Well hello everyone 😁 we are back from our holibobs which was a mixed bag of weather and destinations, the one consistent thing was the excellent food and service. The holiday started well enough two days at sea and then an announcement about very windy weather meaning we were unable to dock at two of our stops 🙄 Another two days at sea 😬 We finally arrived at Stockholm and it was raining, cold hard rain 😏 After that the weather settled to mild and sunny for the other stops until we reached Oslo when it was ridiculously hot 🥵 We have seen some great places and learnt a lot of history, my favourite place had to be Sweden 🥰 In Lithuania we had a fabulous opportunity to go to a Smallholding with the tour guide that lives there, self sufficient, living the good life and sharing it with us. Fab trip with nettle tea, homemade cheese and honey on offer, it was right up my street but all the others really enjoyed themselves as well. One thing that was evident throughout the Baltic countries was the negative impact Russia has had on each country over time and you can clearly see why they don’t want them back. Historic architecture destroyed and replaced with grey, drab, concrete slab buildings, seems like nothing has changed with their mindset for centuries 😢
Once back home it was a marathon of washing and weeding, I literally did not stop except to sleep for the first two days! Shelley did an excellent job of keeping everything going while we were gone but I knew it would be the weeds that got the better of her, they are insane and with rain and sun alternating it’s not surprising 😂 Two more days of constant weeding and we are now at Sunday evening with plenty more to do over the next few weeks, never ending.
One thing Shelley wasn’t sure about were the mangetout (or were they sweet peas) so she didn’t touch them. They were mangetout and there were loads so I set about picking them, some had gone from being nice flat pods to developing tiny peas but in order to keep them coming they need to be picked regularly. What do you do with lots and lots of gone passed their best mangetout, you make soup of course. So today I have made a batch of pea pod and potato soup, modifying it with mangetout pods and some other extras as I always do. I have told John he will have to eat it as I am not wasting food, this year of all years when the prices are rising constantly. My inspiration for self sufficiency was reinvigorated by the trip in Lithuania, they basically live on what they grow, they had five healthy children and were all full of energy. The whole trip made me realise, as if I didn’t already know, that we don’t eat healthily here in the UK, even when we think we do, we fall a very long way short of good simple, nutritious food and yet again the supermarkets are a fraction of the size of ours with far less convenience food on sale.
Monday 13th June 2022: John went to work today that’s the first time we have not spent a day together for four weeks and I think we are both relieved 😂 Since we got back we have mostly been playing catch up with things, we let the hens out to free range again and promptly lost 3 to a fox 🙄 so today they are in until later in the day, these attacks appeared to have been around mid afternoon. I don’t really know what we are going to do because to keep on fighting against it is becoming hard work, it’s constant and I think there is definitely more than one including a family which must be living close by. I am thinking the time will soon come when we give up the ghost and call it a day on having lots of hens keeping just a small flock that can be safely kept 🤷♀️ The main thing I have been doing today is picking which is a whole nicer topic 😁 Mangetout, broad beans, carrot thinnings and self set potatoes are on the menu with chicken tonight as well as strawberries, raspberries and red currants. Red currants are the jewel of mid summer, delightful shiny red globes of goodness 🥰 I think I will make a compote to have with Greek yoghurt and keep some for breakfast maybe with mini pancakes and yoghurt. I picked quite a lot of red currants so I will freeze some and use them for jams or jellies when I have enough or just add them to pies and crumbles. Red currant jelly is a great thing to have to hand as it can be used in gravies and stews for flavour or basted on meat for a sweet sticky coating, I am sure there are a hundred and one other things you can use them for as well. I know the obvious one is summer pudding but although I like almost everything, summer pudding is one of the few things I really do not like, the fact that it is cold is one thing and the texture is the other, not for me thank you very much lol. The weather is perfect for me today, warm but overcast which means I can move around easily and not worry about dashing for shade in the middle of the day.
Popped over to take Mum some rhubarb late afternoon when we got back I got the dinner on and then spent the evening watering pots and anything in the tunnels and greenhouse plus a freshen up for the veg and plant beds. Out into the paddocks to clean out the horse water buckets and let biscuit into the bigger area before finally coming inside at 9.30pm 💤
Tuesday: Sunshine right from the beginning this morning so a hot day ahead and you know what that means for me 🤪 I don’t have flowers to cut this morning and I did the watering last night so it is less of a ‘rush around’ morning and more of a gentle amble about. I had put the washing on last night so hung that out early, got the eggs sorted and put out for sale, messaged the lawn mower man to get that fixed and serviced, invoiced one of Johns customers, had two cups of tea, a banana and then made a yoghurt smoothie all before 8am. The yoghurt smoothie was supposed to be yoghurt with fruit compote. I made the compote yesterday from the fruit I picked and then last night I made some yoghurt. A few years ago I bought one of those easy yoghurt makers and use the sachets for Greek yoghurt because making it yourself involves something like three strainings for Greek yoghurt texture and flavour, this method is much quicker. Or it would be if it had set 😂 I think (well I know now) that the water was too warm and so the yoghurt did not set to the thick consistency I would expect, it was still runny. I had been looking forward to that combination for breakfast but not to be deterred I put some of each in the blender and had a yoghurt smoothie for breakfast instead 🥰
Next job on the list was working out what to make with some pork I got out of the freezer last night. I really need to start using up as much as possible from the freezers before I start loading it with this years pickings 🙄
Out for the afternoon to Shelley’s which was lovely as we picked Flo up from school went back got my nail varnish taken off had a general chat looked at the garden they are just redoing (a mammoth job) and then picked up Josh from school before being dropped off at home 😁
Had a rest before starting the dinner, John had pork casserole and I had pork and peas fried rice so that used up the pork nicely. I had to wait until around 8pm for it to cool down enough to get some watering done 😏 but I need to keep on top of it for the next couple of days as the temps climb. I dug around in the freezer for tomorrows dinner and also found some cherries and strawberries so I will use those to make a couple of crumbles I think and maybe some more compote 😁 They were labelled up for jam but John has gone off jam on toast for breakfast lately preferring scrambled egg which is much better for him 😝 I shall be up very early tomorrow morning to get some flowers cut for a bouquet, get as much done as possible before it gets too hot out there 🥵
Friday: I missed a couple of days days writing but as it was hot I spent most of the time inside 😝 Early yesterday morning as I took the eggs out to the shed and just as John was going up the back to let out the hens I spotted the fox running down the side of the hedge in next doors paddocks 😏 I shouted fox and luckily John heard me and so they didn’t get let out. Yesterday evening Charlie came over with Macca (he played pool) and she went for a wander up the back, when she came in she said she had seen the fox in our little paddock (as well as a large hedgehog 🥰) at the back and so had called the dogs up to see if off. This morning I had just finished cutting flowers and picking broad beans and mangetout when I heard the fox bark up in the little paddock at the back so I took the dogs up there and there was definitely something the other side of the wall judging by the way the dogs were bouncing up and down the boundary and the way a magpie was screeching away. It is a serious problem at the minute and I don’t expect it to get any better, the only thing we can do is be more vigilant and pro active in scaring it or them off. With that in mind I dug out a small solar powered radio and sat that on the fence at the back where it will be on all day hopefully making the fox think there is someone around 🤞 If it doesn’t work I can see our hen numbers going down and down and this time we will be throwing in the towel I reckon 😢
On a happier note I have been busy cutting flowers for orders 🥰 There is a great range available at the minute and I am beginning to see what is worth growing and what is not, I am also working out what other flowers would be great to grow and in what quantities. My mistakes are also becoming apparent now, mostly not staking properly to get maximum stem length or growing too close together which means plants are fighting to space, it’s all a learning curve. I had more plants arrive while I was away which Shelley potted on and then some more arrived yesterday which I need to get in the ground. The problem at the minute for me is the sun, I quickly run out of shade at this time of the year when it’s hot and although I would love to be out there working it is better for my overall health if I avoid it. The flowers love the sun though so I cant grow in the shade which would be the ideal option 😂 It will soon be time for the ‘big guns’ to start blooming, dahlias mainly and who can resist those 😍 I have, I think, made good plans for a continual flower supply right through to November, December, January but only time will tell, I have also been drying some flowers, not many but I will keep doing them and hopefully will have some great material to use if and when I need it. Flower petals have also been drying nicely though you do need a massive amount of those to do any thing on a sellable scale.
We have been eating broad beans and mangetout with all our meals as they are in plentiful supply right now as well as red currants which reminds me I need to pick more of those tonight when it’s cooler (maybe in the dark 😆)
I was up early today to beat the heat and get flowers cut, a couple of ordered bouquets and some wedding jam jars which I am really excited to do. Initially I was asked for green and white and I explained that I couldn’t guarantee a colour so if they definitely wanted that then they might like to try elsewhere. The customer then came back and asked how it all worked and I explained that it would be flowers that were available at the time of cutting to which she replied ‘oh that’s fine, whatever is available then’ great to have customers that understand. As it is I am happy to say that I did indeed have plenty of white and green and so am able to fulfil the original brief. I really had no idea of what would be ready this year, next year I will have a better idea of what is likely to be ready and when 😁
With it being so hot at the minute I have the windows and the curtains closed all day to keep the house cool which it does I am pleased to say. Then overnight I open the windows to let the cooler midnight air in but leave the curtains/blinds shut to keep the bugs out 😝
The rest of today I will be doing mostly not a lot especially outside at any rate and there is only so much I can be doing indoors. Better to use the time reading up, researching, catching up with all subjects that are remotely interesting, to me at any rate, such as gardening, flower arranging, recipes, the walking dead 🤣 yep I am a mixed bag of a personality but it keeps things interesting 🧐
It was an all or nothing day today as predicted, nothing for most of the day as it was too hot for me to get outside and I really couldn’t be bothered to do much except read etc indoors. Then mid evening it was full on getting the flowers and jam jars ready for tomorrow morning plus the two other bouquets ordered. It’s now 10pm and I am sat outside where it is soooo much cooler than it has been and much cooler than indoors. John has gone to bed already because if he has told me once that he is shattered he has told me at least a hundred times 😂 Hopefully we will get the predicted rain showers tomorrow 😁
Saturday: What a drop in temperature 😂 the pendulum has swung so far in the other direction it’s unbelievable, the hottest day of the year so far yesterday and today it’s very much colder and wet, wet, wet. I for one am glad of the rain it replenishes the water tanks and means I don’t spend hours watering the garden. With the amount we have had today I won’t have to water it for a good couple of weeks I would say.
I was up early and outside getting some weeding done before the rain came, also a bit of cutting back and seed collecting. The cerinthe needed some attention and some of it is already producing seeds so it was time to collect. Part of the sustainability angle is to collect the seed from the plants to use in autumn sowings or next spring, it will save you a good deal of money, I will also sell some of them on if I can collect enough. Once I had done that and watered the poly tunnels it was time to deliver flowers, some were collected yesterday evening which left two lots to deliver. One lot of jam jar posies for a wedding and one bouquet to a different customer. I was really chuffed with the jam jars they looked amazing and the smell was divine from the lemon verbena which I included.
In the afternoon Sam came over for a few hours with Mia, George & Lucie, but apart from their visit we didn’t do much else except the usual jobs. Popped out in the evening for our Saturday night fish and chip supper with my sister and brother in law.
We have been having a proper fox problem though and this afternoon John caught the fox chasing my geese. It seems like the same one I saw the other morning, a youngster I think which means it’s no match for full grown adult geese but still it’s a problem as it is stealing hens on a daily basis, we have lost around six since we came home 😏
Just sat typing this up at 10pm when I heard the cat bowl by the back door rattle, thinking it might be the fox I opened the top half of the stable door quickly to surprise it, the cat was sat meowing while a hedgehog was helping itself to cat biscuits 😂
Sunday: Fathers Day, we were up and about fairly early, John went to do the morning rounds and I cut some flowers then Charlie came round to cook her dad some breakfast 🥰 After that we went over to Dads grave where we met the others and I put the flowers I had cut in a jam jar. My brother from Australia and his family came, this is the first time he has been able to visit the grave and see where Dad is laid to rest. I gave them all a family history tour around the graveyard as lots of family members are buried there including Nan and Gramp and Great Grampy Charlie. On to the garden centre, not to but plants but for tea and cake with Shelley, Martin and the kiddies as well as my brother and his family. Back home and Sam and the kiddies arrived with a card and chocolate for John, all about the Daddies today 😁
One annoying thing that has happened twice today is that a bird keeps getting in the egg shed and pecking at the eggs in the egg boxes 😠 twice I have had to clear up in there. One of the problems is that the door doesn’t get closed properly when customers have finished, also though the catch does work it’s not really strong enough and bounces back open. I imagine it’s a magpie as we have a few of them around at the minute and they are pretty resourceful and good at repetitive behaviour.
I am having real trouble with the internet today, well since Friday actually, this happens quite a lot at the weekend and I have a theory that it is to do with that massive cock up of our telephone lines a couple of years ago. Every time it happens I check to see if there is a fault but it always comes back clear from BT but there is definitely a problem somewhere I just can’t figure out where, either that or our router is on its way out 🤷♀️ answers on a postcard please. I have tried and failed multiple times (+10) to upload photos for this blog, it’s just not happening so I am sorry about the lack of them 😏
Have a great week and thank you for reading, take time to enjoy everything, even the little things 😁
frieslandfarm (flowers) 