Monday: Today we have this tail end of the big storm looming, we are on the edge of it but predicted winds are looking quite high! Strange weather as the temps are also predicted to be high for the time of year, with the winds in mind I spent an hour or two picking the rest of the eating apples before they end up on the floor. Some are small and they will go to the horses or the rabbits and chickens but most are the perfect size and look and taste good. Sometimes, just sometimes, I wished I lived remotely so that I really had to gather it all in and store/freeze/bottle it because we relied on it to get us through winter but of course we don’t and if we run out the town is a five minute drive away. Doesn’t stop me saving and prepping as much as possible though but my nature/nurture/gatherer/provider instincts are not completely fulfilled lol11 o’clock and I’m glad I got the apples, the wind has picked up only slightly but the sky is full cloud cover and a dusky pink, and it’s warm out there!
Decided to do some paperwork as I can no longer see the desk, why is it when you sit down and turn the computer on it wants to update!
Tuesday: No wind damage to speak of just stuff blown around. Got the morning rounds done and as it is one of my days for having Mia I prepped all the dinner for tonight, Charlie and Macca are coming so best to have everything g prepared in advance. Hoovered through and then made a coffee to sit down and catch up with Outlander, it’s not on 😭 they are taking a weeks break, yeah thanks for ruining my day 😜 never mind I have been another drama series on Catherine the Great and although it’s subtitled it’s pretty good so I will watch that instead, love all these series of strong women in history.
Watched celebrity hunted in the evening, not something we would normally watch but they turned up at Sam and Luke’s door back in the summer so we were watching it to see them really lol, odd seeing someone you know on the telly 😀
Wednesday: Dark this morning and raining slightly although it had stopped by the time I went out to do the animals, farrier arrived first thing. After feeding I put up some more solar lights in the yard for the dark mornings and evenings ahead, much better to be able to see what you are doing 😜 swung the magnet around the area the farrier was shoeing, they keep leaving the little shards of nail they cut off and if they end up in a tyre that’s not good. Mixed up some bread dough to prove and got something out for dinner, left over lamb casserole which I will make into soup, we have had a few bulky meals lately, time to give the gut a bit of a rest. Trying to decide if it’s a good idea while we have a lot of eggs, to mix up some batches of Yorkshire pudding mixes for the freezer, and contemplating if cake mix would freeze also, anyone know the answer? I will have to google it 😜well it appears you can if the method is a creaming method so I will think about doing that then if we run out of eggs I can still make cake!
Browsing Pinterest I saw an apple cake recipe using oil instead of butter and as Josh likes a bit of Grampys cake and can’t tolerate lactose I thought I would be the ideal recipe to try, strange mixture but we we see how it tastes later.
Had someone come to get some manure for the garden and bought a bottle of wine for us 😀 we won’t have much muck left for our beds but I won’t care I shall be drinking wine instead 😝 love a bit of barter 😀
I have Mia today, she has discovered Bing and likes him a lot lol, so I can at least now leave the room when it’s on to check how the cakes and bread are doing.
Thursday: Definitely a day for ducks! However it’s not cold so I wasn’t going to let that put me off doing some stuff outside, not on the garden as that is too wet but some bits of tidying and clearing up of various areas. Firstly rake up the leaves that are blocking all the drainage and clearing the leaves from the guttering as it’s blocked and can’t cope, sending water over the top causing a right mess on the hardstanding. Plenty of leaves to rake up that are becoming a soggy carpet, I don’t do all the leaves there are millions of them, just the ones that get trodden indoors or block drains, I tend to dump them on the nearest bit of ground or rake them under the trees, might as well replenish the ground with good nutrients, some end up on the heap as well but not many.
Did a bit of egg selling on Facebook, great way to shift all these eggs they keep laying 😀
Next I went out to try sorting the freezers, first I gave them a was down as the tops and sides get dusty from every day living, next dive in and try to a) find out what exactly is in there and b) try some kind of organisation 😝 your finger start to freeze pretty quickly even with gloves on so it’s not easy, what I do know is we probably won’t get through all that beef in the next two or three years! I can’t even get to them bottom so no idea what actually is in one of them, the other is better organised with fruit and veg in separate sacks which are all full, better start having a few dinner guests I reckon.
Friday: Blood tests first thing this morning so gotta get a wriggle on and get the animals done. The weather is bringing in storm Brian and it has a cold wind with it although it’s sunny. The grandchildren came over and we went out to have a peek at the baby rabbits, I still can’t tell how many are in there! I took a photo of what had turned out to be my favourite bantams, I never really got the whole silkie thing until I hatched these and they grew up and now I am in love with them, like little snowballs on legs, cute, very cute, may have to have more of these 😀
I’ve just discovered that chilli pepper can deter rodents from eating chicken feed as they are an irritant, while birds have no reaction to eat thus being able to consume it along with the feed, in light of the changing rodenticide regulations I am definitely going to give this a try.
Saturday: Storm Brian is arriving today 😝 great! Not too bad for most of the day actually, after the morning routine John went off to get feed, I put fresh bedding in for the ducks and filled in holes in the rabbit run because the babies are beginning to move around and it won’t be long before they come out and the holes are small enough for them to fall down into. In the afternoon we went to my nieces 1st birthday party and it was a most magical time in the woods, we were worried the weather was going to interfere but the rain held off until we got home. The good thing about the nights drawing in is that you can light the fire, shut the curtains and get cosy with a hot chocolate and a book or a film, bliss 😀
The weather got decided filthy later on in the day lol
Sunday: Storm Brian is still around and it’s colder today than yesterday, although dry we still have the constant wind.
Having an off day mentally (and stress levels are climbing) today, my onions that were growing beautifully have been flattened and dug up by the ducks because the wind had blown the netting off of them, and something has eaten every single one of the peas I had planted, doesn’t sound like much but it seems like I’m constantly battling some thing and I’m wondering what is the point!
Melancholy gone I decided to try out a recipe my neighbour put my way for toffee apple jam, might as well give it a go with all the cooking apples I have. The result was more just apple jam but delicious never the less, I think I should have cooked the sugar more on its own first to get the ‘toffee’ I shall give it another go soon. You can add brandy but I left that out as the grandchildren will probably want a taste, leave the alcohol for the grown ups batch.
Woken up by the dog barking furiously at 11.30 got up to see the police in the driveway, went out, they had the wrong address!
Lastly a photo of my brother who climbed to base camp this week, a mighty achievement indeed 😀
frieslandfarm (flowers) 