What little things disproportionately improve your quality of life?

[BoogleMcGroogle]

I know that the big things (secure housing, relationships and finances, good physical and mental health) make all the difference. But I just turned on the car radio and it got me thinking about the small, inexpensive things that make life so much better. Here are mine:

Radio 4
The Sunday Times
Having a lovely coffee shop next to the small office I rent
Cheese from the market
Having a village library
Good footpaths nearby
An open fire
Being able to go swimming each week ( roll on Wednesday!)
Baths
Gardener's World and Call My Agent (French comedy drama)
Being on a good bus route (I'm now down to only one school run, thank God)
Brogues and colourful tights

What are yours'?

Thanks @SionnachRua!

@20mum

O.P. Please check Times 17th November, by John Naish, then abandon any burning. You wouldn't boast how lovely it is to hurl plastic into the sea and pour poison in wells, and the equivalent is having either open fires, bonfires, fire pits, or, notably E V E R Y kind of wood burning stove.

Way to ruin the vibe. Start your own environmental thread.

Cuddling my cats

Birds visiting the feeders in the garden

Watching dogs playing together and with humans in local park.

Trees

Coffee

Coffee is a gift from God indeed.
Fresh clean bed linen.
Unexpected kisses and cuddles from DC.
A gleaming, cosy home.

Lighting the woodburner and sitting with the lights off enjoying the glow

First coffee of the day..... I love my Nespresso machine.

My two dogs - I get greeted like a long lost friend every morning when I go down to them, and I adore them.

My grandchildren. They're just bundles of wonder and I love seeing the world through their eyes.

So many on here - but the littlest thing that makes such a difference

instead of struggling to remove the metal cover, followed by stab, twist, squeak, twist, squeak, repeat, repeat, repeat, glug glug glug.

It's now a simple crack, crack, twist, glug, glug, glug.

Corks being replaced with screw caps is brilliant - AND on the (now rare) occasion there is a cork, it is a ceremony to remove it.

Lovely thread.

An increasingly large collection of dresses. Makes getting ready for work much quicker and easier.

Good quality black t-shirts from Jigsaw, since I wear a black tee at least twice a week.

Jigsaw lace camisoles: brilliant for layering or for wearing in bed

Earl Grey tea

My Kindle - means I've always got easy access to something to read

Second hand iPhone - every walk is improved by being able to look for interesting photography opportunities

Bar soap - so much nicer than bottles. I just love opening a new bar.

Sainsbury's rip-off le Creusset casserole dish. love it.

Nice notebooks and pens - just because

Ma c lipstick minis - one in every bag/purse

Decent coats and boots - because we spend so much time in them that they might as well be goodat

Good quality brollies because rain is shit and shitty brollies make it shitter

Robins and squirrels

Tea
Cake
Cats
Crappy Christmas films
A good nights sleep 😴

A magazine
Fairy lights
The beach
Blue sky and a rainbow
Lilies

Basically I've made my Sunday mornings full of little things that give me joy- fancy hollandaise sauce. Battery operated salt and pepper, I love that sound of it being crushed up. The times supplements. Plunging the coffee in a cafetiere!

I also keep a pebble in my coat pocket that I sometimes find and give it a little squeeze as it reminds me of the fun I have at beach with my family.

My city wide parking permit/car park pass. It's the only perk of my job!!!

Not such a little thing, but..We’ve just had our en suite replaced.it was tatty and freezing cold and the shower didn’t work. It’s now warm and there’s lots of storage and it’s so easy to clean. It’s nothing special, it just feels so luxurious after years of making do!

Nice stationery
Bamboo socks
Nice PJs
Nice mugs

Colman's mustard
Hearing the hoot of an owl late at night
My dog's wet nose waking me up
Baked potatoes with a mountain of butter
DH bringing me my morning cuppa in bed
Cryptic crosswords

My wood burning stove. Love it - house is not a home without a fire.

Herbal Tea
Hot Chocolate
My 4 month old baby sleeping through the night
Lipstick
Having a warm bed
My partner being an excellent father

Audible
Spotify
Microwave
Tumble Dryer
Bath
iPhone

Don't intend to ever live without any of them ever again

Learning to cook properly (thank you Jack Monroe)
Owning a glue gun
Good neighbours

My children call every day.
My dog.
The view of the Pennines from my windows.
The coffee machine my children bought me so that I can have coffee in bed every morning.

Our new boiler is making an unbelievable difference to my quality of life at the moment. What I thought was a picturesque but incurably freezing old house has been transformed after 5 years into a cosy home. I actually can't believe it when I get home and the inside is warmer than the outside. Old boiler was only ten years old but even with it on round the clock we might as well have gathered round a lit cigarette. I used to decamp to the marginally warmer back bedroom for half the winter as only DH could bear the sub-zero master bedroom.

My newish coffee machine - an old-fashioned one which makes and keeps hot a huge jug of coffee DH can help ourselves to all morning (both wfh).

The bookshop, independent cafes and gift shops at the end of my road - not open during lockdown obvs but the windows are lit up at night and when I go for an evening walk it gives me hope that normal times will come again.

Old-fashioned pyjamas

Not having to leave the house at 6.30 am for my commute.

Recipes easily available at the click of a button on google.
Baths
Hot chocolate with baileys
I knows it's evil, but amazon and the ease of delivery

What a lovely thread and just what I need
My morning coffee in my bean to
Cup machine in my favourite (of the moment) EB mug
Having this coffee in bed - a slower start to the day now working from home - after 26 years of 6am starts and coffee on the run
A full kindle or TR pile
My ugg slippers
A lovely scented candle at the end of the day
A beautiful bar of soap
Clarins Shea butter body moisturiser
Log burner
Twinkling fairy lights
My flowering orchids rescued from the 50p bargain tray at Tesco's

Olaplex
Bean to cup coffee machines and really good quality beans
Fresh pesto made in the pestle and mortar
Ajinomoto, which is basically legal, slightly healthier, crack
Dove soap, which smells like my husband
A happy, content cat knocking my phone from my hand because she wants a cuddle
Taking a coat from the cupboard and it smelling like a perfume you had forgotten about

@AnyFucker

Tiger bread and butter

Are you my husband? He loves for tiger bread and butter

Being in the middle of a brilliant TV series
Having a bath
DP saying 'shall we get a Chinese tonight?'
DP going to work very early and me being able to go to sleep for another couple of hours
Reading outside
Walking outside in the summer and smelling BBQs cooking