Latest news with #GeorginaMoore
Scottish Sun
4 days ago
- Lifestyle
- Scottish Sun
Five cash-saving ideas for upcycling your glass jars, pots and bottles
Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) IF you have a glut of glass jars, pots and bottles, here are some smashing ideas. They can be used to organise your bits and bobs or create eye-catching items for your home. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 7 Try our top tips for glass jars, pots and bottles you have at home Credit: Getty Jars could also be the starting point for summer crafts, and a way of creating low-cost presents others will love. PUT A LID ON IT: If you have a stack of glass dessert pots, turn them into see-through, stackable storage. Did you know the lids from Pringles are the perfect size to fit the tops of Gu desserts? You can also buy sealed bamboo lids, from £4.99, pudding to transform the glass dessert pots into smart storage. CREATIVE WITH COLOUR: You can get a pack of eight glass paints from The Range, £2.99, and use them to transform glass jars and pots. It is the perfect activity to keep the kids busy during the summer holidays. They can create pretty vases and colourful pen pots from jam jars or tea light holders from glass pots. These could even be gifts for friends and family. BRIGHT IDEA: You can even use them to create your own candles, with soy candle making kits from Amazon for less than £10. Find other brilliant ideas at where there is a whole page dedicated to the 'ramekin reuse revolution'. BOTTLE THE MAGIC: You may have seen mini lights that turn an empty bottle into an indoor lamp. Hobbycraft have bottle lights from £3.50, so you can turn an empty bottle into twinkly indoor or outdoor lantern. You can use any bottle, but the pretty blue glass of the Baron Amarillo Rias Baixas Albarino wine, £8.99 from Aldi, will look amazing. And you get to enjoy a tipple too! Home whizz praised for the genius way she upcycles her old coffee jars, and it's SO easy MATCH OF THE DAY: Group matching pots together for the smartest storage. Pretty jars are perfect in the bathroom to store cotton wool balls and hair bands. Use ones with matching lids to store seeds and spices in the kitchen for perfectly organised pantry-style storage. All prices on page correct at time of going to press. Deals and offers subject to availability Deal of the day 7 Save £11.05 on this Scion Mr Fox rug from Habitat Credit: Habitat COOL for a kid's room, the Scion Mr Fox rug from Habitat is down from £43.55 to £32.50. SAVE: £11.05 Cheap treat 7 The Garnett Girls by Georgina Moore is down to £3 Credit: Waterstones GET stuck into a summer read with bestseller The Garnett Girls by Georgina Moore, down from £14.99 to £3, at The hardback also makes a great gift. SAVE: £11.99 What's new? THE HUGO spritz – a blend of Prosecco, sparkling water and elderflower – is one of the hottest drinks of the summer. Lidl's version is £4.49. Add lemon and mint to make it zing. Top swap 7 Try this classic swingball set for £20 from Argos Credit: Argos 7 Or grab this set from The Range for £9.99 Credit: The Range A CLASSIC swingball set, £20 from Argos, will be a summer hit. Or you can play with the set from The Range for £9.99. SAVE: £10.01 Little helper RAILCARD holders can get a free three-month Tastecard trial, saving on meals out. Go to then follow the offers page for the link. It will renew into a £29.99 annual membership unless you cancel. Shop & save 7 Save £10 on this cardboard RHS shed from Hobbycraft Credit: Hobbycraft GIVE busy fingers a summer project with the half price colour-in cardboard RHS shed from Hobbycraft, down from £20 to £10. SAVE: £10 Hot right now SAVE 25 per cent or more on Dulux paint at B&M, where a 2.5l pot of Walls & Ceilings matt paint is down from £22 to £16. PLAY NOW TO WIN £200 7 Join thousands of readers taking part in The Sun Raffle JOIN thousands of readers taking part in The Sun Raffle. Every month we're giving away £100 to 250 lucky readers - whether you're saving up or just in need of some extra cash, The Sun could have you covered. Every Sun Savers code entered equals one Raffle ticket. The more codes you enter, the more tickets you'll earn and the more chance you will have of winning!
Scottish Sun
05-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Scottish Sun
Win a copy of River of Stars by Georgina Moore in this week's Fabulous book competition
ENCHANTING & ROMANTIC Win a copy of River of Stars by Georgina Moore in this week's Fabulous book competition Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) JO and her grandmother live on a houseboat on Walnut Tree Island in the Thames, a place made famous in the '60s as a venue for up-and-coming bands. But when the handsome new owner returns to the island, the whole community's bohemian way of life is threatened. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 1 10 lucky Fabulous readers will win a copy of this new novel in this week's book competition Full of rich characters and an enchanting setting, this is a gorgeous read. 10 lucky Fabulous readers will win a copy of this new novel in this week's book competition. To win a copy, enter using the form below by 11:59pm on July 19, 2025. For full terms and conditions, click here.
The Guardian
02-07-2025
- Lifestyle
- The Guardian
A ‘wild' lifestyle can enhance your career
I greatly enjoyed reading Georgina Moore's account of finding peace and solace in her new lifestyle on a houseboat after a hectic working life in London (A moment that changed me, 25 June). The article, however, runs the risk of suggesting that the author's 'wild' gravity-defying lifestyle, thoroughly enjoying her evenings and weekends after work with colleagues, food and music, and a work-hard-play-hard early career, is not an acceptable way of life. For many early-career men and women, having the freedom to choose what to do with their time outside their working hours is a defining aspect of their life. Our work lives are increasingly 'alienating' us, in a truly Marxian sense, from what may be our innate 'life spirit', especially in our 20s and 30s. This applies especially to women, who spend a significant amount of their mid-careers juggling motherhood and domestic life, having recovered from childbirth and adjusting to their careers often with decreased earnings, depleted savings and lower levels of happiness. This period is, for some, followed by the responsibility to care for elderly parents. Mid-life responsibilities push out the joys of an earlier life, some of which can be simply entertainment with friends and colleagues. There is enough economic evidence that having healthy and social lifestyles have a significant effect on workplace productivity. If anything, employers should be encouraging and supporting employees to have healthy and enjoyable pastimes outside working hours, no matter how gravity-defying they may Bandyopadhyay Professor of development economics, Queen Mary University of London Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
Times
02-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
I write novels from my boat, Betsy, on the Thames
From her gently swaying 'writing boat' — a converted narrow boat that's tethered to her floating home on Taggs Island in the Thames — the novelist Georgina Moore is watching the river come alive for the summer season. 'At this time of year it becomes a party town again,' says Moore, 52, noting speedboats, novelty inflatables and people sunbathing on the decks of their boats. 'I can hear dance music coming from the nearby cricket club, oars clattering from the rowing club and people shouting from island to island. There are swimmers with pink buoys, the loud birdsong of parakeets darting from tree to tree, and the geese, which are excitable all the time.' During these highly sociable summers on Taggs, 'I love to be up early, to catch the river when it is private and just ours, as the sun rises over the weir,' Moore adds. 'Then, as the day progresses, everyone opens up their doors, windows and terraces on to the river, as if we are all sharing a communal space.' Over the past century, this six-acre outcrop near Hampton Court Palace has seen numerous attempts by the island's former owners to turn it into a pleasure resort for high society, with floating palaces, ballrooms and resident orchestras. There were even plans in the 1920s to make it a mini-Palm Beach with imported palms and sand to mimic its Floridian namesake. • 'I wrote a gothic novel inspired by my island house on the Thames' For Moore — a book publicist who released her debut novel, The Garnett Girls, set on the Isle of Wight, in 2023 — the island provides fertile territory for fiction. Her second novel, River of Stars, which is published on July 3, is set on Walnut Tree Island — the ancient name for Taggs. The story sees its 'ageing party girl' protagonist butt heads with the island's new owner, who wants to sell the land to property developers. 'It's about keeping the legacy of islands like this while allowing the community to move on,' she says. Some early readers of her new novel, pre-publication, have commented that they wish such a place existed. Well, it does, 15 miles from central London, with a resident population of about 100, spanning all generations, all living on houseboats that are moored around the island's perimeter and on its inner lagoon. Moore's large four-bedroom floating home, The Lookout — where she lives with her husband, James, 54, a psychotherapist, and their children, Sonny, 14, and Daisy, 13 — has a garden on the island large enough for James's home office and a mini-Astro football pitch for the kids. And then there's her writing boat, named Betsy, which sits in a secluded spot overlooking the weir. The 23ft long, 6ft 10in-wide boat — which cost £17,000 to build — arrived as an unadorned shell, on which Moore spent a further £10,000 turning it into her creative nook. 'I added windows and doors, lovely skirting, wood panelling and cupboards, LED lighting and a little electric stove that looks like a fire,' she says. 'When I'm on Zoom calls in summer, people are fascinated when paddleboarders drift past the windows, and it's so peaceful at night when fireflies dance over the river and you hear only the water.' Winters have their own charm. 'Our house is attached to steel pontoons, so I hear the creaks and groans when the tide shifts, and the wind carries every sound,' says Moore, who moved to the island 16 years ago, to join James. 'He's been here so long he's part of the river mud.' Like all of the island's homeowners, they were cash buyers as there are no mortgages available on these floating homes. Other residents own or lease their houseboats under a variety of mooring terms. On sale at the moment is a two-bedroom houseboat overlooking the lagoon, with a 999-year lease and no mooring fees, for £725,000; and a one-bedroom houseboat with a 20-year renewable licence for £429,950, both through Water Side Residential. • Read more expert advice on property, interiors and home improvement Sonny and Daisy are at that age now, Moore says, 'where they ask why they can't live in a normal house like everyone else. But then their friends come round in summer and they all go off kayaking or paddleboarding, and they realise the benefits.' Besides, her children have never known a life in which their home is accessed by anything other than a gangplank. The family's holiday home is a houseboat too — an old Thames lighter that they have converted into a luxurious four-bedroom home called Sturdy, in Bembridge harbour on the Isle of Wight. It was there, while watching a family emerge from a large house overlooking the beach, that Moore, a lifelong Londoner, found inspiration for The Garnett Girls. 'I was intrigued how it would feel growing up in a waterfront community like Bembridge, where everyone knows your name and history.' It's a similarly close-knit community on Taggs, she says. 'Just walking to the nearest bus stop can take time as you'll stop to chat to 20 people on the way.' Small-island living comes with great benefits too. 'Inevitably, part of the community is ageing and that comes with challenges when you are living on the water. But if you are ill or need help, the community is massively supportive. Living here is a great way to combat loneliness.' Moore ponders how easy it will be to jump on and off Betsy when she's older. But for now there's the next novel to consider — set on an island, naturally, only this time in the Hamptons. No doubt her gently rising and falling window over the water will help to fuel her imagination again. 'Island living anywhere,' she says, 'is about the tight-knit community and living so close to nature.'
