Blooming heck, it’s chilly. I’m knitting as fast as I can at the moment to keep us decked out in snuggy socks, hats and scarves – and hoping the needle-on-needle friction will create a bit of warmth too.

(I know in the UK we don’t get really cold winters like in Central/Eastern Europe or in parts of the US/Canada – by those standards, it’s tropical here right now – but because of that, we’re not prepared for it. Two hundred schools were closed in West and North Yorkshire yesterday but we only had 2 inches of snow on the ground. Also: the worst bit about working from home: you can’t use the “there are no buses running” excuse for a day off. Bah.)

Anyway, despite the new woollies and the fact I’ve got a blanket, two cats and laptop on top of me while I write this, I’m still chilly so have been gulping down more than my fair share of hot drinks. John and I have a leaning tower of teabags in the kitchen at the moment (it’s too cold to go to the compost bin after every cup) and our collection of hot chocolate tubs is growing daily.

We’ve got a few of the plastic screw-top jars in the cellar – perfect for our ever-growing random fixings collection, or random allen keys and packets of veg seeds. In the kitchen, they’re too big for spices really but perfect for pulses or dried beans (most of the jars we use are semi-transparent once you remove the label so you can just about make out what’s what and how much is in there).

But what else can we use them for?