Monday 6th January 2020: I have enjoyed having John at home for three weeks but this morning I am also happy to have the place back to myself as he goes off to work early. I think it’s the sense of back to normality and there is definitely a lot to be said for doing things the way I want them done instead of compromise or argument 😜
So what will I be doing with my time? Good question, I always say ‘I never make plans’ they go awry quite quickly I find so a loose idea of what I want to achieve with an indefinite time frame is a much better option lol, it also give me room to completely change my mind 😀 Today’s tasks are to get the morning rounds done, finish setting up the heat pad in the greenhouse now I have found everything I need, possibly move a bit more wood chip (nearly done) a few household tasks such as hoovering, dinner prep, lighting the Rayburn (they all take time) and probably a million other little things along the way. I have a couple of other jobs in mind that need doing such as cleaning out the quail and the ducks and they are the kind of job that are on the list but can be flexible as long as I get them done at some point within the next couple of days.
I did the animals, topping up the duck bedding as I went round, finding the rabbit/guineas some lovely greens and then figured I may as well strike while the iron is hot with a bit of outside work. I chose to do the rest of the wood chip laying in the fruit cage, the plan was to get the wood chip down, weed and mulch the pots of summer raspberries and cut back the autumn canes. I was about six barrowfuls in when I felt decidedly shaky, stupidly I had only eaten a banana for breakfast like I have been for the past couple of weeks but with some hard work on top the banana didn’t cut it 😜 I can only assume it’s blood sugar levels, I have had it before when I haven’t eaten enough to fuel the jobs I’m doing, I went in and had a large bowl of bran flakes, and a couple of shortbreads, 15 mins later I felt better but still a bit shaky so I made a coffee and sat down a while.
Once I had recovered I went back out and got the job in hand finished in the fruit cage, the areas that needed wood chip are all done, the summer raspberries have a mulch layer of wood chip on top of their pots, I have cut down the autumn raspberry canes and did a bit extra pruning of the blackcurrant bushes. I got half a trug of weeds out which will go to the rabbit/guineas for tomorrow’s snack. I secured the posts and canes and then shut the gate, that is all that will need doing in there now until well into spring except a bit of potash feeding for the strawberries to encourage flowering.
A midway through and finished picture of the fruit cage.
Indoors to light the Rayburn, John called in for a cuppa and I will have a quick sit down before a chap arrives mid afternoon to collect some hens.
Just as I am about to get back into working outside the weather is on the turn, the forecast over the next couple of days is for warm temps but accompanied by rain and possible high winds 🙄 urgh. Not to be deterred I have rainy day jobs in mind including getting the big poly tunnel up together and ready to plant into.
And right on cue just as I wrote this, it began to rain 😂
Tuesday: I have enjoyed another great morning outside getting things done, I am really enjoying myself at the minute, the weather is fairly kind and I have the energy and strength, fabulous. First up as always was the morning rounds and this time while I was doing them I cleaned out the goose hut, I have to then close the door all day as the chickens would get in there and scratch it all out again 🙄 Then onto the garden or more precisely the big poly tunnel, I tidied it up a little, pruned the grapevine, tidied up the strawberries and topped up the compost they are growing in. I made sure everything else was tidied up and added extra compost, I have chard and flat leaf parsley growing nicely. The other things overwintering in there are the lemon grass and the Chinese gooseberries, I am hoping they come through the winter ok along with the basil and the lemon verbena. All look ok at the minute so fingers crossed. I cut up some old compost bags and used them for weed suppressant round the edges and then I topped up an empty raised bed and sowed some early carrot seeds. I have covered them with fleece and we will see if they germinate or not, nothing to lose as they are some seeds I found from last year so if they don’t grow it’s not a big loss. I sorted out the potato bags and I need to order some first earlies, I am going to grow these in the tunnel as well, I don’t normally do earlies but it’s good to change things about now and again.
Early in January it’s mostly about preparation for the months ahead, there is not much that can be sown until early next month. It’s a good month to get your crop rotation plan sorted and write down anything you would really like to grow. Sit with a cuppa and order your seeds, onion sets, garlic bulbs and seed potatoes. I have just ordered mine, the plants are despatched to you at the appropriate times for planting so you can’t go wrong really. I have also ordered some grafted plants, water melon and aubergine, two plants I find difficult to get going from seed as a general rule. Often with the amount I order I get a ‘deal’ of some kind, this time I have opted for 36 geranium plug plants for £2.99 I probably won’t keep them myself but what I will do is grow them on and put them out for sale for a couple of quid each depending on size, that way I will hopefully cover the costs of the veg I have bought. That’s what I always aim to do with the veg/fruit I sell at the gate, if I can cover the cost of the seeds, growing them and harvesting what we need then I am doing myself a favour plus providing some tasty home grown veg/fruit for customers, a win, win situation 😀
Indoors at lunchtime to grab a sandwich and get the Rayburn lit, decide what to have for dinner later and prep it.
Wednesday: The weather is holding beautifully which means after doing the animals I was able to get another morning out in the veg garden. I started off tidying the greenhouse a little bit, moving stuff around, sowing a few broad bean seeds then out onto the beds. I lay awake last night thinking about what beds I had done and what still needed to be tackled, a bit sad lol but at least I got up this morning knowing what I wanted to achieve. You may remember last year I tried the ‘chop and drop’ thing, well not this year, I didn’t really like the untidy look and more importantly it didn’t give a feeling of an end and a beginning if that makes sense, I also found that I felt I had a lack of control over the garden which persisted all season long. So this year I am clearing and tidying which is what I have been doing this morning, I am happy with what I have done and whilst doing it I am mentally making a note of what will go where which I felt unable to do last year. As it stands out there I just have two more areas to sort out, I do have to replenish the soil with homemade compost or manure but once everything is cleared I can get that done. Both the compost heap and the manure pile are very wet at the moment which in turn makes heavy work so I will wait a while and hope it continues to dry out some more. I still have a few bits of produce growing, the winter spinach and a few tiny cabbages that the birds have been at, I have now put protection over them so they can continue to grow. There is of course curly kale still in the ground and the sprouting broccoli which I am able to get a few bits off of. The babbington leeks are pushing up through, they are a perennial leek and at the moment I’m not quite sure how that works. With conventional leeks you plant one and pull it when it’s bigger the perennial leeks should keep produce off shoots I suppose but as yet that hasn’t happened. I pulled up some radish, I need to try and find out which variety these are as they are far better than the usual French types. They are white and grow to golf ball size, tasty and more importantly they don’t bolt and go woody, a winner as far as I am concerned and a definite to grow again. Oh and the rhubarb is beginning to grow 😀😀
I have to order some more weed membrane to block out the light on the growing beds so that weeds don’t become a big problem. At the moment I am using black plastic which I reuse each year until it falls apart so although it’s not the option I would like it’s the one I take. The reason being that the thin fabric stuff gets absolutely ripped apart by the winds up here, the thicker stuff is very costly and I need quite a lot of it. I will keep searching, I may eventually find an alternative.
So scrap what I have just written, I am going to trial jute, it’s a natural fabric, it will have a limited life span but it’s better for the environment, hopefully it will do a similar job to the plastic in cutting out the light. I also am thinking I can use off cuts of it as strawberry mats or cut holes in it to plant into, watch this space and I will let you know how it performs 😀
Thursday: The weather is a bit more feisty today lol but despite having lots of rain overnight, this morning it is dry and windy. I had already decided not to work on the garden today there are other jobs that are calling. One of those was my jam jar cupboard, I have a cupboard dedicated to jam jars, bottles, Kilner jars and any other glass container that might come in handy, some have been bought, some given and some had goodies in them made by others so it’s quite a collection. Over time they just get washed and stuffed anywhere that is not in the way and that means that I don’t really know what is in there 🙄 so sorting and tidying the cupboard was a job that needed doing, I can also then see what if anything I need to get for the coming seasons. I made a coffee, went out there and got so engrossed in what I was doing I forgot the coffee and it went cold 😏
That actually didn’t take as long as I thought it would and now I need to find some other jobs to get on with.
I’m not sure what triggered the next job but it took me a lot longer than I had thought 🙄 I think I started off by thinking I will tidy up the office, another area that just gets stuff dumped until you can hardly get in the door to find stuff. My aim was to get some of the things under the bed in the spare room but then I looked under the bed and pulled out stuff that was under there. Stuff that came from Johns Mums and to be honest I have no idea why we still have it, other stuff that we no longer use and have nowhere else for it to go, that all got sorted and out into piles, charity shop, free sites, selling sites. The space was then ready for the things like the travel cot which is stored in the office but can go under the bed. That then led me onto all the other stuff in the office lol, again things we no longer use or that are broken so more piles for recycling or selling on or putting on the free sites. I am not saying the office is now clutter free because there are still things in boxes to be gone through but I have made a dent in it.
Friday: Today has been an altogether different day, Josh arrived early morning to help with the morning rounds 😀 he was all kitted out in mud proof gear and keen as mustard to help me. We fed everything and let them out, collected a few eggs then took some hay to the horses. What made me laugh is that he is a little afraid of the chickens and ducks but no fear whatsoever of the horses. Once we had finished outside we came in for a juice break and chatted about the types of food he likes, then I asked ‘shall we make a cake’ ‘oooooo can we make pie’ he replied lol. I let him choose the fruit and he decided on apple, plum & blackcurrants 🙄 it actually tasted quite nice if a little sharp. He did a good job of rolling out the pastry and even made a pastry triceratops head to go with it 😂 Mid morning, just before Shelley came to pick him up, Sam arrived with Mia and the twiglets, everybody (except the twiglets) had pie 🥧 I looked after the twins and Mia while Sam went off to get some food shopping in peace and then it was time to do the afternoon feeding and egg collection. A lovely day.
When I walk down the driveway at this time of year I always stop when I am halfway back to smell the Winter honeysuckle (Lonicera fragrantissima) that has been growing for a few years now. The amazing sweet scent of this otherwise unremarkable shrub is delicious and a real treat at this time of year. It goes by some other rather sweet names such as kiss-me-at-the-gate or sweet breath of spring 😀 I took a few sprigs indoors to put in a pot on the windowsill for a natural room scent and I also took a couple of cuttings, I’m not sure if they will take this time of year but nothing ventured, nothing gained.
At our old place I had a Daphne and really wish I had dug it up and bought it with us as you could smell its lovely scent long before you got anywhere near it. I think sweet smelling winter shrubs are under used probably because by the time people go to the garden centres en mass it’s late spring and they have passed their best and don’t look particularly engaging but they are definitely worth a thought if you are looking for something to fill a gap and the reward is uplifting in the depths of winter.
Saturday: 😀 yay the weekend, great because John does the rounds in the mornings giving me a break from it. I get on with other things and besides the household chores I spent a small amount of time in the garden. A quick job of tidying the bird, butterfly and beer bed, I call it this because it has a pear, apple, cherry and mulberry tree in it as well as Japanese honeysuckle, blackcurrant and gooseberry bushes which pretty much feed the birds and hopefully some butterflies, the beer comes in with the hop I have growing there though I have never used it for that purpose as yet lol. It was a quick visit outside because it’s a bit blowy and a tad cold so my fingers soon felt the nip in the air. I had intended laying the jute weed fabric but when it’s windy trying to do that by yourself is a tricky job and John has gone off to get feed.
When he gets back the jobs on the sheet are to brush the flue and clean out the Rayburn and then he is building a gate for a new fence in the orchard as the one I put up keeps falling down. I need to stop these demented hens in the front paddock from reaching my veg garden. At first just a couple made it there then a few and now about 15 of them, most of the wood chip I put down on the pathways has been scratched into piles or onto the lawn 🙄 I want to get well ahead with keeping them at bay so that gardening is an altogether pleasant affair this year instead of an angry one because they have scratched up all my hard work.
The gate didn’t get built but John re loaded the wood pile in the covered area just out the back then we actually had a few hours off before starting again with the afternoon rounds, Charlie and Macca walked over for a cuppa, we went and got a bit of food shopping and called in to see Shelley, Martin and the kids to deliver a tray of eggs. By 8.30 I was asleep on the sofa, feeling tired after a busy week 💤
Sunday: The weather was filthy overnight, lashing rain and strong winds but all is settled this morning. Again, John did the morning rounds while I had a shower and did the household chores. A quick coffee and John went out to power wash the POL pen now that we have moved our ex laying hens on to a new home. I don’t know what it is about that job but as soon as it needs doing he moves it directly to the top of the list 🙄 still once it’s done it can be left until we buy in the next batch of POL for selling probably in March.
The plan for the rest of the morning is to go out for breakfast at a local plant nursery, John gets a cooked brekkie and I get to look round at the plants it’s a win, win 😀
I bought an evergreen shrub at the nursery, only a small specimen, I can’t bear to part with the amount of money they want for things when I can grow it on lol. If I specifically wanted something for a certain space then I would but this will go in a pot for now and be put out the front, I’m trying to get a bit of colour out there as it’s all very dead and brown looking. On the way back we called into my Sisters for a cup of tea, one cup lead to another cup and before we knew it we’d been there a couple of hours 😜 We booked a trip to the theatre while we were there, some sort of interactive ghost show 👻 it is billed as ‘not for those of a nervous disposition’ 😝 it will get the adrenaline pumping and blow away the cobwebs lol.
We got back, I lit the Rayburn, I had to pop along the road to get some natural fire lighters as we only had one left. These are rolled up wood shavings and I think they have a extremely thin layer of wax on them, I was finding it more difficult to get hold of newspapers as we don’t ever have them and so these are a great alternative, they also light first time and are very easy to use. Meanwhile John went and finished cleaning the POL pen then he fed the birds and collected the eggs then he finally got on to making the gate and I got tonight’s dinner sorted which is shepherds pie.
The long range weather forecast shows no freezing temperatures in sight so looks like we are going to have a mild winter (famous last words) I must admit that although we always think we need a bit of freezing weather to break dormancy and kill off any pests, I am rather enjoying a milder season. Though it does means I am really wanting to get my teeth sunk into some sowing, I’m like a race horse that is being held back at the minute 🐎 I have learnt from many years experience not to be too hasty in that department though as it can all go horribly wrong 🤪
Whatever you are doing this week have a good one, do something outside your comfort zone if you can, as I say to Josh ‘put your brave hat on and go for it’ TTFN 👋
frieslandfarm (flowers) 