Monday 5th April 2021: Bank Holiday Monday and you couldn’t have got a more different day than yesterday 😂 Yesterday we were basking in good temps with wall to wall sunshine and today there is a cold North wind and it actually snowed at one point! To be fair I am writing this at 4.30pm the sky is blue the sun is shining and it is not too bad but the chill in the wind is noticeable 🥶 We started off the day and the week with the usual morning rounds and jobs, I lit the Rayburn at around 8.30am as we didn’t light it yesterday and it was a bit chilly. John got the tractor out and was levelling the drive again although he tells me he is now happy with it, it had a few lumps and dips which he has now sorted out. Meanwhile I spent the morning doing a bit of pirate sewing 🏴☠️. I have sown pirate bunting, pirate cushion covers and a pirate table cloth. The sewing skills needed were not great, pinking shears eliminate the need turn over material, fairly basic but overall a good job done for the pirate ship and the grandchildren when they come to play. The rest of the day was spent doing not much at all really, we popped over some strawberry plants to my niece and had a cuppa with my brother and his wife. Then we went to the green with Shelley, Martin, Josh and Florence so that Josh could show us his bike riding skills 🚲 and then back home to do the egg rounds and water the greenhouse and poly tunnels. It is amazing how hot they are even though it’s cold outside, all it takes it the sun and they warm up massively, the greenhouse regularly reaches 30c on a sunny day.
Tuesday: Brrrr that cold wind is here still and it is positively Baltic out there we even had snow flurries again 🥶 John did the animals and then went off to do a mornings work, I found inside jobs to get on with as I didn’t fancy being out there today. I set about cleaning the kitchen and putting stuff away, throwing out of date stuff away, mostly stuff with 2016/17 dates on them 😂 Cleaning the tiled walls down as I went round, looks a whole lot brighter and less cluttered now. John came home late morning just as I was with a customer who was buying hens. He spent most of the afternoon doing something on the tractor though I am not sure exactly what 🤷♀️ I spent the afternoon making cards, the ones I had made and put in the shed all sold so I needed to restock and I might as well stay in the warm and do that. I lit the Rayburn at lunchtime as it was cold in here, no point freezing our nuts off just for the sake of it, I am here so I can keep feeding it every hour or so.
Late afternoon John came in and a delivery arrived, a gel topper for the mattress, John finds the memory foam too hot and I am inclined to agree so after talking to my sister about it we ordered this gel topper. She has one and says it is great, it’s supposed to disperse the heat more evenly, we will find out if it works 🙄
I discovered that John had been removing ivy from the hedge at the back, the trees and shrubs are being choked by it and a lot of them have died. It is a job that is on the to do list, it’s a big job though as there is a falling down stone wall, barbed wire, dead trees, lots of ivy and broken fencing, it is not a quick fix job but it is one that you can take up or leave whenever you want.
Apart from the afternoon rounds and egg collecting that is pretty much it for the day, not much going on outside in these temperatures 😜
Wednesday: Oooooo that was cold last night, we had thick snow flurries mid evening and the temps must have gone down to around -4 overnight. Everywhere was covered in a hard white frost this morning, John did the rounds and then went off to do a mornings work, I got sorted indoors and then out to feed the Guineas and check the torts. Billy was in the hut and Voldertort had dug himself into the ground 🙄 it should be milder from here on in but you never know. I came back in and got some household bits done and I lit the Rayburn, then I spent a good hour looking thorough seasonal recipes so I can make good use of the things I am growing.
To be honest I haven’t done much else today 🥴 I always feel a bit guilty at the end of the day if I haven’t done much but sometimes I think it’s a case of recharging batteries. I did watch the seaspiracy documentary that is a hot topic at the minute, shocking, is the word. We don’t eat a lot of fish but will be eating a lot less now if any at all, if you haven’t seen it then as a consumer you really should 🙄 I watched it with an open mind, I am aware that this kind of reporting is often driven by the vegan section of society but it is undeniably bad even if you only think it’s half true.
Mid evening and still light, looking out of the back door I can see the two cats (that are usually so lazy they don’t go far from the food bowl) down in the hedge line stalking rabbits 😂 They have just got into their hunting stride, last week John said “did you put a dead mouse in the cats bowl”, why he would even think that is something I would do I have no idea! They had caught a shrew and bought it in and put it in to the bowl themselves 🤣
Thursday: Slightly warmer today in a cold sort of way 😜 if the sun had come out it would have been lovely but there is still a chill in the air. John did the morning rounds while I did the indoor bits, he went off to do a quick job in the village while I then did a few outside bits. When he came back we went off to get a bit of shopping from the local market, back home to put stuff away and then over to see Sam and the children and give her a bit of a hand if necessary.
When we got back from the market the sheep from the next field and got past their fencing, through the hedge and were stood inbetween that and our new fence lol, it took the first one a minute or two to work out how to get back but the second one took decidedly longer to work it out 😋
Back from Sams, lit the Rayburn then an afternoon of sorting out Johns van insurance which should have taken two minutes online except it wouldn’t recognise the email address even though they had emailed to that exact address 🙄 unbelievable sometimes. That then took half an hour to do it over the phone 😂 John went off to do another small job this afternoon while I sorted out some online payments and ordered the third electric radiator, this one is for the kitchen. We are getting to the stage that the Rayburn only needs to be lit for a couple of hours, unless it’s really cold, so if we slowly install the electric rads we can begin to use them just to take the chill off the air. We do have to sort out the back door as you can see daylight through it and so that’s not cost effective but we will get that done soon as well.
The blossom is beginning to be noticeable all around the place and the leaves on the trees are also bursting into life. Unfortunately if the old saying is to be believed we have Ash before Oak here which means a wet summer ahead 🙄 Oak before Ash just a splash, Ash before Oak expect a soak, time will tell.
Friday 😀 After doing the morning rounds we spent the rest of the morning doing the pirate ship. I have swept it out and put fairy lights up high in there, I have put the cushions and bunting and table cloth in and hung up some paper parrots. John and I then found some Perspex and put that in the windows, this will stop the wind blowing in and the leaves, make it feel a bit more like a playhouse and hopefully the children will get to play in there this summer.
We came in at lunchtime to the sad news that Prince Phillip had died 😞 I know there were lots of varying opinions on him but he was someone’s husband, father, grandfather and great grand father and they will miss him dearly. He was the Queens Consort, not an easy job by any means, he devoted his life to supporting her and in turn everything she stood for, RIP
After a quick lunch John went off to look at a job and I planted the broad beans plants finally, as well as the Oca. I had to be very quick with the beans as the chickens could smell the Earth I dug for the holes and were there quick as a wink! I managed to get them in and cover them with hoops and netting though I had wanted to get some mulch round the bases but there was no way I would fend them off in time 😂 I can do that another day but at least they are now in. I had a few spare plants and where one or two garlic did not appear I have used the gaps up and put some in between and a couple of rows at the end of the garlic bed. Should be interesting to see if the garlic keeps the blackfly off of the bean plants.
Guess what, broadband and phone line issues again, this is ridiculous I think I will be going to ofcom this time 😡
Saturday: Still cold, not as cold as it has been but still no sign of the sun which we really need this time of year to get the veg plants going. After all the various morning stuff that needs to be done John went off to get feed and I went out into the veg garden. The planting and sowing really ramps up from here on in and this morning I have sown red onion sets. I will have a cracking haul of onions, shallots, garlic and leeks for winter storing hopefully. I then went into the greenhouse to do some pricking out, I have a mix of veg and flower seeds growing and this morning I have pricked out a couple of trays of achillea (summer berries) and I have also sown some celeriac and lemon grass seeds as well as some ginger roots but as I said we really need a bit of warmth soon for those to start growing. The lack of heat also means that the tomato and pepper plants that have come up are not able to move from the propagator to the bench yet, it’s just a tad too cold. I have cucumbers, melon and squash plants all coming on which also need to move out from under cover onto the benches, hopefully any day soon we will feel the temps rise. We also have a lack of rain at the moment 🙄 I can’t recall the last time it rained properly, at least a couple of weeks ago, it is the way things go sometimes and you can never know what kind of spring you are going to get so even the best laid plans get scuppered.
While I was in the greenhouse I was listening to the radio as always and the topic was the ship that blocked the canal holding up all the freight. It got round to the subject of self sufficiency of the country and if we ought to look into becoming more self sufficient 🤔 hmmm let me think, hell yes! I actually can’t believe that it is not on the ‘must do’ list, it is not rocket science is it 🤷♀️ if we produced as much as we could here that would give us food security and help the environment at the same time, why it is not happening as a matter of urgency I don’t know. I would have thought that the pandemic would have taught us big lessons in that department, it seems that we haven’t even felt the ripple effect that will be caused by the ship jam yet, I wonder what kind of panic buying that will result in, we will find out in a few weeks time 🙄
We have lived through history in the making over the last year and today we witness another at midday, a 41 death gun salute to HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, a very rare salute to witness especially as it was coordinated right across the UK and Gibraltar as well as HM ships at sea.
Just when I have stated the lack of rain situation we had a little shower, not much but enough to wet the ground which is all we need really 😀
Sunday: I hope we get a better second half to April than the first half, it’s been bloody cold today. At times the sun has made an appearance and it was nice, cool but still nice, but when it disappeared behind clouds the temperature plummeted and at one point it was trying to snow! After doing the morning jobs I went out into the greenhouse to get some bits done but after an hour I had to come back in as my feet were frozen and I haven’t been able to warm up all day. I did get a few things done in there, some rearranging, I sowed some more squash seeds and split and potted some pheasant grass I had growing. In the front I have resealed the bird bath hopefully with some success, it had a crack through it and before I try putting something in it I wanted to see if I could seal it.
I am struggling to function today because I am feeling the cold, I know that is a pathetic statement lol but it’s true. I think I am primed and ready for some warm spring days and they are not forthcoming and so I have gone into idle mode 🤣 I am currently huddled on the sofa, John meanwhile is busy outside tidying his van 🙄 I am literally shivering, hope I am not coming down with anything except ‘whereisspringitis’ 😜
Have a great week, a little more normality is creeping in, this week coming I am having a haircut and a massage whoop whoop, other shops will be open so we have a bit more choice when it comes to buying birthday presents 😜and the pub gardens will be open, not that I want to sit out in the freezing cold 🤣 one step closer to total freedom hopefully.
I think I will start a running list of what I have growing, what I am planting and what I am picking:
- In the greenhouse:
- Tomatoes
- Peppers
- Chilli
- Butternut Sqaush
- Banana sqaush
- Courgette
- Crown Prince
- Pumpkins
- Cucumber
- Basil
- Garlic chive
- Melon
- Runner beans
- Dwarf French beans
- Sweetcorn
- In the cold frame
- Peas
- Mangetout
- Swede
- Turnip
- Beetroot
- Planted up outside
- Broad beans
- Onions
- Garlic
- Shallots
- Oca
- Carrots
- Potatoes
- In the tunnels
- Lettuce
- Baby spinach
- Rocket
- Spring onions
- Radish
- Flat leaf parsley (already growing from last year)
- Already growing and harvesting
- Purple sprouting broccoli
- Leeks
- Rhubarb
- Asparagus (just starting to come through)
Not included on any of those lists are perennials such as herbs, sage, mint, lovage, thyme, oregano. Nor any of the fruit bushes, raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, gooseberry, blackcurrant, blackberry, Logan berry, chokeberry, olive, fig. And then there are the top fruit trees, apple, pear, plum, apricot, peach, cherry.
I will keep adding to the lists as I remember as I am sure I have missed a fair few things out already. The lists will change as I move things around and plant up but they will give me an idea of what I have and what I need to be doing such as getting on with sowing the runner beans 😀
frieslandfarm (flowers) 