What a Lot of Shopping We Have Bought!

When I was little we read the Ladybird learning to read books, as well as the Peter and Jane series, my favourite was The Farm (of course), Going to School and Shopping with Mother.

Shopping with Mother depicts the perfect 1950's world in a perfect 1950's town. Mother sets off beautifully, if restrictingly, dressed in a tight suit, hat, gloves and court shoes, to walk to the shops with her two children. Their town is still the ordered world where you buy meat from the butchers, bread from the bakers, fish from the fishmongers, hammers from the ironmongers. Having bought something from every shop in town, Mother staggers home with her basket (the pictures gloss over that bit, nor does the text describe Mother cursing over the weight of the basket or the unsuitableness of wearing heels) and they lay everything out on the kitchen table and look on it with satisfaction saying 'What a lot of shopping we have bought!'
I thought about that  this morning, returning from collecting my oils and jars (We go to the glass jar and bottle distributors, we buy jars for Mummy) but as I laid everything out on the table, I was more anxious than satisfied.

Yes, it is satisfying to have a good stock of everything in, that I can get on with making stuff without thinking I'll run out of something, but on the other hand I am saying, that I think I'm going to sell all those jars. In particular, I have just bought a box of 378 lip balm jars when I am not convinced that I will sell more than 6.

I am reminding myself, that when I started making chutney I could not imagine ever selling a thousand jars in a weekend, which we did at our peak (if anyone wants to know why I am not doing chutney again I will tell you that a thousand jars of chutney involves an awful lot of apples to be peeled and chopped, not to mention onions).
Well they are bought now, no turning back, I will just have to make them as good as I can so that they will sell.
No news on the quail eggs by the way. I am beginning to give up on them.