the living room

Second-hand gas Aga off Ebay.

Binners – I need one of those now 🙂

Oil filled radiators. Boiler u.s.
🙁

Had one of these made to the width of the kitchen window. Frees up a ton of cupboard space and looks pretty good too.

Slow cooker.

Bunged a mushroom balti in there yesterday with a load of overripe cherry tomatoes. Sublimely tasty and didn’t lose any moisture.

Day before a big bag of (9p!) Mozzers on-the-date sale bag of chopped veg soup mix, add water and bouillon. Throw it in, live the day, or cook at night while asleep.

Best buy for years.

We got a new double oven this week instead of the old single. Yesterday we made biscuits in the top one while dinner was in the bottom one. Awesome.

Also a heat recovery extractor fan for the utility room makes our clothes dry faster, keeps the house warmer and has reduced the amount of condensation on the windows. It’s great.

Like that pot & pan rack. Reckon they should do a contemporary version for hanging microwave meal packets on.

Not so recent, but Mrs Digga bought one of these things after wrecking countless lesser blenders and it makes the best smoothies, even with frozen fruit & veg, no hassle:

Reckon it could smoothie old boots. It’s one of those things that, when you’ve had two cheaper blenders literally go up in smoke, you realise is not actually that expensive. **** noisey though, but you can’t make an omlette etc. etc.

what silly boring household appliances have made you happy?

Double oven induction cooker. See above comment on double ovens. Induction hobs are great.

Anthracite fired boiler. Which means we now have central heating running on a timer, which is 1000% better than the aesthetically pleasing yet inadequately powerful, slow to respond, manually demanding, capricious, always-cold-in-the-mornings-and-when-we-got-back-in-at-5pm, not forgetting incredibly awkward to sweep/clean, wood fired range it replaced.

Another kettle one.

Adjustable temperature, boil for tea, 90 degrees for coffee, 55 degrees for hot water bottle.

The days of waiting for it to cool slightly or adding cold water from the tap are over 🙂

Honeywell Evohome along with 9 radiator valves and the hot water kit.

http://getconnected.honeywell.com/en/thermostats/evohome

I got a mini chopper thing, it’s amazing for making pastes for curry bases. Just throw some ginger and garlic and whatever you fancy in there and you’re set!

A microwave, ok so that’s not exciting but what was was the old one going “pop” 😐

Tile combs to stop bl00dy birds nesting in the bl00dy roof lining.

A flushing toilet is the latest greatest thing in our house 🙂

Raspberry pi/openelec/fusion
Electric knife sharpener
Shower squeegee
LED light bulbs

I’m sick of no one filling up the water filter so yesterday I went & brought a Brita filter tap, I thought I may as well buy a new kettle whilst I was at it & I picked up a Russell Hobs 75% quieter jobbie, all I can say is wow, how the heck did I manage to live with the noise of the old one for so long? It sounded like a jet fighter taking off in comparison!

I was intrigued by this so googled it – it’ll have to wait till I’m not renting, but if anyone else is looking:
http://www.robertdyas.co.uk/brita-torlan-3-way-mono-mixer-filter-kitchen-tap-chrome

Looks like an excellent deal, £137 installed.

One of my tenants decided to fit a Hive tinterweb/smart phone operated thermostat thing before he left. I used to enjoy climbing into the loft when I got cold to adjust the thermostat!?

Karcher window cleaner……for the wife! All heart me, apparently it’s ace 😀

A positive pressure ventilation system.

Definaty a wood burner

Led lights outside 6.5w equals dusk till dawn for a fiver a month.

Ohh, and outdoor lighting – a two-way circuit with PIRs so either PIR triggers both lights (front and side of house).

It’s like Wembley stadium of a dark evening now.

Underfloor heating in the ensuite
Water softener – only had it a few days but already noticing a big difference in shininess of bathroom fittings and using mush less cleaning products.
Pocket sliding door for the ensuite – frees up so much space
Sage kettle – different temp for different drinks
Sage toaster – less likely to burn fruited breads, toasts the opposite bagels or crumpets different amounts

+1 for the mini chopper thing for quick sauces and pastes

An extension……. Cost enough though,

Bought 5 of this Royal VKB hard anodised storage jars from TK Maxx for £1.99 each … all sizes.

Royal VKB Hard Anodised Cup and storage jars.

A funky duvet cover imported from those crazy dutch

(Thats not my house – the bailiff haven’t taken my furniture. Yet)