Month: May 2022

Posted in Friesland Farm

Eggs, bee swarm & a million and one jobs to do.

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday 16th May 2022: Unlike a usual Sunday evening, I didn’t sit down, instead I made cakes 🙄 simple 2lb loaf cakes, four lemon and two chocolate. The chocolate ones were made with oil instead of butter because I ran out of that. I definitely managed to use up a few eggs though and as it stands I will have 9 cakes in the freezer for future use 😂 Always handy when we don’t have any eggs in the winter, if we still have loads of eggs when I get back from holiday I shall start among other things, not sure what yet but I will find some recipes I am sure, and I will also start freezing them, might as well. John was also busy out strimming until it started to rain, hopefully we will continue to get some showers over the next couple of days, we really need to replenish the water table.

Actual Monday 😁 I spent nearly all of the morning sorting out clothes ready for packing, all of mine anyway, still have Johns to do yet. He was supposed to be just popping out to replace a set of taps, by 1pm he had not returned, I phoned him and he had had multiple phone calls from customers for various small jobs so had decided to get them done. That’s all well and good but I was waiting to go into town and pick up a few last things for our holiday. Eventually he returned and off we went. Went we got back we had a quick rest before cracking on with some jobs in the evening, mine mostly involved cleaning the washing machine and hoovering the boot room😝 nothing very interesting today.

Tuesday: Started off well with getting some things done in the garden areas, putting up some trellis for a couple of climbers that will ramble over the dog kennels. They have dual purpose, cover the shape you looking kennel structure and provide some lovely foliage for flowers next year 😁 Meanwhile John was fixing wood to the bottom of the gates to stop the bloody geese getting through, they have been ducking under and coming into the front area and then round to the lawn if the gate is open. I then went on to do a bit of weeding and planting the squash plants that had been growing, I also planted up a couple of cucumbers outside and some tomato plants, might as well get them in if I have got them. The reason being that the Bank of England is predicting apocalyptic food prices by the end of the year and inflation at 10%, grow everything you can and make sure you use everything you grow. With doom and gloom on the horizon I thought I would try and experiment, freezing eggs in a muffin tin. You crack them open into the tin, pop the yolk with a cocktail stick, cover and freeze, then once frozen take them out of the tin and freeze in freezer bags. I think this will work fine for any eggs you want to use in baking once they are defrosted they should be like any other egg you have just cracked. Not sure about poached and fried but I can’t see why they would be much different and certainly will be fine for scrambled. Come autumn when the hens are all moulting the egg number reduced drastically and this way I should always have plenty.

Freezing eggs for the inevitable shortage in autumn

Sam came over with the twins late morning and then Shelley and Florence, we spent a pleasant enough hour in the garden although first George got stung by stinging nettles and then Lucie 🙄 They had both finished crying and we were chatting again when Sam looked across to the house with a look of concern and said ‘what’s that’ I stood up to look and immediately shouted to everyone to get in the house. I then shouted to John to get the dogs in now, every one did exactly as they were told which was great. The reason was a swarm, thousands of bees had decided that somewhere nearby they were going to settle, they were not high up either but low down at face level which is why I thought it was better to get in out of the way. They settled in the cider apple tree next to the house and I phoned around to get someone to come and collect them. Dave, one of the bee keepers who we sold honey for last year came over, he got his bee suit on and collected them up, much to the delight of the children, it was exciting for them. He waited a fair time to gather them all up but there were a lot he couldn’t get to go in the box and so he left with the ones he had which must have been thousands, it was a big swarm apparently. The rest were still flying around and clustered on the tree for a while but we went out to get some shopping and when we came back they had dispersed. Early evening I went out to water the poly tunnel and as I got near to the small one I could hear exactly where they had gone 😂 hundreds of them in my tunnel. Hopefully Dave is coming back late evening with some pheromone to gather them up.

The swarm settled pretty quickly fairly low down in a tree right next to the house.

Dave came back with a box that previously had a swarm in and some syrup in the hopes they would go in but they were quite docile but this point and reluctant to move, he gently brushed some of them in and is leaving the box overnight to see if more can be encouraged to go in. I need to water the tunnel 😂 so I am waiting until almost dark before going out to do it, don’t want to make them angry 🐝

Wednesday: I was up early this morning 5am, I needed to get quite a lot of flowers cut for orders today and I didn’t want to be disturbing those bees in the tunnel 😂 They were still mostly all sleeping 💤 I went about my business in relative safety 🙄 actually they are apparently not hostile when they are swarming as they have nothing to protect, no hive, no honey and no eggs, that’s reassuring but still when there are thousands of them it’s a bit scary. The ones that have been left behind number around 200 which is a tiny fraction of the amount of bees in a hive, still it’s a lot of bees in my poly tunnel 😂 I got all the cutting done ended up with wet feet and arms as the dew was pretty heavy after the rain yesterday. Then I went on to getting some weeding done in one of the front beds, I wanted to get them out before we go away or they would be triffids by the time I get back. I got stung on the arms and feet by long stinging nettles, I had changed my shoes for flip flops, what the heck was I even thinking 🧐 numpty. After doing that job it was round to the veg garden, which is rapidly becoming a flower garden 😝 to plant up, you guessed it, flowers. Grasses this time actually, specific types that are great for flower bouquets, they add movement and sparkle. Then I planted up some scented pelargoniums, not my usual thing but the foliage smells amazing and again good for flower posies.

Back indoors and I got the eggs from the freezer, they took a little bit of persuading to leave the tin, bang, bang, bang, but eventually I got them out and popped them into a bag and returned them to the freezer for use later in the year. Back outside to potter a little bit more and to observe the bees, I am quite fascinated by them to be honest, their behaviour patterns under the circumstances are interesting, they clump together quite a bit and appear dozy. Here is what I have learnt, if they don’t go to the box Dave bought, they will die, they need to feed and they are not getting any instruction from the rest of the hive so they don’t really know what to do without all the others 😢 As I said before they are a tiny fraction of the hive, a couple of hundred out of a swarm of 40/50,000 so are dispensable as far as the hive health goes. But they are bees and we need bees so trying to gather up stragglers is a good idea. Those that don’t go to the box will definitely die, this is ok though because they then become part of the food chain for other insects and small mammals such as beetles and mice, it’s just sad. Some of the younger ones could gather pollen and go to a different hive and because they are young and have the pollen they would probably be accepted, old bees or bees with no pollen will not 😏 Nature is both amazing and cruel at the same time isn’t it.

Indoors early afternoon to make up the flower orders and then a sit down before going out late afternoon to deliver flowers and eggs today 😁 Then I have a flower bouquet collection late afternoon.

It’s definitely swarm weather, the chap that collected our bees has collected another three swarms today! He came back to get any of the bees that had gone into the box by dusk, sadly the rest that are clustering in the polytunnel in various places will now die off and be part of the food chain. A queen bee can lay up to a thousand eggs a day apparently so they will soon replenish and he also said ‘our swarm’ is now in a hive and working really hard, yay go bees 🐝

More rain this evening, I for one am not complaining, we really needed the ground water levels to get back up to decent levels 🌧

Massive thunder storms with lightning and heavy bursts of rain.

Thursday: I spent the morning getting my hair done while John was busy at home sorting and tidying his van.

When we returned home we watched the lunchtime news and I can’t help but comment on a couple of things. First is the fact that potentially there will be food shortages due to goods not being able to be shipped from Ukraine. It is a fertile and abundant country but don’t you think it is a bit ridiculous to rely so heavily on one country to provide vast quantities for the rest of the world. Obviously Ukraine needs all the support we can give it in anyway we can but if it teaches us one thing it should be to look at worse case scenarios and see how resilient we are going forward.

Second is the rate of inflation and the rising cost of living, well I just can’t shut up sorry 😝 Back in the 80’s (yes I know I am going to sound like an old fossil) inflation went above 10% and mortgage interest rates climbed up and beyond 15%, 15%! Just let that sink in if you are in your 20/30’s and have a mortgage, I am not age bashing but seriously it was a tough period for our finances and guess what, there wasn’t any talk of help in any way from any direction at all. You got on with it by working more hours or taking a second job and dispensing with any little luxuries, you rode the storm basically and yes some people sank under the cost of it all, some people lost everything and had to start again. I can tell you countless stories of the types of jobs people took that wasn’t their usual line of work because it was a necessity to do so. But also back in the day hardly anyone was in debt up to the hilt, mostly we had a mortgage and that was it, we had a second hand car that was bought and paid for not on tick and our lifestyle was not as extravagant as they are today, that extravagance has become the norm 🙄 it seems to have become an entitlement. I don’t know, maybe it’s just me, I know things have changed a lot and I know that there is genuine hardship out there but from observations there are also a lot out there who do not know how to cut their cloth either that or they couldn’t possibly give up what I would consider luxuries at a time like this 🤔

We had a busy few hours this evening, I wrote a list of jobs that need doing just in case John was not aware of all of them 😂 He started off by cutting the grass in the driveway then the paddock and finally the lawn. I potted up some chrysanthemums that arrived today, these will extend the flowers available right through to Christmas 😁 I did the watering in the tunnels, cleaned the horses water buckets out and filled them all up, did a bit of weeding, sorted all the eggs after John fed the birds and collected the eggs. In-between all that we had the twins and then I had a live online workshop to attend, my eyes are very tired 🥱 Up early tomorrow to cut flowers for a 100th birthday bouquet 🥰

Friday: Still rainy lol after all those dry months it hasn’t stopped raining on and off for a week now. Up early and I cracked on with cutting flowers for todays birthday bouquet 🥰 Then it was on to cleaning and then just before lunch ironing johns shirts. The only time I do ironing is for occasions and though I don’t mind doing it I was glad when it was finished 😂 Meanwhile John had to pop out to get a small job done and then once he was back there were jobs on the list for him to get his teeth into. Shelley said make sure I leave her some jobs to do, so I definitely will 😝

I made up the flowers at lunchtime and then delivered them and when I got back I thought I would have a go at a corsage. I quite liked doing one, it’s a different skill to try out.

Popped out early evening to pick up some plants that I had seen for sale, good sized plants that were too good to pass up lol. When I got back I put the dinner on then out to the paddock to get Biscuit in and confine her to a small pen. She hasn’t been bad it’s just that she will get bad if I leave her out on all that grass after the rain we have had so this is preventative.

A live meeting then gardeners world, lovely Friday night, almost, my jeans unexpectedly ripped across the front of the thigh area so I now have to quickly order new jeans for going away 😂

Saturday: A busy day today rammed with every type of job you could possibly think off both inside and out. John has been busy as well cleaning out the birds and mowing the grass in the front paddock by hand because the belt broke on the ride on mower 😝 Shelley came over in the afternoon and we walked through two lots of flower selection, conditioning and arranging, she did a great job and all will be well with that side of things I am certain. In the evening I printed of yet more paperwork for the holiday 😂 one more bit to do.

Sunday: Another busy, crammed day of things to do, mainly packing, I think I have packed way too much and then not enough at the same time 🤪 It’s all the little things to remember but hopefully I have remembered everything and what I haven’t, tough. John has been cutting everything g with the hand mower again, flipping typical that the ride on breaks just as you need to get everything up together. Then he had the front hens to clean out and power wash, that’s the last of the big clean outs, Shelley will then be able to just skip out and all should be fine. I have cleaned the spare room ready for the kids to sleep in, I still need to go and alter biscuits electric fencing to give her a bigger area for a week, then Sam is back from her holiday and will re jig the grazing again.

There is such a massive amount to organise on a Smallholding when you want to go on holiday, there are endless lists of daily, weekly routines for each and every animal, lists for the top priority jobs, lists for what, where, when, how and why, general lists for the household stuff, deliveries, customers and then there is all the work needed to get it all up together to make life easier for the person who is coming to take over. We are incredibly lucky to have the girls who always know how much we need a holiday and are willing to step in and help out massively, without them we simply couldn’t go away 🥰🥰🥰

Downloaded a few books to read and the Miriam Margolyes book in Audio form, that should be a bit of a hoot 😁

This afternoon I am having my nails, eyelashes and eyebrows, preened, tinted and polished and then a roast a Shelley’s 😁 Back home to get some watering done and water in some nematodes for the vine weevil, fill up the horses water, let a biscuit out for a day and a half before she gets confined for a week, and finally get a sit down. We will have plenty of last minute jobs and things to get sorted tomorrow but for the blog that’s it for almost three weeks. That just leaves me to say have a wonderful Jubilee celebration weekend, it’s not often a Platinum Jubilee is held, what an amazing lady our Queen is in every way, and providing we get a fit to travel result I will be back in a few weeks time. 🚢😁🥂🥳 🇬🇧

Posted in Friesland Farm

Workshops, meetings and finally some rain 🌧

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday 9th May 2022: Woah what a full on morning I have had this morning. First though, after I published the blog yesterday afternoon we had a situation. John shouted, you better come out here the goose is not well, it’s backside is hanging out 🙄 I go out and sure enough the goose had prolapsed, yesterday I spotted her going into the stable block so I said to John you’d better check for goose eggs in there, turns out she was going in for other reasons 😏 We managed to separate her from the others and catch her, with some shouting from John 😂 I got m rubber gloves on and had a good look, hoping that she was just egg bound which I might have been able to do something about. She wasn’t and the prolapse was all fluid filled making the decision a quick one, sadly she would have to be dispatched 😢 Trying to reinsert a prolapse like that would likely end in rupture which would cause her death anyway so we had to do the deed. Very sad, no particular reason for it, sometimes it just happens.

Back to this mornings workload, it started around 7.30am with two hours of weeding, then onto panting up one of the cutting beds. John has now made the supports and so I decided to plant it up with some of the annuals I have coming on. I also have some of these direct sown as seeds so I should get a good succession providing we don’t have a hard frost and if one is forecast as long as I remember to cover them up. Then I had a message from a local flower shop asking if I would be willing to be a contact to supply locally grown flowers. I explained I was starting off small and that was ok they are looking for all sizes, so I said yes that is something I could do. With that in mind I thought I better get on and plant up more of the plants I have been nurturing, all annuals now so they need to go in but also be protected from the cold. That lot took me up to 1pm, in for a quick rest before a live online workshop this afternoon. Oh I also planted up the courgette plants so I did get a bit of vegetable stuff done too but I can see at this rate it is going to be mostly about flowers lol.

The online workshop was brilliant, it was an hour and a half of learning all about the value of the flowers we grow and sell, about how when we start out we nearly all undervalue ourselves, our work, our skills and our results. Without exception we were all nodding and laughing knowing we had done all the things we shouldn’t have and now need to rectify that in order to make a living from what we are doing. Very interesting, and very revealing but also empowering 🥰

Shelley called in so we did a walk round the garden discussing what will need doing while I away, I think the added cut flower bit is daunting but I know she will cope 😁

Tuesday: Bit of drizzle this morning 😁 not much but hopefully at some point we will get a splash more 🙄 we definitely need it the rain tanks are dry 😏 I have a regional meet up with the Flowers from the Farm South East group today which is being held locally so I am going to that. I am looking forward to meeting up with others, a couple of them are only a few miles away from me so it will be nice to make some connections. Just the usual morning jobs to get sorted before I go.

Well actually I got the wrong day 🤪 but luckily I double checked before going 😂 so with a spare day ahead of me I got on with the usual things out in the garden. John came home at lunchtime so we went out to get something to eat and pick up a plant I have been looking for.

Wednesday: Today I actually went to the meeting I thought was yesterday 😬 First in the morning though I spent about an hour printing off paperwork for our forthcoming holiday, in the age of technology and ‘E-tickets’ it confounds me that we are advised to print everything off in case the internet isn’t working on check in 🤷‍♀️🤪😂 So after I printed off a novels worth of pages it was time to go out for the day. What a day it was, the place that we met and had the meeting is a member also and her set up is truly amazing, inspiring and we all took photos with the intention of getting husbands and partners to build us something similar 😝 We talked about all kinds of flowers and growing them, types of compost, good and bad, had a good look round the whole flower farm (immaculate) and then went to the pub for lunch. All in all that was one of the best days I have had of late lol and it was lovely to meet up with other local area members from Flowers from the Farm 😁 Back home mid afternoon and on with some planting up, make up a bouquet, deliver it, dinner, etc etc, day done. We had a good lot of rain today which is fabulous as we really need it.

Thursday: I spent quite a bit of time sorting out eggs, plants for sale, cutting flowers ready for conditioning, a few household chores and then out to check on everything and water the tunnels and greenhouse. I am getting good enquiries about the flowers which is exciting and I am glad people are loving them 🥰 With the enquiries coming in I thought I had better crack on and get everything I can in the ground, I think I am going to need it all. John was home at lunchtime again and we popped out to get a few things. Shelley came with Josh and Flo after school so that I could show Shelley what conditioning the flowers is all about, plus a wander round the garden just showing her what and when to cut the flowers and foliage. As she will be living here while we are away and looking after everything that will include the flowers this time. It is a bit daunting but I have total faith in her ability to cope with whatever comes her way 😁 Sam arrived with Lucie and George, Mia went off for her swimming lesson, once everyone had gone home I sat down with a cuppa and thought about all the things I need to get done tomorrow, there is always a long, long list 🤪

Friday: Which all morning I actually thought was Saturday 🤪 That’s because John has been at home probably. He has been busy clearing and topping the paddocks while I have been Uber busy in the garden. Yesterday I had an enquiry for quite a large flower order eeek, at first I was ‘oh I don’t think I am ready for this’ and then I thought ‘absolutely I can do this’ and so that is what I replied. So I was up early to get cutting flowers which took me longer than I thought it would lol, then it was on to planting up everything I have that is ready to go in and and in every available space I could find. I also sowed plenty of annual seeds direct into the ground, these are over and above the ones I have already sown. Not ideal as flowers will be all over the place but the garden is going to look amazing 🤩 I had another small order to cut for which I also did first thing and then another order for four posies that came in for tomorrow, I am loving this and wish I had done it years ago 🥰 By early afternoon I was pooped and so inside for a bite to eat, a cuppa and a good long sit down, maybe even a nap.

These two pictures are for the big order, they are loose to be arranged by the customer, hopefully I can get some pictures from her when they are done.

And this is what my flower storage area looks like right at this minute 😂

In the afternoon I put in flower support jute netting in the small poly tunnel, I did want to get some wind break up but it was windy 🤪 so there was no chance of that. I did a fair bit of watering in the evening and had all the flowers that were ordered collected finally getting inside as it was getting dark.

Saturday: Up early to cut more flowers this morning for the hand held posies that were ordered for today. I wanted to do it early because I suspected it was going to get hot pretty quickly and I was right. Once they were cut and in the back conditioning we went to get some dog food and some peat free compost from the farm next door. I need more flower growing space 😝 I have two raised beds in the veg garden unplanted and so have now allocated those to flowers 😂 John barrowed the home made compost over and filled the beds 2/3 full with that, then as it is likely to be weedy we put a layer of cardboard on top, wetted it down and put the peat free compost on top of that. By the time the plants have established roots long enough to go down the cardboard will have rotted (that’s the plan anyway) I now have two more beds to fill up, I will have grasses in one, different types of grass, sparkling fountain, millet grass and bunny tails, all good for flower bouquets. The other bed will probably have chrysanthemums which will be arriving soon. If you think chrysanthemums are boring then watch this space, the new varieties are zingy and bright and as a bonus they can keep flowering right into the winter months making them an excellent addition to a flower farm.

Hand held posies for a customer this morning, there are three in this pot but they make an amazing bunch 🥰

I have already (asked 😬) told John what I want for my birthday in July 😂 I want a hydropod for cuttings lol. I fail miserably at cuttings no matter how I try, I just don’t think the conditions are right and so a hydropod will eliminate all of that and I might actually have more successes than failures 🤞

I have a quiet few days at the minute for flowers which is great because I have used everything that is blooming already, need to wait for the next flush of flowers.

Sunday: We have been non stop busy over the past three days really, this morning we were still busy getting things tired and sorted. John has been busy in the paddock taking down the rest of the fence, he is doing it slowly, changing to other jobs now and again so that he is not overworking his elbow and that seems to be working as the pain is much less now. He has also been giving the stable block a tidy up and we will probably have a bonfire next week sometime. Meanwhile I have been in the greenhouse potting on the last few things and sorting out the cold frame area. Getting rid of anything that did t grown over winter or is struggling to grow now and putting plants out for sale so that there is less work for Shelley to do while we are away. Not that she minds it’s just that keeping things on an even keel in the greenhouse is difficult enough as it is with the temps up and down like they are at the minute, if she can just concentrate on keeping the stuff outside watered if it doesn’t rain much and the stuff in tunnels watered anyway then we should be on a winner. Then it was out for the afternoon to visit Ken who is 80 years young today, plenty of cake and chat before returning home to get the afternoon jobs done. I was delighted to see that we had actually had a few eggs customers, I was starting to get concerned at the lack of egg sales 🙄 I was wondering what the heck we were going to do with all these eggs, not sure where everyone has gone but normally Saturday is busy and yesterday we only had one customer. Only one customer today up until we went out as well but thankfully quite a few while we were out which makes me feel better. I know it’s not just us that are struggling to sell them and I can’t work out why that would be 🤷‍♀️ Maybe everyone has gone away the same week or maybe they are just not eating eggs this week 😂 That’s the problem with egg sales they are all or nothing it seems lately but trying to get a balance is really difficult. If the egg shortages that are predicted come then we will be inundated with customers but then I will be thinking that it’s not fair on our loyal regulars, maybe time to introduce a loyalty scheme of some sort 🤔

It has rained today again, fabulous, there are thunderstorms and heavy rain predicted for sometime this evening as well, might get those tanks filled back up again yet 😁

The elderflowers are about to come out and I really wanted get some elderflower cordial made this year but what’s the betting they will appear when I am away. It is a very distinct smell and I am already getting a waft of it now and again 🥰 The asparagus, which has been slow due to the dry weather has now started shooting up after the first bit of rain, hopefully we will get a decent crop now it has rained again. I really need to look at way of preserving it so that we can have it later on in the summer as well.

Have a great week 🥰

Posted in Friesland Farm

Planting out, flowers (again) & a bit of horsey stuff.

Posted on by frieslandfarm

Monday 2nd May 2022: Bank holiday Monday, overcast but not raining like it was yesterday and not as cold either. I have been out this morning cutting flowers for conditioning for a birthday bouquet. I have quite a few enquiries which is brilliant and I every day I look around at what is coming on, it’s exciting when you realise something will be ready soon and it’s going to look amazing in a bouquet. I have been planting out the dahlias and chrysanthemums this morning though I will have to watch the weather to make sure I cover them if a frost is forecast. I really need to start getting plants out into the ground but the weather is as always unpredictable 🙄 I still have plenty of veg plants to get planted as well, the squash, courgettes, cucumber and runner beans still need to go out or in wherever they are going to end up. I have some veg seeds still to direct sow but I am not going to go too mad with that this year as I won’t really have time to do big amounts of picking and processing, I will limit it to just enough I think.

As it is Bank holiday and there are plenty of things going on we went out to have a walk around some of them, got to have a day off now and again 😁 We went to the May Day fair in the next town which was heaving, great for raising money for charity but so packed that we walked round once and then went to the Vintage show a coup,E of villages away. That was a lot quieter though still quite busy, we had a walk round and a bite to eat, a chat to people we know and met Sam, Luke and the kids there. Then back home to do the animals before going over to see my niece for her birthday. Busy weekend but lovely to get out and about.

Tuesday: Another overcast day but not cold, after the usual bits and pieces I went out to the greenhouse to water everything and plant up a few things that my brother had given me. Then John came home and it was time to go to the chemist and see if (without holding out much hope) I could get the rest of my prescription 🙄 Yet more saga 😂 I explained the situation that John has been twice and they had given him parts of my prescription each time, they still didn’t have my other meds ready, could I wait 20 mins 😏 yep ok then. I waited half an hour then somebody asked me again what my name was and what I was waiting for. I explained again and then they said sorry the printer isn’t working can you come back later, no, no, nope I said, I am not leaving here without my prescription meds, I have already been without them over the weekend. Ok have a seat and we will get it sorted. Finally after I had been there just over an hour they gave me my meds, I opened them and I said, they are not all here. I think I was pretty good because I didn’t even get irate 😂 They said the rest of the prescription had not got to them so I went round to the doctors explained everything and they printed out another prescription simple as that, well one thing I can tell you is that I will not be taking it to that chemist 😝 I actually never want to use them ever again if I can help it!

Other jobs today included hoeing the front driveway and trying to tidy it up a bit, every weed in the the place had suddenly sprouted massively. Watering the plants I have recently planted and some that are struggling with the lack of rain. In the evening it started raining 😂 only a little bit, typical.

I noticed that Biscuit had escaped from her little enclosure and into the paddock where Jack was. What I couldn’t quite work out is how she got past the new fence and gate until I looked again and could see she had pushed one of the new rails off 🤬 honestly as if there isn’t enough to do round here.

Wednesday: It’s only 11am but I feel like it’s manic Monday today 🤪 I have been rushing around trying to get all sorts of things done. I started off with cutting flowers to condition, I have the weekly bouquet to do plus some for flower club competition tonight. Then onto getting the eggs sorted and out for sale, onto social media to let everyone know what is available. Pings from rural crime as the rate is spiking in specific areas 🙄 personal message pings, pings from customer messages, ping, ping, ping 😂 Out to pick rhubarb and asparagus and bundle that to put out for sale. In to get something out of the freezer for dinner tonight, decided on diced beef in the slow cooker, out to pick some fresh thyme and some spring greens, in to prep it all and get it under way. Make some crumble topping for a rhubarb (fresh) and apple (from the freezer) crumble, cook those both down and leave to cool, make coffee, sit down and type this. Still haven’t got the washing on the line yet nor some of the plants out for sale that I have been trying to sort out and get on the table for sale. It has been trying to rain so may abandon the washing line and just bung it in the dryer, needs must when time is scrabbling away.

Facebook and Instagram are both great ways of promoting business locally but I am finding it all very time consuming 😝 For the farm egg/veg sales I have both media, for the flowers I have both media, for my personal life I have both media, then there is WhatsApp connections, for the business, personal and rural crime. I then have the smallholders facebook page group to run and I can’t even tell you how many people don’t even bother to read the rules on joining. It’s there is bold letters and still they ignore it. There are the sales pages for plants and anything else I am selling, I need a PA just for social media I think 😂 it’s mentally exhausting some days.

1pm and sat down for an hour with a cuppa and a bite to eat. I did manage to get all the plants that were ready out for sale plus put them all up on the selling pages to catch a wider audience. I have a bouquet to make up this afternoon plus an arrangement for flower club later and three deliveries to do at some point, an egg collection, get the rest of the dinner sorted and eat dinner at some point in everything that is going on, I think John will be on washing up duties today 😝

Manic afternoon after the lunchtime sit down, sorting, organising and preparing then out for delivering, back home to get the dinner sorted and on the go, try and sort my flower arrangement for this evening. The arrangement didn’t quite work out how I wanted it to so I quickly changed some of it, I am half happy but not entirely but you have got to try these things or you never learn. Eat dinner, clear away, wash up, go to flower club, come home, sleep 😴

Well flower club competition done and I got a second again 😁 I am very happy with that as I did think nah not going to take it lol. The brief was ‘jubilee’ the critique was that the board was too rustic but that it was bang on trend 🥰 I will take that 😁

Thursday: A busy morning and by lunchtime I was flagging a bit 🙄 Mostly whizzing around doing household bits, I was going g to hoover and polish and then thought as it was overcast I might as well work outside. Sunny and rainy days for indoor stuff, so I spent some time cutting flowers for a bouquet tomorrow and watering the poly tunnels plus anything g I have planted in the last couple of weeks. I also picked some blue and yellow flowers for a jam jar posy, blue and yellow for the arrival of a Ukrainian lady coming to stay with my sister. Slightly difficult because I don’t have many blue flowers and definitely hardly any yellow. That’s because the general rule is not to put yellow flowers in a bouquet or arrangement 🤷‍♀️ I did manage to find some borage, forget me not and some little Leo (though the birds do like to eat the petals on those 🙄 A bit of weeding, sort the horses water out and by that time the sun had come out and I was lacking shade and feeling tired so I came in.

Yesterday afternoon when I was delivering flowers in Witney there was a downpour, it didn’t last long but it was heavy, ooo I hope we get that back at home I said to John but when we got back it was bone dry, nothing, nada, not a single drop 😏 I seriously think we picked the wrong place to live if we wanted to grow anything easily 😂

Went with Shelley and Flo in the afternoon for a mooch round the charity shops, got a nice haul 😂 3 vases and a little ceramic stem pebble and a couple of tops for the holiday 😁 Back home and a quick rest before the twins arrive for their Thursday session 🤪 to be fair they now go to playgroup on a Thursday afternoon and so don’t have quite so much energy as they did. They left and it was time to make up the bouquet that I cut the flowers for this morning and then deliver them. Back home and it’s pool night for John and the boys meanwhile my sister messaged me and was coming to pick some things up that I am lending her. That was a good opportunity to get the yellow and blue jam jar posy done so that she could take that back with her and put in the room ready for the arrival of the lady staying with them.

Friday: I spent the best part of the morning watering anything that was in the tunnels or greenhouse, anything in pots and anything newly planted just to make sure they keep growing well. I cut flowers first thing for a bouquet to do later today and did a bit of pottering. Sam arrived with the twins mid morning and I looked after them for a couple of hours while she got the horses in and gave them a shampoo and set, trimmed up tails and manes and polished hooves. I bought a £3 stick of bubbles the other week when I was shopping and what good value that was, it entertained the twins for at least an hour 😂 They are getting to the best age (in my opinion) the age of discovery and coming out with the funniest things. They found lots of old hazelnut shells on the path and decided they were pumpkins, it kept them occupied finding them and putting them all in a box lol. Then they went on to dig around in the gravel, they were digging for ‘dinosaur bones’ 😂 very delighted with themselves when they dug a stone out of the dirt and declared they had found one 🥰

I made up the bouquet later in the day, delivered it then went for my Bowen therapy session and then round to my sisters for the evening.

Saturday: It rained over night, whoo hoo, not much but enough to give the plants a bit of umph. I think I did well today as I got most of the cleaning done despite visits from various family and also customers collecting plants and to boot I made something I was pretty impressed with 😁 I wanted more hooks to hang dried flowers and they do really well in the kitchen as it’s mostly dry and cool and the corner I have them in does not get direct sunlight. So I ordered some hooks a while ago and today I found a piece of wood, sanded it down, bri waxed it, measured out the spaces between the hooks and voila a new place to hang flowers to dry 🥰 go me 😝

John has been busy cleaning out the geese and the front chickens today as well as finally, I say finally, collecting the rest of my prescription 😬 and picking up some offcuts of batten to make more flower supports for the cut flowers, hopefully he will start on those tomorrow. He has now finished any big jobs he had on and will mostly be around for the next couple of weeks until we go away on holiday, apart from popping off to do small jobs such as taps etc, hopefully he will be here more than not 😂

We are off on the 24th of this month for a whopping 16 days and Shelley will be moving in to take over for us. We are so lucky and very grateful that over the years at least one of our girls has stepped in to run the place while we are away. Whoever stays here is usually joined by the others whenever possible to help out, they do an amazing job and without their help we would never be able to get away 🥰🥰🥰 I have told Josh I will leave him a list of jobs that are going to be his responsibility every day after school.

Sunday: Busy morning, busy evening, less busy in the middle 😬 Up and about early and I did some watering first thing, it’s so dry it’s ridiculous. Then onto getting plants out of the greenhouse to start hardening them off, I figure if we are not going to get any rain then we might not get frosts either 😝 Onto a bit of planting up next, planting plants wherever there are any gaps, might as well cover all bases and spread my bets, if I have flowers all over the place at least some of them will succeed. That’s the plan anyway and besides, mono culture is not the way forward, mixing it up helps protect plants and confuse the nibblers, hopefully 🙏 For instance I have planted up sunflowers, they were getting near 4ft tall and toppling over in the small pots so I planted them but I also planted peas with them, they should grow up the tall sunflower stems and then sowed some annual flowers underneath, hopefully cover all the ground and maximise the use of space. Meanwhile John was busy building my last remaining supports for the taller cut flowers, then we cut the grass and that was a mornings work done, time for a rest. Well actually we went out to drop of plants to Charlie and then round to mums for a cuppa who gave me some more plants that I have been after. Then it was back home for a rest and back at it late afternoon with more watering before finally sitting down mid evening. That’s my week, I’m done lol, whatever you are doing g this week, have a good one.