Monday 17th January 2022: Old twelvey, 12th night (pre Georgian calender) Wassail day 😁
Another cold and frosty morning and I was on the morning duties as John went off to work. After doing that (a little late as I spent an hour on FaceTime with my brother in Aus) I got on with making an apple cake for the Wassail tonight. I had a few paperwork things to sort out and then goodness knows what else I did but it must have been something 🤷♀️ John came home mid afternoon, the dentist had called and had a cancellation and so he was off to have his tooth out 🙄 I will be honest the timing was not the best, I had plans for him to help me with a couple of things for the wassail but he was incapacitated. So I got everything sorted and changed anything I couldn’t do on my own and it was all fine in the end. We had a fire pit, we made a lot of noise, we chanted, we poured cider on the apple tree roots and we put cider soaked toast on the tree, all under the Wolf Moon and we had a lovely time 🥰
I had a notification today that the blog had reached 10,000 all time views, whoop that’s amazing 🤩
I remembered what it was I did in the afternoon, I cut back (pollarded) the willows at the front of the drive. I now have a large bundle of willow whips and I want to use them for something, I would like a willow sculpture of some kind and I watched a few videos to see what I thought I might be able to tackle, maybe a small wigwam on the grass verge in the driveway 🤷♀️ I would quite like to do a big one but not sure where I would do that without the risk of it being eaten by the horses or the geese.
Tuesday: It was a very cold, clear night again last night and everywhere is white and frosty this morning. I don’t feel the best today and have been struggling a little bit more each day, my joints on my fingers have swollen and hurt, so much so that I have had to take my rings off 🙄 I can feel twinges in my teeth at times and I feel generally ‘meh‘. Hopefully it will be a passing thing, I feel quite emotional with it today as well which is not ideal, doing the animals is going to be a struggle and then I think I will do nothing for the day except rest, sometimes you just have to recognise your limitations and today is one of those days. When I mentioned to John about how I think I will struggle with the water buckets, his answer was to use another bucket with a little bit in and go back and forth, thanks for that, I define will not be making you any dinner today 🤪I have taken a covid test to rule that out and it’s negative.
Well the morning rounds, as I suspected, were difficult, not least because it is frozen solid out there and even the stable tap is frozen. I will have to go back out and try again later as I don’t have the energy to haul water from inside the house. Most of them have buckets I can just break the ice on, some are tiny water holder so hopefully the sun will thaw those quickly but in the stable although the water buckets are not frozen, they are half empty and I can’t fill them from the frozen tap so again I will wait until later and hope the tap thaws quickly. It feels depressing at the minute, mostly because I don’t feel fit and able but also because the egg customers have dropped massively 🤷♀️ We have the usual core of customers that always come but that’s it and we are hardly selling any eggs. I definitely wonder if it is really worth any of it to be honest, it is a fair amount of work for next to no return 😏
Yesterday (Sat) I thought I hadn’t written a single thing all week and so I started a new page only to find this one on the draft section 😂 I think I am losing the plot.
It is now Saturday afternoon, this is the point when I realised I haven’t written anything all week long 😝 (Or at least hadn’t remembered writing anything 😂) Today has not been that productive either, not outside at any rate. I had a hair appointment first thing and then went called round to see Mum and Ken for a cuppa. Mum sorted through her lace and ribbon stash and I came away with a good deal of lace and ribbon in lots of colours, they will be for the tied bouquets and posies. The aim is to use paper and trimmings that are either up-cycled, recycled or at the very least recyclable, as with the veg and fruit garden, there will be no pesticides, herbicides or artificial fertilisers used, so when you sink your nose into a bunch of my blooms you can be sure that it is perfectly safe to inhale that aroma 😁 I have been thinking about flower bunches that have meaning, purpose or just say what you want to convey, to be honest I have done a lot of thinking and none of it can be tried until I have flowers growing 😂 so I just have to keep thinking at the minute.
Sunday: Milder today but we were up later than usual as well, once up and about John did the animals while I sorted out a few things indoors and then outside to get on. I spent a couple of hours potting some things up, a couple of shrubs that, as we about to have a fairly dry period, will be ok to pot on and leave. I sorted out a few plants that I have growing ready to go out the front but it’s all still a little early and a little bit slow. I spent a while taking some photos of various pots I have for sale and I also picked a few bits for the vase. There is not much about at the minute, not bright and pretty colours anyway but there are some lovely structural and architectural bits to be found and some winter honeysuckle which smells delightful.
I have got a new logo for the flower side of business, I am rather pleased with it, simple but effective I think.
New logo
Some more seeds are starting to grow 😁 zinnias and some lupin are all beginning to sprout, it’s all very exciting. I have spent a good few hours this week learning new things, soaking up all sorts of information and ideas and watching a couple of seminars. I feel really excited about the months ahead with this project, I can let my creative side loose for a change.
Zinnia seedlings appearing. Pots of English Bluebells going out for sale 🥰No flowers to be had yet but plenty of lovely foliage around.
Monday 3rd January 2022 (Bank holiday): We have done quite a bit of work over the holidays and there is always plenty more to do but I decided not to do outside work today, I just feel I needed to get some things done inside. John however has been working outside sorting out the duck pen, the duck hut needs a new floor apparently so that will be added to the list 🙄 Meanwhile I am trying to get ahead with the food challenge I set myself and I have a pan of soup ready for lunch, butternut squash, leeks, carrot and a potato as well as chicken stock and black pepper, plenty of veg in that 😁 I also whizzed up a dressing/sauce for my salmon later tonight using flat leaved parsley which I have growing in abundance, parsley, olive oil, salt, dry mustard powder, garlic clove, lemon juice (and because I happen to have a jar) preserved lemon, it looks amazing, tastes delicious and will zing up my salmon fillet no end 🥰 In my quest not to waste anything I have roasted the chestnuts I bought got at Christmas and they will be a great snack over the next couple of days, sprinkled with a little salt normally but I might try some other flavours just to see what it tastes like, I am thinking cinnamon might be nice 🤷♀️
I am still doing lots of research and reading on cut flowers and flower farming or floriculture and consequently I am still ordering seeds and bulbs for that 😂 I keep seeing things and thinking ‘oooo they would be nice’ we might end up with that font paddock covered in flowers this year after all. There are so many great social media pages full of ideas and information it is mind blowing and difficult to reign in the over enthusiasm 🤪 I need to remember I will still be growing veg as well as doing all the other jobs I normally do, I did tell John he might have to get his own dinner a lot of the time 😂
Late evening we went to lend a helping hand dispatching some cockerels for someone, I did get to see their very lovely donkeys and goats, it got me thinking about goats again but then I thought that escaped goats and flower farming may not be a match made in heaven 😜
Tuesday: We spent the whole morning sorting out the hens in the stable and the ducks in the pol run. Clean them out put in fresh sawdust, give them cabbages hung up to keep them entertained and put in extra nesting areas as they have started laying more and there is always a fight over the best nesting areas 😂 The roof on the pol run had a hole in it caused by a wayward log that had been thrown for the dog at some point 🙄 John got a new piece and that has now been fixed so that the rain does not get in and cause any more mess than necessary. We have discussed moving the front hen back to their hut, it has an outdoor enclosed run and it has now been cleaned out thoroughly, that would then mean we could divide the other lot up into two stables and they would have more room and more importantly would stay cleaner for longer. The fact that we have to house them for nearly four months pushes up the cost of keeping them, during winter when the egg sales are not that good this is a conflict we are trying to find a resolution to. Do we give up entirely? it’s not cost effective over the winter months at all with the added housing costs, we are unable to advertise spare eggs on social media pages now, in years gone by we would just put a post up and deliver trays of eggs but that is no longer possible so we have to try and get the footfall here, that is difficult when we don’t have anything else to offer, decisions, decisions 😏
Wednesday: It’s early afternoon and I am just sitting down while waiting for the bread to finish baking. John did the animals this morning before going off to do some ‘real’ work, I did all the usual jobs, putting the eggs out as well as the rubbish and recycling etc and then I spent the rest of the morning in the kitchen. I have these oranges to use up and another box arriving today 🤪 I don’t know why I didn’t space them out a bit more but I didn’t and now I have lots of oranges. I scoured the internet for recipes and decided on making an orange drizzle cake and some orange jam, I also prepared an orange and beetroot salad to go with my dinner later. The orange jam I have never tried before and I added some fresh ginger but on tasting I think I could have easily added more, I think cardamom would be a good choice maybe I will try that next time. The jam is all jarred up and I have left it to cool, I made it quite chunky and it will taste different to marmalade as there is no rind in there to create that bitter taste. I am hoping it will be a winner, even with John, at the very least it would make a lovely filling for a Victoria sponge along with some fresh cream in the spring/summer. The orange drizzle cake I probably won’t drizzle, I taste tested it and it is a lovely lightly flavoured sponge, no need for extra calories with that one. I had some beetroot that I pulled up last week and wanted to start using them up, orange and beetroot salad seemed like a great option, I have added some crushed mixed nuts and I will pick some pak Choi from the polytunnel later to go with it, nice and bright, making good use of fruit and veg I have here, something different and nutritious as well, what’s not to like. I am not a fan of salad dressings so I won’t bother but you could make a nice orange salad dressing to go with it if you wanted to.
The weather is much colder today, we had a good frost this morning and the breeze is from the North again so it’s very fresh, it does mean we have some sunshine though which is always a bonus at this time of year. It was tempting to get a bit carried away with the garden with all the mild weather but from experience I know it’s best to wait, do lots of reading and research, do all the other jobs that need doing so you are free to get cracking when the time is right 😁 With that in mind I cleaned out a couple of the kitchen cupboards this morning as well as cooking. To be honest there wasn’t much that needed throwing out only a jar of opened mustard and two almost empty bottles of tomato sauce, I still have a third one in there, we don’t eat it but I do have it for the grandchildren. It was more about knowing what was in the cupboard and giving it a wipe round than anything else. I did find a tin of Jack fruit and need to find out what I do with that 🤔 🤷♀️
Thursday, Friday, Saturday: Not much to report from any of those days 😂 wet and cold so apart from the usual I didn’t do anything else outside. I did go out and pot up some dwarf iris (reticulata) bulbs and intended to do the sweet peas but by the time I had done the bulbs my fingers were blue and freezing, it was 1c in the greenhouse so I came back indoors. I have been doing a fair bit of reading up and video watching about flower farming though so I haven’t wasted time at all. Oh yes and John has been suffering with toothache since Wednesday, he went to the dentist Thursday who charged him well for an X-ray, said they couldn’t see anything but sent him home with antibiotics just in case 🤷♀️ he started taking them, the pain did no subside, a swelling formed and to date it hasn’t got any better but it also hasn’t got any worse.
Sunday: Despite having toothache and being on two hourly painkillers as well as the antibiotics, John agreed to take me to a local nursery to get some foliage plants. It was frosty this morning but the sun soon thawed everything and it turned out to be quite a nice winters day. I got three plants from there but it is a nursery rather than a garden centre and so we called in at another centre on the way home and had coffee and cake plus a couple of sale bargains 😁 We then called in to my brothers which was also on the way back, intended to stop for a quick coffee and ended up being there a few hours. Mum and Ken were also there when we got there and as it was sunny we decided to don our wellies/boots and search for Roman pottery in the ploughed field in front of his house (it belongs to the farm that their house belongs to so permission is granted) It didn’t take long to find a good bowlful of pottery, the site is being monitored by experts, geophysics have been over it, archaeologists have looked at findings there and a local chap has permission to metal detect there. They have found plenty of Roman coins and pottery and even had a full report written up on the findings so it is exciting to find pieces that haven’t been touched by anyone else for thousands of years 🥰 We would have stayed longer but we had to return and let the dogs out that had been in since mid morning. I had intended to get some garden work done as it was not a bad day but that will wait for another day. Seems like it was a day of intentions that never quite got fulfilled, sometimes a change is as good as a rest.
I hope you have all had a lovely festive time and I wish you a very happy 2022. We still have Covid (who would have thought it 🙄) but we are getting to grips with living with it on a daily basis, let’s hope this year coming is a little more like life used to be 😁
We have wined and dined, loved and laughed, rested and recuperated, felt grateful for what we have, watched endless Christmas tv and generally had a fabulous time. All the while of course, we have had to continue doing the daily routines with animal feeding and care no matter what day it was but that is ok it’s what we signed up for.
I have also spent some considerable time thinking about how we move forward with the Smallholding this coming year. I had mused over cut flowers and that is still very much part of the plan I just need to put it into practice now. As well as the usual bunches of flowers I saw a lovely jam jar posy while I was researching and thought ‘oooo yes, I like those’ they very much they fit in with the ethos here, the jam jars can be returned time and time again for refilling, they are small enough to fit on any table or surface if you don’t have a large enough area for a full vase of flowers and all kinds of up-cycled embellishments can be used including the customers own if they want a particular ribbon used, yep I really like this idea, ‘Flowers @ Friesland Farm’ is in its newborn phase 🥰 Locally grown, no pesticides or artificial fertilisers used, minimal miles, grown with love and pride, doesn’t get better than that does it 😁 Add to that the plants I divide or grown from seed to sell at the gate and the direction for the year is looking good, just got to hope the weather is kind 😜
Betwixtmas: 😂 We we’re not idle (not all the time anyway) over the holidays, the chickens and ducks keep on laying, the horses need checking over, the other non laying lot still need feeding and watering as do the dogs and cats as well as ourselves. We have been busy most days with cleaning out and cleaning up, the huts that the birds were moved out of when the avian flu came have now been cleaned and power washed. The hard standing has been cleared of leaves and debris and power washed, the leaves all over the driveway have been raked and piled under the trees and we have been moving woodchip onto the paths in the garden. We also moved plenty of barrowfuls to the orchard where the ground deteriorated very quickly once the rain came. When the weather permitted we worked on the veg garden to get ahead ready for spring, putting home made compost on the beds, harvesting leeks, carrots and beetroots, we still have kale and cabbages in the ground, the broad beans are growing nicely as are the garlic and onions. Flower bulbs are beginning to appear which is always a lovely sign that the wheel keeps on turning. There were also plenty of times when we sat and watched a film or saw family and ate up all the festive food 🥰 No matter how hard I try not to have too much food in, there always seems to be too much, none of it is wasted though. John had bubble and squeak on Boxing Day and I have three more portions frozen as well as cooked veg which will make soup at some point. I have some cake from an unexpected visit that I also froze because we have Christmas cake and Christmas pudding to eat up first and of course plenty of chocolate to get through 🤪
Once all the festive food is used up I have set myself a bit of a challenge (in fact I have started it even though we still have stuff left) I am not doing ‘veganuary’ but I am intending to make vegetables as much, if not the biggest, part of our meals. Sounds easy right but I also want to use seasonal and mostly what I have grown myself, this is a lot easier said than done. I searched for some inspirational recipes online but most of them overlook the seasonal and there are plenty of ingredients that have come from far flung corners of the world which I want to avoid. So you see keeping it interesting is a challenge. I will be using store cupboard goods that I have already such as rice and pasta (though I could make my own pasta if I run out) As it is winter then soup is the easiest go to lunch, packed with home grown veg, very nutritious and healthy which is what is needed after the indulgences lately.
The first recipe was lovely and lacto-vegetarian (it seems there are different versions of vegetarianism) John did not eat this 😂 but I fried off some butternut squash (cubed) along with some garlic and some dried sage in olive oil. Fry just enough to get them coated and then add a splash of water to flash cook until the squash is soft, then add chopped mushrooms until it all caramelises, add to cooked pasta and I crumbled blue cheese on top though you could use whatever cheese you like such as Parmesan. Twas delicious I have to say and what’s more it felt like comfort food which is all the more important during the winter months. I also got some vegetable soup going in the slow cooker, turnip, butternut squash, carrots and onions from the garden, I added celery (which I had bought for Christmas) some mushrooms and some peas, veg stock, bouillon powder and pepper. Cooked it down for a good few hours until everything was soft then turned it off overnight, blitzed it and reheated in a pan for lunch the next day, delish and I felt I had already had my five for the day 😁 Let’s hope I can keep up the momentum 😝
Butternut squash quickly fried in olive oil with garlic and sage, add water to flash cook, once soft add mushrooms and cook, add to cooked pasta and crumble cheese of your choice on top 🥰
New Year’s Eve went without a bang this year in fact we went to bed at 11.30 lol, well it arrives wether you wait up to see it or not doesn’t it and I think it was pretty muted everywhere this year. New Year’s Day we started off well, John started to build a plant table for me, for the plants I will have for sale this year coming and I sorted out all the pots of English Bluebells which will be the first plants to go out, and then it started to rain quite heavily 🙄 So we came in for coffee and waited for the rain to stop, it didn’t, so we took down the Christmas decorations and hoovered and polished instead 😝 Years ago I would have cooked a roast dinner on NYD but ever since the kids were late teens and too hungover the next day, I haven’t bothered. The place looks bare with the docs down and I can’t remember what went where beforehand 🤷♀️ but it’s a job done and quite literally ‘dusted’ 😝 sorry, not sorry.
I have been through all my seeds to see what I needed to get, turns out I have rather a lot of them and don’t need much else at all. For the few seeds I did want, we popped to the garden centre to get them there, I also picked up some first early seed potatoes. I am good to go now and as always I am chomping at the bit but I also know it doesn’t pay to get started too early. Our weather at the minute is ridiculously warm, 17c which is insane for Winter but I am also aware that it can take a real plummet at any point and if I have over sown I will be struggling for space so it’s best to hold fire and wait a while. There are a few things I can get started, some extra broad beans, there is still time to sow those and on the flower front, sweet peas can still be started off now.
Sunday: The weather was kinder today up until just after lunch, we got busy, John finished the plant table while I sorted out more plants to put out for sale. Once that was sorted and John cleared up the wet leaves on the drive he came to help me on the bed that was the herb bed and needs clearing. It has taken quite a while, many of the bigger herbs such as fennel and lovage had very big strong roots and I needed to wait for the ground to be soft enough to dig them up. There were a few other things to salvage, ice plants which I have potted up and will move to the tortoise run for them to feed on, a blackcurrant sage which I wanted to get out in good condition, that has now been replanted elsewhere and also a large patch of aster which has now been dug up and divided into many plants 😁 On the whole the area is now ready to clear ready to put grass down. The project after that which is also rattling round in my head at the same time is the cut flower patch, forming a plan on what to put in and how many of each plant. John and I also talked about putting the patch in the front paddock but we decided that for this year it will be better in the veg garden and we will work towards moving it next year. The idea being that it gets sun all day, it can be seen and even accessed on a pick your own basis if needs be plus it will look lovely but I need to see how well this year does before investing in fencing etc.
Have a great week, still one more bank holiday to go 😁
Monday 6th December: Today was a bit of a write off, I went out and did the morning rounds but started feeling a bit dizzy and nauseous halfway round, that feeling didn’t leave me all day and so apart from the absolute basics I didn’t do anything except sit or lie down. I was hoping it would pass quickly, I had the same thing on Sunday morning which went after about an hour but this time it didn’t shift until around 2pm. So I didn’t get anything done at all really and am hoping it’s a passing thing.
Tuesday: I haven’t got the dizziness today but I still feel a bit like my head is a dough ball. That I can cope with, the dizziness not so much, I am guessing it’s sinus related and that it doesn’t last too long. Going from the warm, out to the cold and then back into the warm makes it worse. It was a lot colder than I thought when I did the morning rounds, it didn’t look that cold but my fingers and toes were telling me something different 🙄 We have another storm warning, high winds, cold weather, possibly snow, at the minute it is quite calm but likely to be a different story by the end of the day. I would have liked to get on with doing the rest of the pantry but we only just picked up the door yesterday and I don’t want to put any food source in there until I can keep any animals out, cats, dogs and mice included, so that will have to wait, John is putting the door on when he come home from work later. I think I may make mince pies today, seems like a good day to get that done and another thing I can tick off my list.
Early evening we got the door lining in and the door on the pantry so it is pretty much finished now, I am super chuffed with it. Everything in there is something we already had, it looks like it’s been there for years which was the intention and I have plenty of space to be able to store everything I am going to grow next year plus hang dried flowers and stock up on extra things that I can’t usually get in the kitchen cupboards, yep happy, happy me 🥰
Now I have the space I have ordered some apples direct from an orchard in the UK, I have long since finished my apples as there were not that many. My intention is to do the same with whatever produce I can as well as oranges direct from the grower in Spain, I am cutting out the middlemen that make a big fat profit while producers get paid a pittance for their goods. At least if I do that then all the money goes to the farmers, growers and producers and not the supermarket chains.
Wednesday: Windy today and cold rain with it at times, I got the morning jobs sorted and then out to do the morning feeding and watering. I just got back in when Sam called to see if I wanted to go to the garden centre, the twins were at nursery and it is one of the first times she has had a morning to herself since they were born so off we went 😁 When I got back I sorted through the Christmas presents I have already got so that when I go shopping on Friday (I made John book a day off 😂) I will know what I still need to get. Then I started sorting through things to put in the pantry, I have things all over the place and so it will be great to have it all in one place and know where it is and what I have got. I am going to have a field day next year, drying, dehydrating, pickling, jamming, jarring and storing oodles and oodles of different things. I have started a list of different combinations of jams, dehydrated vegetables for soup mixes (thus relying less on the freezer) yep the pioneer women in me will be in her element 😂 I will definitely be hoping for the best but preparing for the worst case scenario as you never know what is around the corner. A bit ott maybe? But maybe not 🤔 China are the biggest producers of tin cans in the world and they are having crisis after crisis with energy supplies which in turn means they keep shutting down factories, including the tin can ones. You may think that won’t affect you but the knock on effect is that there will be a shortage of them, knock again means there will not be as many tinned products on the shelf, people start buying dried goods, shortages occur, people start panic buying or stocking up, the supply chain is easily affected all the way to us as individuals. You only have to look at the fuel panic to see how quickly things get ridiculous, whichever way things pan out, I will either have plenty to keep us fed or plenty to keep us going if needs be. Being prepared is not about being a weirdo with a massive underground bunker stocked with supplies (although I admit that would be awesome 😝) it is about looking ahead and asking yourself ‘what would I do if ? happened) and then trying to give yourself a buffer against that scenario. In the last twenty years that kind of thinking has completely fallen by the wayside and we have a ‘live for today culture’ which on the surface of it is fine but hopefully we have plenty of tomorrow’s ahead of us as well so it makes sense to look beyond today, I guess a lot will find that out the hard way eventually 😏
In the afternoon as well as doing the usual I also got the horses in, the farrier is coming at 9am tomorrow and I don’t want to be under pressure when Jack starts to give me the run around in the paddock🙄
Thursday: Had to be up and about pretty sharpish this morning so I could get the morning rounds done before the farrier arrived. I was halfway through them when he turned up early lol lucky that I did get the horses in overnight then. Jack was a right prat today, normally he is good as gold for the farrier but not today 😏 he messed him about a fair bit and then once he had finished and moved on to do biscuit Jack decide to lob his hay net at my back while I was talking, no idea how he managed to get it undone let alone toss it in my direction 😂 he was ‘hoofing’ the ground and snorting, very impatient to get back out to the paddock. Once I took him back out there he had a good welly around to get it out of his system.
Once the farrier had gone I got on with the rest of the rounds and skipped out the stables so they are ready for next time they need to come in. Next I was due to have my hair cut but the hairdresser had messaged me the night before to say she had double booked me with an mot for her car lol, that’s fine, it gave me breathing space that I otherwise wouldn’t have had. The reason for that was because Sam was arriving with the twins much earlier than usual today, it was Mia’s Christmas play and as with most schools only one person from the family was allowed to attend so that meant the twins needed to be looked after. They came over just after lunch and they too were in high spirits today, must be something in the air! I had the twins right through to around 5.30 and I honestly don’t know how Samantha copes, it’s pretty simple with one toddler but with two that go in different directions, are much more nimble than I am and so that much faster it’s like trying to catch a room full of bouncing balls 😂 I just stop one from doing one thing and the other is already up to something they shouldn’t be and added to that George has quickly worked out the round and round the table game when he doesn’t want to be caught 🤪
Once they had all gone home I could make my dinner and relax for the evening that’s the beauty of being a grandparent, the children go home and are someone else’s hard work 😁
Friday: John has more or less finished for Christmas now and so I had booked him for the day to go Christmas shopping in Oxford. We got the animals all done and off we went, might as well stayed at home really as the shop didn’t have what I wanted and I sat in the coffee shop and ordered it online to be delivered 😂 We did actually get a few other things but it was hard going, no wonder the high street is suffering when their stores don’t have the stock but the warehouses do 🤷♀️ That took up much of the daylight hours really and so apart from the afternoon feeding there is not much else to report for today.
Saturday: I did the morning rounds while John started clearing some more of the back bit, there was a last bit of old roofing that had to be cut off and taken down. Once we were both done John went to make coffee, he came back and I used his favourite phrase ‘I have a plan, you are not going to like it’ 😂 His plan was to move everything else we had left to the storage caravan, I thought this was a waste of time because it is stuff we will be using and it will have to come back over at some point. My argument is why move it twice? ‘because we have nowhere to put it’ is his reply, well that’s my plan, we build a cupboard 🤪 And so that’s exactly what we spent Saturday morning doing, building a cupboard, we used all the odd bits of wood and cut offs from the ply and now we have a very useful cupboard with a worktop that has the vice bolted to it, brilliant, even if I do say so myself. In the afternoon we popped over to see Shelley and the Children and had tea and cake with them before coming back to do the afternoon rounds. The days are very short in the Winter for animal work, no sooner have you had lunch and it’s time to start thinking about feeding them and shutting the up for the night but we are marching towards the Winter solstice and then the days will very slowly start to stretch out again 😁
One box of oranges arrived today but I don’t know where the other box has got too 🤷♀️
Sunday: John helped with the animals this morning and then gave the gutters a clean out now most of the leaves have fallen. Meanwhile I planted some pretty pink cyclamen bulbs I got in a sale and also some persica which were originally marked at £45 for five bulbs 😮 but I got them for £5 so a bargain indeed. Then John went off to the tip with a broken fridge and a broken microwave, I cleaned out the greenhouse and got the dahlia bulbs all brushed off now they are dry and I have them stored in boxes under the staging in the greenhouse, hopefully they will survive. In the afternoon John went to watch the Grand Prix round at Maccas and I did some crafting, I did have the race on though and it was an exciting and controversial race, good job nobody was here to see me jumping around and shouting at the final lap 😂
That’s another week over, it was mild ending weatherwise, we have had everything so far this winter from snow and ice to wind, rain and sunshine, the temperatures have so far ranged from just below freezing up to 14c 🙄 that seems to be how things are these days, all over the place 🤪
Monday 29th November: Oh what a lovely Monday morning 🤪 snow on the ground, flipping freezing and as yet (2pm) it has not thawed 🙄 A different routine this morning, the birds are now all housed and so that means there is no point John doing them in the morning before he goes to work, it becomes my job 😏 I was glibly thinking ‘I don’t need to go out until mid morning’ but then realised that I actually would have to go out first thing of course (silly me) The horses need hay, the water buckets need the ice broken and although we had filled up the feeders in the stable block and for the ducks, the others in the orchard will still need feeding and watering. So I donned my big ‘duvet’ coat, my isotherm wellies (they keep your feet warm down to -10 🥰) and my leather gloves because if they get wet it doesn’t go through to my fingers and make them freezing cold. I did all the feeding and watering and then had to set up a small run for the light Sussex hen with the chick, everything needs to be enclosed and no wild birds should be able to get to the food or water, this is quite a task but luckily, as it happens year on year now, we are prepared. Once I had finished outside it was back indoors to divide up some blocks of mature cheddar for the freezer and get those in along with some blocks of butter and a carton of milk. I am not stocking up honestly lol, the milk I asked John to get on top of our regular delivery because he seemed to be drinking a lot of tea. In the end we didn’t use it and had our normal delivery this morning so I need to freeze it and save it for another day. The butter I am going to need when I start making mince pies by the dozen and if I have them in the freezer ready then I can do them when I want to. The cheese is because John only eats mild cheese which is not much good for flavouring something like cauliflower cheese so if I put it in the freezer I always have some handy and it’s not going hard in the fridge. I have been a Jack of all trades today because after that job I went and painted the pantry. I say painted and John is going to tell me it’s not finished but that is the look I am going for 😂 he will hate it, I will love it, it’s my pantry and once the door is on I doubt he will ever go in there 😂 Then I spent a bit of time trying out new bits of crafting, I want to make some decorations for myself and so have been having a go at cone trees, not pine cone trees but cone shaped trees, I haven’t finished yet but if I am pleased with the result I will take photos. A quick sit down with a cup of tea and then onto the next job of the day, caramelised red onion chutney making 😁
With the chutney on the go, the dinner prepped ready for this evening and an apple and blueberry crumble also made, I got all togged up to go outside and do the afternoon feeding and egg collecting. Luckily the outside taps had thawed and I was able to get more water to the ducks, geese and horses who also had more hay. The shift took me far longer than it did to write about it 😂 I had planned on coming in for a cuppa before shutting them away at dusk but by the time I had finished that, collected the post, checked the egg shed, fed the dogs and the cats it was getting dark and so I shut down doors etc before coming back inside and taking off my artic gear. I just got into the kitchen when John arrived home, typical that he arrives just as everything is done. He asked if I had painted the pantry, I told him yes but he won’t like it, he said and I quote ‘it’s your pantry, you can paint it how you like’ 😮 As we went through to have a look, John shouted at the dog who was busy helping herself to eggs from the bucket! Normally I put the bucket of eggs in the sink but there was the paint tray in there so I put it on the floor, I won’t make that mistake again 😂 The reason I don’t box up the eggs right away is because then the cat sits on the boxes which is ok-ish when the weather is dry but if it’s wet she gets the boxes dirty. Sometimes I feel the battle is already lost before I even get up 🤪 I complain all the time that the geese eat all the chicken food (because they should not be down in the stable block) the dog eats the cat food (he reaches up on the side to sneak it out of their bowl) the chickens eat diesels cat food (big no no) if the he hasn’t eaten it all and now the dog is eating the eggs, I need some sort of order back with the feed routine which will be easier now the birds are all shut away.
Hens on lockdown 😏
I think I am just going to relax this evening, once the dinner is made, eaten and washed up that is! I hope it thaws overnight, Smallholding life is a lot harder when it’s freezing outside.
Tuesday: i did the rounds again this morning and it has all thawed thank goodness, it was hard work over the last few days 🙄 The art of the job is getting in through the stable doors without letting any hens out 😂 this morning just as I opened the door and ducked down to go in, one of them flew straight at me from where she was perching, I did t have the heart to tell her she has a very long time until she can go outside again 😏
I didn’t have anything in particular planned for today which was just as well as Sam came over with the twins and Shelley and Flo came after Flo finished nursery so it was a few hours of chaos and cacophony 😝 Once they had all left to do the school run I sat in total silence enjoying the moment 🤪
I did have time to make a cake before anyone arrived though, it was a recipe I wanted to have a go at, pumpkin cake with a cream cheese frosting. The verdict from the little ones was ‘nah’ the verdict from Sam was ‘not bad’ I can’t decide if I like it or not 🤷♀️ I think if I did it again I would doctor the recipe somewhat as it is quite heavy, more like a pudding texture but chances are I won’t make it again lol.
Wednesday: Busy day today, first up, the morning rounds and sorting out fresh water, feed etc then onto digging up the dahlia bulbs and putting them to dry out in the greenhouse before storing for the winter. The smaller ones I have left in the ground to see if they survive but the big star ones and the cafe au lait I have dug up as I don’t want to lose those. Some of them have got massive over summer and so I should be able to get lots more plants from them in spring. I also found a couple of lupin seed heads which I have drying in the kitchen now, also for sowing again next spring. I had quickly painted the remaining bits I needed to do in the pantry before doing the gardening and so once that was dry I went back to get some bits of furniture cleaned and moved in there. The apple rack is going to live in there and needed the dust cleaned from it, also a cupboard that needed a hoovering to get the dust off. The rest of the day until feeding time I spent cleaning out screws and nails from the workbench which is also going to be going in there. The bench is one that we inherited at our old house from the previous owner, it is old, heavy and well used, it will look fab once it is cleaned up. But before I can do that I needed to clean out the little cubby holes at the back which were full of screws and nails, some of which have been there for well over twenty years I imagine 😂 I sorted through thousands of screws and nails of all different sizes and types, lots were rusty and so have been thrown away, lots are still very useable and indeed we are always looking for nails and screws so sorting them all out will be a good job, well done. I have now ordered a screw organiser thingy that will go on the wall and I can sort them out into sizes hopefully. I came in for a s quick sit down before having to go out and do the afternoon rounds and saw what I thought was an egg customer sat in the car, I went out with more eggs as we have had a few visitors to the shed today. He got out and asked for Samantha, my thought were now whirring as the horses were due to have the dentist visit but I didn’t think it was today, I asked him if he was the dentist and yes he was 🙄 A quick phonecall to Sam and it seems she had the wrong day written down 🤪 he agreed to come back tomorrow bless him, which is when Sam thought he was coming. The reason that I couldn’t supervise is because Sam doesn’t know how Jack is going to react, previously he had to be sedated to have his teeth rasped and it’s not something I would be confident overseeing. I finally got a sit down for about half and hour before starting with the afternoon rounds and egg collecting.
Huge dahlia tuber root, hopefully I can get a lot more plants from it next spring.
I am not quite sure where Thursday and Friday went lol or what I did on those days except that the horse dentist came back to do their teeth and it’s good to finally get a rough idea of biscuits age, apparently somewhere around 20 years old. She is in good oral health though which is good to know, Jack also has no problems and his lameness has gone so that is good as well. I have had the twins three times since Thursday morning so no wonder I have no idea what else I have done 🤪 Friday (I think) I went into town with Shelley and Flo for a mooch round the charity shops and to get a nice coffee. I found a few bargains including a gorgeous Rumtopf pot, I did already have one but this one was so lovely I couldn’t leave it sat there so I bought it 😁 I gave the other one to shelley so she can have a go at it next year. Traditionally you fill the rumtopf with layers of fruit, rum and sugar, the fruit can be a complete mixture which means to can add to it as the season progresses. You then eat the boozy fruit around Christmas time. I tend to use plums and brandy but any combination works just as well if you fancy giving it a go.
Saturday: I had the twins for a couple of hours while Sam and luke went to a meeting and then it was time to go to the family Christmas party. Each year (except last year) my sister hires the hall in Kelmscot and we have a big family get together, there are a lot of us and we need a big space for everyone to be able to come 😂 This year it was mainly centred around the children having fun so there was a disco and games and a sack of gifts for them all, we all did something for a buffet and as always there was plenty to eat and drink 🥰 It is important for the children to get together as a good few of them have only known pandemic conditions which is really quite sad.
Sunday: Up and about early this morning and after getting all the Smallholding jobs done, feeding, watering etc, and then the household things done, washing on, rubbish out etc, I could finally get on with the job I was excited to get started, the pantry 🥰 We had moved some of the cupboards in yesterday but we could finally get started on fitting shelves and fixtures. I am delighted with how it is going so far, I have plenty of shelves and storage space and I have lots of hanging space for drying flowers or storing onions and garlic. I have tried to use everything I already had here and have easily achieved that, I still have a fair amount to put in there but here is a sneak preview 😁 I can’t wait to start stocking it with goodies 😍
Monday 18th October: I had fully intended to get a fair amount done today but in the end I didn’t. The one thing I did do was to get the tortoises inside ready for the winter sleep. I found Voldy pretty easily he was still out and about, when I started searching for big billy though he was nowhere to be found. I spent about 15 minutes searching the compound, searching again, moving the hut, looking in the foliage etc etc. I was just about to give up, convinced he had been taken as he can’t get out of there (unless he was Houdini) I noticed some loose soil near a big tuft of grass, when I lifted it up I could just see the top of his shell. He had dug himself so far into the ground that he was hardly noticeable, definitely time for him to go away indoors 😜
I came indoors once I had discovered his whereabouts and picked up my phone to record the story for the podcast, I could see I had many messages and once I opened them I realised that we had received some devastating news this morning. My cousin who was double vaccinated but had contracted Covid around three weeks ago had died. We had been getting daily updates on his condition since he was admitted to hospital and things had not looked good but we were all hoping that he would pull through, he didn’t and it was quite a shock really. Covid is still out there, two vaccinations mean that the risk is less but there is still a risk, it doesn’t make you immune. That’s the reason I have done nothing else today, I just couldn’t find the energy or the concentration to do anything. As I have said before I have a big family, a close family, we all keep in touch with each other as much as possible and so it feels close to home and has hit hard. My heart goes out to his family, he was a big character with a big heart and he will missed so much by all of us but especially by them 💔
Tuesday: I have mostly been sorting stuff out in the back area, goodness knows how we accumulated so much stuff 🙄 but it all needs sorting out. Lots of it just needs to find a new home, some of it needs to be thrown away, some of it will stay in the back but we need new shelves to keep it on, some of it will go to the scrap man and some of it we have no idea where it will be going yet. I moved a fair few things today but when John came home we went through the stuff I had no idea about, was it any good? did John need it for something? 🤷♀️ Hopefully a few more sessions of that and we should be all sorted 😜
Wednesday: We are getting to the time of the year when I start doing the animals rather than John. The mornings are dark and only get light just as John needs to go to work and the evenings are drawing in every day which does not give John much time once he gets home. So it becomes my job to do it instead as the garden is not demanding so much of my time anymore. This morning was my first morning, it was thundering and hammering down at 7.30 🙄 I left it another hour, had a shower and got the eggs from yesterday sorted and by 8.30 the sun was shining 😁 I got all the feeding and letting out sorted and then I spent the rest of the morning cleaning out the light Sussex pen. I cleaned out their hut, sprayed it for red mite, put in clean straw and then I barrowed umpteen loads of woodchip to put on the floor in there to stop it getting too muddy over winter. I did want to get a tarpaulin over the top but it was very windy so there was no way I was going to be able to do that on my own, best wait for a calm day when there are two of us around. Shelley called round with Flo at lunchtime for a couple of hours and then John came home early so he did the afternoon rounds.
I had my third vaccination this evening, initially there was some confusion with this vaccine, we were informed by Lupus Uk and NHS vaccine that this was a third primary. When I rang the surgery they said nope it’s a booster but eventually the catch up of information happened, when I got the appointment and when I arrived for the vaccine I was told it is a third primary and I will be due a booster in six months time. Either way I am glad I have had it, the efficacy of the vaccine seems to wane according to some sources so I would rather keep topped up just in case 🤔
I keep thinking I need to do more for winter veg but having watched a you tube video that someone else has done I realise I am pretty prepared. Leeks, kale (of various types) cabbages, cauliflower, broccoli, they are all growing well out in the garden. Winter lettuce in the greenhouse, and carrots and beetroot are still in the ground doing well, the only other veg they had growing that I didn’t were chard and turnips both of those I won’t miss if I don’t have any 😜
I still have a fair bit of preparation to do on some of the veg beds to get them ready for winter, mostly because they have been left to their own devices all summer and need some control measures, some of the weeds are taking over. The brassica cage has not been used since I finished harvesting the sprouting broccoli back in spring. I didn’t have time to go in and clear it and now the weeds are pretty rampant including a wild blackberry. My plan in there is to pull or dig any perennial weeds and then smother the annual weeds with cardboard, that should hopefully knock it back a bit and give me a chance to sort it when I have more time.
Thursday: I spent a couple of hours first thing recording a podcast and then I spent the rest of the morning sorting out draughts around the two doors in the kitchen. The wind has changed direction NE and it’s quite cold, I can feel it blowing in through gaps. I have ordered some draught excluder for the door frames and I ordered some thermal curtains for when it gets very cold. I have saved some wool insulation that comes with fresh food deliveries sometimes and have used them for the floor in front of the doors to stop any cold coming underneath. First and foremost I don’t want to be cold and secondly we need to save energy wherever possible, it’s the right thing to do for our pocket and the planet. John came home just after lunch so we sat down with a cuppa for an hour before he went and got on with some more of the side cladding. Meanwhile I prepped dinner for later and also prepped some tomatoes, onion and garlic for roasting later when the oven was on. That will make a nice passata once I have put it through a sieve and I will be having that for spag Bol tomorrow. The twins arrived with Sam and Mia who went off to swimming lessons leaving the twins here to have their tea. Our electrician arrived to do the bits of electric work we needed to get done, lol everyone arrives at the same time, chaos, actually it wasn’t too bad. I did think the twins would get all upset with a stranger in the house but they were fine mostly because I was feeding them by then so they were more interested in the food 😜 After everyone left we were able to get our dinner sorted, I also made some toffee sauce to go with some sautéed apple for dessert, very easy and very delicious on an October evening 🥰 John went out to put the animals to bed and that’s another day done. My arm is fine, I did think it might hurt but only slightly where the actual vaccination site is nothing more.
I have been collecting a few flowers to dry and the combination of these drying is really pleasing at the moment, hopefully I can do them justice when I try using them in some sort of arrangement.
Friday: It was much colder this morning than it has been for months but the sun came out and there is still some warmth there when it does so I got some washing on the line. John was up early and so he did the animals before going to work, he will be home early today and will be working on the side of the building, trying to get it all done before it really gets too cold. It is a different winter for us this time, no Rayburn, no wood chopping, no cleaning out of the ashes, not cold in the mornings before we get to re light it. The electric radiators give us constant gentle heat that we are not used to yet lol, I said to John this morning ‘it’s a bit warm in here’ 😂
I got this evenings dinner sorted, the tomatoes, garlic and onions I roasted yesterday have been pushed through a sieve and I have a delicious passata for my spag Bol later. John has mince, I may make it into a shepherds pie or I may just do mince and potatoes separately with veg not decided yet. I have got a pan of soup on the go and I have used the carrot tops in the soup as well, I looked it up to see if you could eat them because I wasn’t sure and turns out you can. They have 6x the amount of Vit c in them than the actual carrot plus calcium and potassium, nutrient packed so not going to waste them. Both lunch and dinner tonight will be entirely from produce either grown by me and reared by a local smallholder plus the bread is made from flour at the local mill, food miles approximately 7 🙄 a good day I reckon, I also know exactly what has gone in to each meal, no added extras or unnecessary ingredients unless I choose to add them 😁
Late morning I spent some time in the big tunnel clearing down, weeding etc but the sun came out and it got a bit warm in there 😂
Saturday: This started off with John coming to shout me for some help, I had my dressing gown and slippers on still so quickly changed and went out to see what the problem was. The dog had disturbed and chased a muntjac deer in the small paddock at the back, the terrified deer had tried to jump the wall but got his antlers stuck in the stock fencing. It was thrashing about and making a heck of a racket for something so small, John quickly got the wire cutters and we were able to release it successfully. It ran off back down the paddock, along the walkway, through the other paddock and then through the hedge along the side. We had no chance of making sure it was ok as it was gone like lightning 🙄
I went back in got a shower and went off to get my hair done, John stayed at home doing some more to the side of the building, it is almost finished but not quite. I think he will be happy when it’s done as it means he can start on his pool room 😁 Once home again I spent the time sorting out a few bits for the wedding and also some thermal curtains for our two doors in the kitchen. The aim is to reduce our energy consumption as much as possible both for our pocket and the environment and the doors are a bit draughty, we need to get them sorted next year I think.
I picked a few more dahlias for the kitchen, the plants just keep on giving, they certainly are the best value for money of all the flowers I have ever grown I think, I just hope I can keep them alive for next year.
Sunday: I spent until mid afternoon working, firstly I helped John do the animals as he is not feeling well then I spent a very pleasant few hours in the front cutting back dead foliage on the flower beds. I pulled up quite few aster plants that seem to have grown where I hadn’t intended, I feel like a achieved a good amount out there and it’s still looking good even in late October. After that I went into the front paddock to extended the grazing area for the horses, that took me a lot longer than I had expected as I didn’t think the area I added was big enough to last very long and so I gathered up more fence stakes and electric tape and made it even bigger. The reason being that the horses are looking longingly over the other fence on the side paddocks and I don’t want them to break into there anytime soon 🙄
Back inside for a sit down and to check on John who by this point had gone back to bed, we did a Covid test, it’s negative, hopefully it’s just a passing bug and he will be well after a good sleep. I made some beef broth, I would have made chicken except I don’t appear to have any saved chicken carcasses so beef will have to do. I chopped up and onion added some garlic plus some of the bouillon powder and a bag of frozen beef broth I made a few weeks ago. It is one of the best things to use as a pick me up when you feel unwell, it’s light on the stomach but highly nutritious and helps to rehydrate, what could be better 😁
I will be feeding the animals and egg collecting this afternoon and then I will be putting them to bed as well I think. Then I have an evening of getting my eyebrows threaded and tinted plus an eyelash lift ready for the wedding this week 🥰
Monday 11th October 2021: Must try harder to write every day and not forget like I did last week 🤪
Already this morning the plans I had have changed and it’s only 9.30 am. I had a phone call from a tree company who are working in the area had want to bring wood chip😁 I am on a site where they can ring and ask if you want some, I said yes please and now I have three loads coming 🙄 so I need to decide where they are going to dump it and what I will do with it. We use a lot of it on the pathways in the veg garden, it’s ideal for suppressing weeds and does need renewing each year. We used to use a lot of it in the ménage but that has just become a weed bed at the minute so I can put it straight on there although I will probably put it there when I get time to sort it all out. So the jobs I had on my list go by the way and make way for a different job today, sometimes that’s just how things go. I might have another cup of coffee before having to get stuck in to moving it all.
I have spent most of the day shifting wood chip onto the pathways (still a long way to go yet) I spent the rest of the time, cutting things down or pulling things up. I have tidied up the hoses and anything I left lying around which is always a fair amount of stuff 🤪 and I worked right until it was dark. I did have a short interlude when Shelley came over with Josh and Flo and we cooked sausages on the fire pit (Shelley moved a few barrows of wood chip for me as well)
Tuesday: Another busy one in the garden, I was going to move more woodchip but I was thinking while I was falling asleep last night that I needed to get the fruit cage in order so that I could woodchip in there. If I did all the paths around it first I would find it hard to push the barrow, so I spent the morning tidying, weeding, cutting back and repotting the blueberries and the yellow raspberries. I topped up all the pots with compost and added some pelleted chicken manure and some carbon at the same time. I did actually find a few raspberries 😁 only around 15 but still that’s a win. The raspberries have on the whole been terrible this year but there is a late flush, due to the weather I imagine and so I might get a few more before the weather turns.
I did plan to sit down after that but found I had more energy so I changed jobs and barrowed some of the homemade compost onto the smaller raised beds that John put in for me. I got three of them filled, added some carbon and covered them with membrane, they will stay like that until I either decided to plant into them for winter or leave them until spring. I have a lot of much smaller beds now which is time consuming at this end of the year but will be much easier to look after in the growing season hopefully.
I did get the dinner on first thing in the morning and got the ducks some clean bedding before I started all of that lol.
Wednesday: Another good lot of work in the garden today although I did sit down at 1.30 for a good hour or so, the more I do the more tired I feel the next day 🙄 But I feel like I am really getting somewhere and making good progress with the preparation which in turn will make next spring a lot easier hopefully. I started off in the greenhouse picking any remaining chillies and peppers then putting the plants outside, they will go in the compost bin when there is room. I cut all the lemon grass, took the tops to the rabbit and Guineas and kept the rest of the stems, some are for sale some I will find a use for. I also took one of the plants inside to overwinter along with another ginger plant. I dug up part of the horseradish, it has got huge and I don’t want it taking over, some of the root I put out for sale the rest I will grate and freeze. Next I fixed the side of one of the long beds, the wood had rotted and the side collapsed and then onto a fair amount of weeding. I picked all the remaining courgettes, they are small but still useable. All the while I was popping back and forth to the kitchen because I was baking bread. While I was waiting for the bread to cook I made a batch of tomato soup all with home grown ingredients, garlic, carrot, basil, tomatoes and a lovely red pepper. Back outside to get some more bits done before moving 4 barrows of woodchip. I think I earned the sit down lol.
All home brown ingredients for tomato soup, can’t show you the finished article because we ate it all up 😋
Thursday: Mostly busy indoors today which was unexpected, I was quite tired so I had already decided to potter today rather than get stuck into anything big. But the day didn’t pan out like that, Luke came to rebuild the end side of the building which is the undercover outer area, we had a discussion however an decided to completely remodel the whole thing 🤣
Friday: Gotta love Friday and especially a sunny one 😁 I got busy straight away with putting some bits up for sale to make room in the back covered area and then I started dismantling the worktop and anything around it in the area where the door will now be going. I also rang the surgery as I had notification from nhs vaccine that I need to get a third vaccine booked. There is some confusion over if this is the booster or a third primary vaccine but a bit of research showed that the booster is the same as the origin vaccine so I can’t see it makes much difference really except that I am then supposed to have a booster in six months time as well 🤷♀️ Luke is busy out the back opening up the new doorway and re fitting the doors, can’t believe we didn’t do it years ago it would have made much more sense lol. I have barrowed a few loads of woodchip as well today, if I do some every day then eventually I will get it done.
Lemon grass tea, full of antioxidants and goodness and so easy to grow in the UK
Saturday: Did a bit of pottering about first thing, I was waiting for someone to arrive who was coming to buy some equipment we were selling. They were a lovely young couple eager to get started on some land for their smallholding dreams, it was lovely to chat and show them around listening to their enthusiasm 😁 I totally forgot I had a loaf of bread proving mind you 🤣 all was not lost and after I had baked the loaf I went outside and cleaned the Guineas and quail. This was a big clean out ready for the coming winter months, mostly they get skipped out, that’s just the messiest bits clean up but this was a complete job for both pens. The quail often come inside for winter as they will keep laying then but I think this winter we will leave them out and they can rest from egg production. I put in fresh hay for the rabbit and cleaned out all the water and feed bowls. A quick bite to eat and a little sit down before going out to sort the light Sussex pen and the Turkey pen.
Sunday: Been busy today helping John do the side of the building, it coming along nicely now but still a fair amount to get done yet as always 😜
Thai chillies in various stages of drying outStill managing to harvest a few things though the summer veg is coming to and end now. The flower garden is still giving up its bounty, this has been one of the best decisions I have made, they brighten up the garden and the house 😁
The summer veg garden is almost finished but there are still things growing for winter, I have leeks in as well as kale and brassicas and winter lettuce.
As we have been redoing the side of the building I thought it would be a good idea to buy a bat box, we have plenty flying around at night and so a box seemed like a good idea. It all adds to the diversity of the wildlife we have here.
Monday 4th October 2021: A nice day for the best part, a little rain in the afternoon but only quick showers really. I had decided how my day was going to go and got on with things only to get a phone call from John at around 9am. The job he was starting this week and had gone to was cut short because the customer had received a phone call from the hospital to say they had tested positive with covid. John put his tools back in the van and came back home, that put paid to my peaceful day 🤪 he decided to stay home and so I got him working, not going to waste an unexpected opportunity like that 🤣 He burnt all the paper and cardboard rubbish that had mounted up and then did some tidying up of various areas. He did pop out again in the afternoon to a couple of small jobs.
Meanwhile I spent the whole day outside working on the veg garden. Firstly I did some picking, the tomatoes are still giving me plenty of lovely fruits, I had considered pulling them all up a few weeks back but I am glad I left them now. I picked a few of the last cucumbers, the plants have pretty much finished and the cues I picked were really only any good for the animals. While I was in the tunnel I decided to give it a bit of a tidy up, the weeds had grown again and mint has managed to find its way in too so I cleared all that. I will keep the mint, dry it and it will be used for the Guineas and rabbit over winter. I cleared one of the makeshift beds that had strawberry plants in, got some huge pots, filled them with compost and replanted some of the strawberry runners. Plenty of work left to do in there yet but the sun came out and it was quite warm in there so I left that and moved on to something else. I kind of floundered around a little doing bits of this and that before knuckling down to digging up the herbs from the herb bed. I am relocating that bed and it will be flatted and laid to lawn, more grass for the children to play on, less area that I have to work on. The herbs have been there for nearly ten years and the roots on some of them are huge, I have dug up what I can, divided and potted at lot of it up ready for when I decide where it will go. Some of the p,ants will be kept to go out for sale next year. That all took me up to around 5pm and I didn’t really stop except for a few tea breaks so a good days work there. Luckily it was bubble and squeak for Johns tea and I had cold lamb so not much preparation to be done for that.
Tuesday: Oooosh that was a lot of rain over night but not as much as other parts of the country have had and I just saw the forecast for the end of the week the temps are going up again to an unseasonable 20c 🙄🤷♀️ crazy days.
I had a good productive morning, I spent the first couple of hours clearing the small tunnel, all the tomato plants are now down, those plants were mostly finished, they were flowering again but I don’t think we will have temps that would help them to fruit successfully at this time of year. I planted the garlic chives in one of the beds instead of leaving it in the pot, hopefully they will continue to grow all through winter. Next it was the turn of the tomatoes in the big tunnel, there were still plenty of tomatoes on these. Some were ripe and some still green but I have got all of them off and have left them to ripen in the greenhouse. The tigerello tomatoes are definitely a type I would grown again next year, they are nice and fleshy and ideal for cooking with, produce well and have few problems with disease as far as I can tell.
The farrier was arriving at 11 and I worked right up to 10.45 when Sam arrived with the twins, I twinsat while she went and got the horses in, gave their tails and bit of a trim and waited while the farrier did his job then she put them back out in the paddock. They stayed until mid afternoon. The weather was on and off in the afternoon, rainy, sunny, rainy sunny so I did some inside bits and pieces. The lamb we had Sunday was a big joint and so there was plenty left even after John had bubble and squeak yesterday. Today I sliced it all up, put two lots in the freezer and saved a third lot to reheat with gravy for dinner tonight. The bone has gone into the slow cooker along with carrots, celery leaves, baby leeks and a bay leaf, also a bit of lemon juice. The lemon juice is the acidity needed to pull all the goodness from the bone to make broth, a delicious, nutritious way to use every last bit of the joint.
When John came home we organised getting the side of the building reclad, I say organised, what that consisted of is me taking control because John hasn’t done anything about it and then John interfering with what I was doing! Anyhow we now have the ball rolling, I just got to keep pushing it 😜
Wednesday: I spent a very pleasant morning in the garden, working mind you, but it was lovely and sunny and not too hot so I got on with things. At first I couldn’t decide what exactly I was going to get done but once I made decision I cracked on and didn’t stop until early afternoon. The bed that the herbs are coming out of is a very long bed and at the other end is where the rhubarb grows, before that is the asparagus bed and where all the strawberries have run riot, there is a pear tree and a chokeberry as well and somewhere in the middle are the courgettes I planted this year. I pulled off all the dying rhubarb leaves and weeded round them, then I weeded round the courgettes, cut down the asparagus fern (normally I leave them but want to get sorted this year so they have been cut down) after that it was the humongous task of taking out literally hundreds of strawberry plants and runners. They have really taken over and so I needed to thin them right out, buckets and buckets of plants went onto the compost heaps. I still want a fair few of them left to grow again next year, not for the strawberries particularly but because they grow well with asparagus and they make excellent ground cover, they also provide food and shelter for wildlife and I seem to get a great crop of pears each year with them growing underneath the tree. I worked on that until I found myself self resting more and more often, time for a break and some lunch. It may seem like such a waste with the plants going into the compost but honestly there are too many of them to do anything with, I have already planted up plenty of runners for next year both to plant elsewhere and to sell, you have to know when to stop lol.
Shelley called round with Flo before going to pick up Josh from school and then I hoovered through and cleaned the kitchen floor which I have been looking at for ages thinking I really must do that, well now it’s done 😁
Tonight I have my flower arranging group so I made sure I had everything ready to take, not really sure if I have enough or if I have the right things but I guess I will find out later. I am looking forward to it although a bit nervous about what I am supposed to produce 😂
Not a bad effort if I do say so myself 😁
Thursday: A perfect day for working in the garden all day which is exactly what I did. I spent the whole day weeding the veg beds, digging up what I didn’t need anymore, a whole lot more time on my hands and knees carefully picking out couch grass. I actually love weeding couch grass 🤣 I find it very therapeutic trying to get all the roots untangled from the soil. I feel like the beds are coming back into some sort of order now although there is still a lot of work to get through before I am finished. It helps that this year I have not been plagued with any Lupus flares 🤷♀️ no idea why but I am not complaining as it means I have been able to achieve a lot more than previous years. We had a couple of loads of type one delivered for the side driveway first thing this morning and I could have spent the day levelling it but nah I would rather garden instead. Twin sitting late afternoon means chaos and fun and then dinner and the day is over already.
Oooo I have been proper slack at writing this up this week, it’s Monday morning and I haven’t done it since Thursday! Mostly it’s because I have been pretty busy with one thing and another, I have done a fair bit of clearing in the garden, tidied out both my sheds so I can get in them and store stuff away for winter. I have also sorted out all the bird feeders and boxes ready for winter feeding and roosting for the wild birds, cut the grass, helped John with recladding the side of the building, been out twice for cake with both lots of grandchildren, cooked a Sunday roast for one of the families to join us in, moved the fencing for the horses so they can start to eat off the grass in a different paddock as they were getting a bit hungry, planted garlic, transplanted winter lettuce, been foraging for apples in the lanes around here, no wonder I haven’t had time to write anything 🤣
Must do better next week 🤪 Have a good one wherever you are x
Monday 27th September 2021: Autumn made itself known this morning, we have had sunshine and warm temperatures for a few weeks now but this morning we woke to windy, rainy weather and the temps are a tad lower than they have been. The sun did break through though and most of the day was nice apart from a sudden shower just after I put the washing out 😜
I have been busy today trying to catch up with jobs that I couldn’t do Friday and Saturday. Firstly though I had promised John a roast dinner so I got that all sorted, veg, potatoes all from the garden and beef from Emma, apples for an apple crumble from the garden as well. I had promised John apple pie but discovered I had no flour left, lucky I made some crumble mix for the freezer last week. Then I made some elderberry syrup with a batch I picked and put in the fridge last week, knocked it over as I was bottling it, swore, then mopped it all up, lucky I didn’t lose too much of it but it was a messy clear up job.
Once that was done I set about sizing up and ordering the last electric radiator we need, John took the last old one out of the living room and I need to get the new ordered and in before the cold weather sets in. After some lunch I went out to the greenhouse and potted up all the herbs I dug up yesterday, some will be for the relocation of the herb bed and some will be for sale next Spring. Back indoors and I had an hour sit down before making a couple of loaves of bread. I want to try and utilise the energy I am using as well as possible and so the bread making was timed to bake them while I am cooking the roast dinner and the crumble. I need to be more aware this winter, not having the Rayburn anymore is going to change how I have to do the cooking and drying the washing (yep the rain shower wasn’t helping today on that score) I don’t actually have to be energy efficient in terms of paying for it but I chose to do it for the sake of the planet, hopefully I am doing the right thing, it won’t always work but at least I am trying.
I put in an order at our local flour mill for different types of flour, plain, self raising and bread flour, that should arrive tomorrow and I also have a delivery of chicken, in various forms plus sausages and bacon from a farm arriving tomorrow as well. With all the problems around CO2 and now fuel John said ‘I think we should go shopping and stock up’ no we don’t need to do that I told him, we have enough here in one form or another to keep us going. I prefer to make sure we can manage with what we have rather than rely on the supply chains as they seem dodgy at the moment lol.
With that in mind I have been thinking ahead to Christmas, we are already being told there will be shortages, think laterally then, eat something different, it doesn’t have to be the same as every other year just because that’s what we usually do. I shall be checking over my stores etc and see what I can use as replacement ingredients for things like the Christmas pudding and mincemeat just in case we can’t find the usual ingredients, in fact I may not even look for the usual ingredients and use what I have which is the whole idea of a life of self sufficiency really.
Tuesday: Today I wanted to get the new project area planted up but I felt I needed to get the ‘must do’ jobs done first, that way I could enjoy the time doing what I wanted to get done. Mainly it was all the usual stuff and then some bill paying etc before finally getting outside to plant up. The area is in front of the dog kennels, they are no longer used and the plan was to take them down and build an arbour but as that is not an urgent job I can’t see it getting done anytime soon so I started growing things up the kennel instead 😜 The hop looked so lovely that I thought I would add some more bits to it and that’s when the plan formed. I had a big wooden box that my brother was getting rid of one day when we were visiting, I will have that please 😁 It’s been sat there a while but today I lined it all filled it with some well rotted manure and a few bags of compost and planted it up with a hydrangea I bought in the summer. Everything I used was something I already had, plants, box, manure, just the compost I bought to do the job. It looks good, the hydrangea is a bit lost at the minute but next year it should look brilliant if I do say so myself. I now have a wisteria, hop, climbing rose and a jasmine which will grow up and over the kennels, the hydrangea in the box along with some huechera and bronze grass, various pots with small trees in to give shade to the hydrangea in the afternoon and a pot of tulip bulbs which will add a lovely splash of colour come spring, I planted some small dahlias in the pot on top of the bulbs for now. I think I will move some pots of daffodils out there to at some point.
Next Spring this should all look lovely and colourful and a lot more full. A nice way to hide the dilapidated kennels 😁
Once I had finished that I had a quick sit down and then got on with other jobs. The beef we had yesterday was quite a good sized joint and I don’t want to waste any of it. I have used half of what is left, chopped it up and along with onion, swede, turnip, carrots and potatoes, added some beef stock, mustard powder, flour, black pepper, tomato purée, Pontack sauce, rosemary sprigs and a bay leaf and piled it into the slow cooker. Once it is cooked I will freeze it in portions for another day. I had a delivery of fresh, free to roam chicken in various forms, a couple of whole ones and then breast, thighs and diced plus some marinated strips as well as some pork chops, sausages and bacon. That all came from Blackwall Farm in Dorset, I sorted out what we would have for dinner later and got the rest sorted for the freezer. I am pretty much stocked for the next few months with everything really, I have flour coming form the local mill and I have 5kg of sugar delivered lol. Every time we go to the shop there is no sugar so I ordered some and will have to find a space to keep such a big bag.
I am not sure what I will do with the chicken thighs yet, I would have liked to make a korma with some but also don’t want to waste energy cooking two different meals as John won’t eat curry, maybe if I cook a big enough batch I can freeze some for another day 🤔
I did intend to go out and pick runner beans in the afternoon but the rain came in and didn’t really stop long enough to get out there, it is definitely turning towards autumn now, hopefully John will get the wall plastered tonight where he took the old radiator off and we can get the new electric one on, we might need it soon.
In the end I did decide to make a batch of curry, some for dinner tonight and some for freezing for another day. With Johns chicken I made a spring chicken pot lol, in autumn 🙄 It’s just basically chicken, potatoes and runner beans in veg gravy, I fried off onions and garlic then browned his chicken before taking it out with a few onions and then I added mine chopped along with tikka spices and a tin of tomatoes, smells good hopefully it will taste good. I think I have a garlic naan lurking in the freezer somewhere so I will have that instead of doing rice.
I do love the Autumn not just for the amazing colours but also because as the weather changes I love being in the kitchen cooking up lots of delicious dinners and treats, I was thinking I may even make a harvest loaf just because I can 🥰
And the rain has well and truly set in today 🌧 When that happens and I can’t go outside to get stuff done I generally browse online for ideas on many different things. Today’s ‘ooo I think I might have a go at that’ is homemade bouillon cubes, I have most of the ingredients already as I have made powered onion, garlic and mushroom, I have herbs I can dry and powder and I have paprika in the cupboard, the only thing I would need to buy is nutritional yeast flakes and voila I would have my own bouillon cubes which could be used in soups and stews etc or can be added to hot water for a tasty warm up drink in the winter, watch this space 😜 I am definitely a prepped at heart I think 😂 I was also looking to see if could make hazelnut flour, turns out you can 🤷♀️
Wednesday: A better day today, I did some picking, it’s getting fewer and further between now but there are still things to pick.
Thursday: Blood tests this morning so I got up and got on then out early to the docs, had my flu jab at the same time so that’s ticked off the list. John dropped me at the docs then went off to do a small job so I had a look round the charity shops and then had a coffee before he returned to pick me up. He is at home today and so has been plastering the wall that the old radiator came off, then drilling through the wall in order to get electric cable to where the new one will go, hopefully the electrician won’t take too long to come round 🙄 he then had to make good the floor and skirting and we will think about decorating in the new year, until then it will stay as it is . Meanwhile I pottered about tidying bits up and sorting the office area out but all the while being on hand as the labourer 😂 When he went off to get some more supplies I set about making some bouillon powder. I had all the dried herbs so thought I would give it a go, I just needed nutritional yeast flakes which arrived yesterday. Blended it all up and it’s now stored in a jar on the side for use whenever I need it. I tasted the powder and it tastes delicious so I think I will be drying more herbs and making bigger batches of that 🥰
Friday: Not a bad day, the sun was out but it was slightly colder than of late. I spent the morning in the greenhouse sorting out the chilli and pepper plants. A lot of them have all but finished now, still a few that are producing but in all honesty I don’t need any more than I have got stored and I only sell a tiny amount of them. Half of them I removed from the greenhouse, some have succumbed to whitefly and greenfly, half of them I have left in to finish off the fruits that are still growing. I moved all the trays and are moved the capillary matting as they don’t need constant damp now and besides I found an army of slugs and their eggs hiding under it 😜 I bought one of the ginger plants indoors to see if I can keep it going over winter so it has a good head start next year. The other one I will put in the poly tunnel and see what happens, it will depend on how cold the winter gets as to its survival. I have some seedlings growing in there which I need to pot on next week, some herbs, parsley, coriander and basil and also some winter lettuce which I need to plant up in the tunnel once it’s cleared of cucumbers and tomatoes. I also have some annuals already growing for next spring. Sam came over with the twins, Charlie popped in and then Shelley came with Flo, John was home as well so we had a houseful in the afternoon. 🥰
Saturday: Oh such a different day today lol, we knew it was coming 🙄 Before the rain broke through John cleaned out the ducks and geese and I did the quail, rabbit, light Sussex and turkeys, topping up all the pens and huts with fresh straw. Two reasons, one because as their minder you want them to be warm and comfy 😜 two because it will make the eggs less muddy in all this rain. I put a load of straw in the tortoise hut and placed them inside, they have been digging into the ground so are definitely getting ready to hibernate. Then I got the hop up and the apple picker and went out to pick the remaining apples from the cooking apple tree. To be honest I didn’t think there were many but in the end I got two bucketfuls so I am happy with that this year. Into the kitchen then where I chopped up a butternut squash and made some soup for lunch and I made a big batch of mincemeat ready to jar up and store for December when I will begin making mince pies 😁 John grouted the tiles in the living room, the electric radiator is now in place and the area round it made good just need an electrician to put a socket in. Apart from the necessary jobs of afternoon feeding and egg collecting I doubt very much we will do anything for the rest of the afternoon, just sit and relax I think.
Sunday: Not too shabby today although it feels colder, still some sunshine in the showers though. John was up early enough, surprising really as he went out last night for a pre wedding drink with the lads and had much more than one too many sherberts 🤣 While he was doing that I made bread, an apple pie and prepped for a roast later. That seemed to take me a lot of the morning as I can’t think I did much else other than peeling and mixing 🤪 Mid afternoon a chap called in to drop some honey off, the honey we had been selling has now finished but he is just down the road and had supplies and so we struck up a deal and now have more honey in the egg shed to sell 🥰
Home made mincemeat batch, 8lb and most of it will be gone by new year 😂
Monday 13th September 2021: The morning after the weekend before 😂 and while it took us a week to put up the hen do village it only took a couple of hours to take a lot of it back down. There is a lot left to remove and sort out mind you and that is mostly what I have been doing today. Sorting out all the things that have been borrowed from other family members, washing up plastic storage tubs to return, putting everything in piles for people to collect. That took up most of the day apart from Smallholding things I had to get done in between. Early evening John came home and we took down two of the tents ready to store and bought in as much as we could from the field to get it all in the dry because it is due to rain tomorrow.
When we were planning the hen weekend I wanted to make sure that as much as possible was eco friendly in one way or another. That meant either reusable, recyclable, biodegradable, compostable, begged and borrowed rather than bought new. Some things we had to buy but things like plates and cutlery were bamboo and wooden, doilies and wallpaper for table settings, lots of fresh greenery and flowers in with artificial ones that some of us already had, we did pretty well with that side of things I think but it is quite difficult to cover everything on a tiny budget. I often say that I don’t have any food left overs and we also did quite well in that department, this week will be one of only a couple of times a year I put it out, it is small but it is not full up. One of the reasons it has anything in at all is because I accidentally left a tub outside over night and didn’t want to risk using or freezing the meat and cheese that was in there even though it had a lid on.
Tuesday: Today I really needed to get out on the garden and get some picking done, not least because a customer had asked why there were no vegetables available lol. So I picked, cucumbers, tomatoes, courgettes, jalapeños, peppers, Thai chilli, runner beans and French beans. I am definitely going to save seed from the French climbing beans, they produce lovely long slender beans and because they grow upwards are much easier to harvest than getting down on the ground to pick dwarf beans 🙄 I sorted all the veg out and put out for sale anything I wasn’t going to use or prep for the freezer. I then went on to sort produce I had picked last week but hadn’t managed to get sorted, apples, pears and tomatoes mostly. Some were beginning to spoil or go soft so I made a batch of tomato soup and then some apple and pear butter which cooked in the slow cooker for about 6 hours. Chop up apples and pears, add maple syrup, cinnamon, ginger and a little bit of water, leave to cook on low and then whizz when it’s done. I put it into sterilised jars but it needs keeping in the fridge or freezing as it won’t store for more than three weeks in the fridge. Use to spread on toast or ice cream or in yoghurt, whatever you like really. The tomato soup is now in the freezer, another batch which will be lovely on a cold winters day. It absolutely poured day for a good part of the day so I spent most of the rest of the time indoors sorting stuff out, putting away, putting washing on, although that had to be tumble dried today 😕 Later in the afternoon Charlie came to pick me up and we went off for her final dress fitting, very exciting and it all looks beautiful. When I got back John was home and so he went out to feed the birds and collect eggs and then we shot off to get some shopping as I haven’t been able to get to the shop for over a week due to being busy with people coming and going here. Before we went we had to get the cage into the boot room and get Jill the cat safely shut in the cage as she is going to the vets tomorrow to be spayed, she isn’t impressed 🙄 but I don’t want to risk her disappearing like Jack did 😂 After shopping, dinner then John put the birds to bed while I jarred up the fruit butter and the tomato soup and popped them into the freezer.
Another batch of homegrown tomato soup.
I have so many jobs in the garden to get on with that I haven’t got round to yet, seeds to sow, plants to dig up, plants to pot up, plants to chop down, weeding, dead heading, rearranging the garden, I am trying to get a little bit done each day here and there and hopefully eventually it will.
Wednesday: Trying to think what I did first thing this morning lol, a fair bit of deadheading in the front flower beds as I haven’t done that for a few days. At some point John came home and we got the cat in a basket and she went off to the vets to be spayed. I fed the Guineas/rabbit and torts (mindful that they need a clean out but not sure when I am going to have time to do that) Still tidying up stuff from the hen weekend, oh yes that’s it, I was trying to get one of the tents down and packed up but the breeze was making it difficult by myself lol. Eventually got it rolled and then it was too big for the bag 🙄 had to get it back out in the evening and will try again tomorrow. The postman arrived with a special package, the painting of the paddock had arrived, painted by a chap called Duncan Ball https://m.facebook.com/duncanball.art/ It is lovely and such an amazing find by my neighbour 🥰
The cat was picked up mid afternoon and then I went to watch Josh get his yellow belt with a white stripe in his Martial Arts grading ceremony 🥰 Then when I got back we had to repack one of the tents that we had laid out earlier to dry the bottom off as it wasn’t quite dry enough. After that I went out and started getting up the flooring, I have a few people coming to get pieces of it so it will have another use instead of getting thrown away. By this time it was dark and so I went in and got something to eat before finally having a sit down. So many things to do, so little time to get them all done lol. I was hoping to get some seeds sown, annual flowers for next year and some spinach and parsley but that will have to wait for another day now.
Thursday: A Misty start to what turned into a lovely day. I started off with housework, I wanted to get the hoovering and polishing done and clean the bathroom as it was driving me nuts that I hadn’t been able to do it all week long. I let the ducks out around 10am and then went into the greenhouse and sowed some seeds. Annual flowers including Cerenthe Major and Californian poppies, I saved the seed from the latter, initially the seed came from Sarah Raven and I was so impressed with the quality that I have subsequently ordered from there again including the cerenthe. I also sowed some winter crops and herbs, dill, coriander, winter lettuce and corn salad. Then I went on to dig up some of the mint that has to come up from the herb bed I am going to move and after a spot of lunch and a sit down I went out to do some more tidying up in the paddock. It has taken me ages to clear things away, there was an army of people putting it up but mostly it has been me on my own until John gets home then we work until it’s dark getting more stuff put away. Every night this week we have worked until dark outside, then a bit more inside until bedtime, we have eaten snack food for tea because I haven’t had time to make anything. Tonight we had fish and chips and my sister and her hubby came over along with Shelley to get it knocked on the head. Hopefully tomorrow I just need to get the tents out to dry right off and it’s mostly then done. John keeps complaining I am grumpy every evening, that’s because I am hot and tired, ‘we’re not doing this again are we’ he said, exactly what was running through my head was the reply 🤣 we had a fabulous weekend but the clear up operation has taken its toll 😜 Due to the extra help this evening we have actually managed to sit down at 8pm whoop, whoop, probably fall asleep in the chair now.
Friday: Samantha’s birthday today 🥰 I had lots of jobs planned but in the end I spent around two hours wrestling with bell tents, trying to get the last bit of any moisture from the bottom and then the mammoth takes of trying and failing miserably to get them resembling the size and shape of the bag they came out of. Two hours of my life I won’t get back, two hours of sweating (had to do it in the sun, no choice there) and swearing profusely, two hours of wondering why I was the only donkey doing the job 🙄😜 I would have given myself the day off except I had forgotten to let the ducks out and it was now midday, I shall be glad when I can focus on this place entirely once again 🥰
Most of the rest of the paraphernalia finally got picked up which means I will be able to let the geese back out again, I couldn’t do it while there was stuff still around as they like to nibble at everything just to see if it’s tasty or not 😜 We went over to see Sam early evening and then back again before dark to put every to bed.
Saturday: Whoop, whoop we finally got to the spa weekend, up shower, pack my bags and off in the car with Sam, Shelley and Charlie for a lovely relaxing time and treatments at a spa in Malvern. I left John in charge 😁
Sunday: Arrived home at lunchtime, I have no idea what went on while I was away but all seemed fine on my return and that’s the main thing. John has been busy cleaning out the birds and tidying some parts of the front. The cat is looking well after her op, the sun is shining and I feel very rested and relaxed, ready to start another week with renewed energy tomorrow, as for the rest of today, I am still in chill mode 🤣 so probably won’t get anything else done.
I was sat outside watching and listening to the bees buzzing round all the asters, it is literally swarming with them which is fantastic. I need to photograph as many different types as I can so I know what is visiting.
I have been fairly preoccupied with the recent events and we now have a good few weeks before the wedding itself so I should have more time to focus on the Smallholding and a bit more in depth blogging (it’s been a bit sparse 🙄) Have a great week and hopefully this lovely sunshine will continue a bit longer 🥰
frieslandfarm (flowers) 