shilton – Page 15 – frieslandfarm (flowers)

Foggy weather, human lockdown lifted, avian lockdown imposed 😖

Posted on December 6, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 30th November 2020: Monday again 🙄 a good Monday this week as we come out of the second lockdown so by Thursday things will feel fairly normal again hopefully. The infection rate has decreased by a third over the last couple of weeks which is good news but we are still not out of the woods yet, when they start to roll out the vaccine we will be on the up and up 🤞

It’s still foggy this morning but it’s fairly mild, it doesn’t feel too cold at all out there. I did the morning rounds, let everything out, fed and watered everything collected the duck eggs, not much to report on that front.

Did a fair few bits indoors, routine stuff really, washing, cleaning out the fridge, clean the boot room. I lit the Rayburn about 12.30 as it felt a tad cold and John called in for some lunch about 1pm, I had FaceTime chats with Sam and Shelley in the afternoon, a bit of reading and then it was time to go out and feed/collect the eggs. I was reluctant to go out, it was nice and toasty inside but actually it wasn’t too bad at all. John was home before 4pm so he will be shutting the birds away tonight, lovely 😊 it’s a bit of a pain having to go back out so soon after the feed rounds especially when I am trying to get the dinner sorted for the evening.

I have looked at the weather forecast for the end of the week after Samantha mentioned it was going to get cold, looks like we might even get some snow ⛄️

Tuesday 1st December: White rabbits 🐇 This morning if I stood in a particular place in the kitchen I could see the moon through the back door and the emerging sunrise through the front window, it was pretty cool 😀

It’s the first day of December and the radio has back to back Christmas songs this morning 😏 I am not a fan of starting too early with the festive stuff, my tree will not go up for another couple of weeks, if I put it up now I would be bored of it by the time Christmas arrives not to mention the dust that will accumulate on the baubles 😂 I did buy an advent calendar this year a chocolate one which is normally something I refuse to do, I prefer the old fashioned ones with a picture behind the door lol, but this year is different and we do need a little bit of cheer, however I forgot to get it out this morning before John went to work so looks like he will have to go second this year 😜

This morning I did the rounds as per usual and all is well. Then I finally got round to getting the heat mat on in the greenhouse, this means I have to run an extension cable to it. With hindsight we should have dug out and put a cable underground but at the time I had no intention of using electric in there. Now however I have changed my mind (a woman’s prerogative ya know 😜) and if I want to keep certain plants alive over Winter then needs must. We had a chat last night with a local company about solar PV and battery storage and hopefully that will be something we install next year so in theory we will be creating our own electric to run the greenhouse and the house itself.

I then spent a large part of the morning doing some crafting, I have plenty of buttons to use and so along with some recycled card I have been making cards as well as gift tags. It’s fun and different to something I would normally be doing although I was proving and baking a loaf of bread at the same time 🥰

Wednesday: A beautiful sunrise this morning it was positively glowing through the windows.

It went from orange to pink, just beautiful.

It is National tree week this week, there are lots of initiatives to get people planting trees, visiting trees or pledging to nurture trees. I have said before, there are not enough trees in this country purely from personal experience there is not enough shade and if the climate hots up we are going to need that shade. Over the years we have planted about 20 new trees here that have successfully taken and a few that haven’t but even on our five acres that’s a drop in the ocean, we still have room for plenty more. I like to plant trees that are either productive or native but now and again there is room for a non native decorative tree. I have a few trees in pots, some that I know where they will be going and some that I have no idea about yet but I will find a place for them eventually.

Today is the first day out of lockdown but we are straight into the tier system and we are tier two. That means we can pretty much do everything except visit inside others homes, the pubs and restaurants are open for table service meals, the beauty industry is open again, the non essential shops are open as are many other services and events as long as they are covid secure. Just think, this time last year we had no idea what was coming, our existence is fragile, though as a species we think we are top of the tree. We have watched politicians try to pick their way through the crisis and be slammed with criticism whatever path they took. At first people were concerned about the health of their friends, family and neighbours, then that kind of wore off and they were worried more about the economy and finally about their freedom. It’s a funny mix, from where I stand I’m not too worried about the economy but I don’t have a young family and a mortgage otherwise I might think differently. I sit on the fence with the rules really, on the one hand I follow them on the other hand I think ‘you don’t own me and I am capable of making intelligent decisions for myself’ no good getting irate about it all, it is what it is and they are doing what they think is the best for everyone. The first vaccine has been approved today so here begins the road to normality, not that I think our normality is a good thing, it’s not, the all consuming, regurgitating species that we are will definitely be the downfall of this planet, if something else doesn’t get us first that is 🙄 It should have been a wake up call but it just became an inconvenience.

Did the mornings rounds, it is chillier than I thought it would be out there, definitely felt a nip in my fingers, should have worn gloves definitely will tomorrow. I came in and rang the surgery, I am still waiting for the results of my bloods, I called yesterday as I hadn’t heard anything, still with the doctor, I called today and still with the doctor. What does that actually mean I asked, it means the receptionist can’t see the results as the doctor either hasn’t looked at them yet or is reviewing them. I am hoping that means he has been in touch with my Rheumatologist to figure out what to do, either that or the results are fine and carry on as before needs no rushing, however it would be nice to know 🙄

I am going out for a coffee this morning, because I can, it will be nice to see other human beings even if my tolerance of them is low 😂 I used to think that I would like to be living on a remote island somewhere away from civilisation but in fact this years episodes have shown me that I am not a hermit and I do like small, well tiny interactions with my species after all 😜

I really need to find some recipes for duck eggs, we have loads of them, they sell much more slowly than the chicken eggs and the ducks have been laying well consequently I have about seven dozen to do something with 🤣

I have been making more cards today after I had an order for 10, then another order for 10, I figured I’d better get on and make some. I am finding it very addictive and rather wish I had somewhere I could leave it all out so that when I had a spare hour I could just sit and do them.

I did the afternoon rounds and collected the eggs, I will be glad when they don’t have to go out at 4pm as this will give me a little bit of leeway on my time and what I can get done.

John came home with a bag full of biscuits p, he had been to do a job where the lady makes them, it started as a hobby apparently and now she takes orders for them, there is hope for my card empire yet 😜

Thursday: Did the morning rounds in the rain 🌧 it was too bad it’s not pouring just raining 😝 It mostly went the same as every morning except one of the little light Sussex chicks was not well. I have been watching it for a couple of days and yesterday it was still eating fine although a little static at the end of the day. This morning it was obviously in trouble, I guess the cold nights didn’t help, I scooped it up and bought it in, gave it some sugar water but I could tell it was too far gone and so had to dispatch it. They can go down very quickly, with lots of fluffed up feathers it’s easy to miss the signs of wasting underneath but this one had got quite thin. Neck dislocation is a very quick and precise method of dispatch and one I have been doing for over twenty years now so I am proficient, never a nice thing to do but often the kindest. It was a lot smaller than the others that hatched at the same time so I am guessing there was something wrong with it from the start, sometimes it can take weeks or even months to become evident.

Samantha came over to get the horses in, it is wet and cold and we are supposed to have snow/sleet showers tomorrow so they can come in for a bit of a break and a warm up especially Biscuit who is getting on and we all know how you feel the cold the older you get.

I spent a few happy hours making more cards as I have sold all the ones I made so far 😀 it’s fun, I enjoy doing it and it’s a job in the warm 😀 In-between making them I did the afternoon rounds and was supposed to do the shutting away but John was home in time so I carried on card making while he went out and did it instead bless him.

Friday: Busy couple of hours first thing this morning, the horses came in overnight and that adds to the job list, they need feeding, watering and skipping out (removing the poop) Jack will probably go back out later today as he is not too happy at being in but depending on the temperature Biscuit will stay in a little longer. The rest of the rounds were done without incident and John was here to take charge of another eight tonne of topsoil for the raised bed which is now full I am pleased to say. Charlie popped over before going to work to collect a card order that I made for someone at her work and bought me a juice of carrot, celery and ginger, lovely. I am having Florence this morning as part of the essential child care we are allowed to do, Shelley can now work again and there are a lot of clients on the waiting list, so I said I would look after Florence while she gets some of the back log sorted.

Went for a walk with Florence, first to the post box to post a letter, I have to fill in a sheep and goat inventory annually even if I don’t have either at the moment, then we carried on down to the village Ford where there is a Christmas tree in the middle of the water, then all the way round church lane w

The announcement came yesterday that as from 14th December all poultry and captive birds must be housed so that the wild birds cannot get near them. This is essentially lockdown for the birds, so we are not the only ones with a virus rampaging. Last time this happened we were not prepared, I had never had to do it before and we were caught off guard. The things we put in place turned out to be awful (tarpaulins covering the runs) it was wet and muddy and a disaster. This time we are on top of the game 😀 we have enough spare stables to house all 90 laying hens plus outside pens that can be closed off and netted, they have solid roofs already. The weekend will be all about preparing, moving, and cleaning out. I feel bad for Ted as he is a big bird but his pen is fairly large, he is in the big rabbit run which is 10ft square probably bigger guessing measurements is not my forte 😜 I want to move the big guinea hut he out of there and put the single pig somewhere else but not sure where just yet. The quail are already in the back area under cover. That just leaves the ducks and the geese, the ducks could go in a stable once the horses go back out and if we needed it back they would have to go back outside. The geese however are more of a problem, they are big birds and they eat grass as their staple diet, they will be confined to the small back paddock for the time being. We also have to have foot dips which have to be used before entering any pen, run, stable block, oh the joys of poultry keeping. I seriously wonder if it is really worth the effort sometimes 🤔

Afternoon rounds included turning Jack back out into the paddocks and moving Biscuit into Jacks stable because it’s bigger than hers. Then put the birds all to bed and off to get a bit of shopping. When we got back and after we had eaten we booked a holiday 😀😀😀😀😀😀 it’s not until 2022 mind you but boy it feels good to have something to look forward to 🥰

Saturday: Turned the alarm off last night so not such an early start today. John did half the rounds while I did the other half and sorted out Biscuit. The next job was cleaning the flue although it has been burning clean and didn’t need much doing, I definitely can’t wait for electric heating next year though. A few more odd jobs to get done and then it was time to go and pay our respects to a friend on his last journey 😢

Unexpected things that happen in life give you cause to evaluate what really is important and what are the things that would not matter if they were gone. It is important to enjoy whatever it is you have decided to do, the small things and the bigger things, if you are not loving it then change it, you only get one go at this life make the most of it.

We met one of our new neighbours over the road today they moved in about a week ago so that was nice.

Sam came over in the afternoon to check Biscuit over, she definitely is not keeping herself as warm as she ought to be which is worrying really, could be something major going on. The vet will be coming soon to rasp Jacks teeth so we can get them to give her a look over and see what they think. I am no expert but I think by the way she puffs a bit and the fact she is not staying warm it’s going to be her heart but I might be wrong, when she goes back out she will be having a rug on this year.

Sunday: Suddenly realised its mid evening and I haven’t signed this week off yet 🙄 We did the morning rounds and then John moved a load of timber that was stacked in front of the stable we were going to use for the third lot of hens. Meanwhile I did a few other little bit and pieces, I went to have a looked and we realised that the stable would not be secure enough from the fox and we would also have to put up netting to stop the hens escaping, so we went to plan b. We will use the stable that Biscuit was in as that is secure, it means that John moved all the timber for nothing but hey Ho sometimes it goes like that. After that we went out for breakfast, yay finally we can go out to eat on our way back we picked up the Christmas tree which we bought from the farm in the village. It won’t be going up just yet but at least we have it ready. The weather was foggy, grey, drizzly and a tad cold so we decided not to do anymore outside work today, we watched a couple of films instead, that’s what Sunday afternoons are for isn’t it lol.

Friesland Farm

Foggy, frosty & freezing brrr, Winter has arrived.

Posted on November 25, 2020November 29, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 23rd November 2020: An atmospheric foggy morning this morning and it had been cold enough overnight for a frost. It’s almost noon and I haven’t stopped this morning until now. With the mornings getting ever darker I said to John that I would take over the morning feeding etc so that he can get off to work on time so this morning was my first for a long time that I have done everything. Feed and water all the animals, clean out the ducks, fill up the wild bird feeders, put the washing on, get the milk in, take the rubbish and empty milk bottles out, you get the idea. I got a chicken out of the freezer yesterday for tonight’s dinner and so I figured as I was going to have the oven on I might as well make good use of it. At the moment I have bread on the second prove and two cakes in the oven and some fruit stewing ready for the crumble topping I also made, busy busy.

One of the cakes was a simple quick fruit cake the second was a honey and ginger cake which is lovely. The reason I made this one is because it used natural yoghurt and I had some that needed using up, win, win, it’s a River Cottage one and I would definitely make it again. It’s light not heavy, not too much sugar in it so not too sweet.

The only thing I didn’t use was the cloves, not sure I would like that and I know for sure John wouldn’t 😜

A foggy, finger nipping start to the week this morning.

Watching Countryfile last night I was pleased to see a section on hedgerows and how important they are to our wildlife. Trees, we know are hugely important but not many people think about hedgerows, these are wildlife corridors and when they were ripped out for the war effort that was a tragedy, a necessary one admittedly but there should have been provision to put them back in at a later date. I listen in polite horror when people talk about ripping them out to get a better view, of what, the next field, the wildlife and the hedgerows beyond? oh the irony of it 😏 Anyway I am glad that this topic has been bought firmly to the fore and hope that many thousands of miles of hedge get planted in the future. Hedges are great windbreaks, they are micro climates for thousands of insects and ideal nesting and roosting places for our native birds. Someone once said to us when we moved here ‘you should take out that row of trees so your view is better’ that’s a row of hazels they were talking about, its a native small tree/hedge that provides food and shelter for a plethora of wildlife, Humans 🙄

Last night we got two lots of the hens in from the paddock and also moved the light Sussex to the outdoor pen so that made feeding a bit easier this morning. We crated up the first lot just as dusk arrived, 19 in that hut, we then crated up the second lot, 10 to a crate, it was heavy pushing the wheelbarrow with two crates so we left one in the field while we took the other. When we got back they had escaped and we had to load them all over again, luckily when they got out they just went back into the hut as it was dark by this time, there was about thirty of that second lot, can’t precisely remember the number but roughly. The light Sussex we rounded up easily and we have 9 of those well 11 actually but the other two live with Ted 🙄 I counted the front lot this morning when I let them out and there are 36 of them, just over 100 in total and we are only getting about 48 eggs a day, some of them are free loading 😂

Fabulous news of an effective vaccine from Oxford University today, very proud to be Oxfordian born and bred, Oxford University Hospitals are our local hospitals and we are incredibly lucky to have world class services provided by them 😀

Looks like we will come out of lockdown into a tiered system again, still no definite idea of what we are allowed to do for Christmas though but all non essential shops and businesses can now open again so at least they will get their Christmas trade. The numbers of infected people are falling and so are the deaths but that’s because we have been in a lockdown, what will happen over the next couple of months is anyone’s guess, still, with a few vaccines looking promising there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Tuesday: An altogether different morning this morning, much milder and the sun was shinning first thing though it has disappeared now. It was shinning beautifully on the hazel tree outside the back door, the leaves were glowing golden 😀

I did the morning rounds, feeding and letting out, collecting the duck eggs, today I have all three shifts to do, morning, evening and putting to bed as John has a job he wants to get finished, normally he is home in time to put them away.

I went into the small tunnel to water the carrot seedlings, I was hoping we would have carrots for Christmas but something keeps eating the tops off 😏 a mouse I suspect, honestly you think it would be a simple enough thing to do but others have different ideas. I am not sure what to do really, I don’t want to trap it but I do want my carrots 🙄

I ordered some roots trainers for the sweet pea but they took ages to arrive so I potted them up, two days later the root trainers came 😜 so I may start off an early batch of eating peas in them and see how that pans out. Again it’s the little critters that are the problem, they love pea and bean seeds and I think there is a mouse in the greenhouse too as the sunflower seeds I spread out to dry also got eaten 😖 I think I will have to trap as at this rate I will end up with nothing.

I haven’t decided what I will do today but I have plenty of choices, it’s mild enough to be outside working, I have left over chicken to use and make into soup or pie or both and I need to go through the presents I have bought and see what else I need to get, that last one can wait for a rainy day I think 🤔

Lyra Silvertounge is not the only one who wants to know about dust! Apologies to anyone who isn’t watching ‘His dark materials’ as you won’t have a clue who that is but I would also like to know where all the bloody dust comes from! I know the wood burner is probably a big culprit and the low winter sun shining in doesn’t help but seriously 😩

In the end I decided to sort the presents and see what I still need to get and then as I figured I hadn’t really done much I ought to go for a walk and get some exercise. I also spent far too long looking for some new lampshades for the living room online 🤪 I made up for it when I got back as I got the dinner sorted for this evening, lit the Rayburn, fed the birds, collected the eggs, sorted them and put them out and then went back out to put the birds to bed once it was dark. My new book by my fav author arrived hot off the press today so I have that to look forward to reading but first I am part way through another one so I need to finish it, that’s what the dark winter nights are for, that hot chocolate 🥰

Wednesday: Is it only Wednesday 😏 the weather is horrible this morning, raining and wet underfoot, I have already had my first soaking of the day even my knees are wet! It probably won’t be the last time I get wet either if it rains all day I have another two lots of rounds to do later but for now at least everything is fed and watered 😀 I have left the front lot of hens in this morning, I will let them out later, I want to see exactly how many eggs they are laying and if any of them are laying elsewhere such as the hedgerows etc. I will have to repeat this for a few days as they can hold onto their eggs if they are not getting to their favourite laying sites.

Meanwhile I have come in and I am having a well deserved coffee now, I took a photo of the hazel tree outside the back door, it’s the same one that was shinning golden yesterday and today looks wet and forlorn. The three photos are Monday, Tuesday and today just goes to show exactly how changeable our weather is here in the UK and justifies our obsession with talking about it don’t you think?

I really should have done outside work yesterday but I didn’t and so now I have missed that opportunity nevertheless I still went round and checked a few things. The carrots that are having the tops nibbled, the oranges which are still ripening and the onions and garlic I planted. I am pleased to say they all have little green shoots, the shallots have multiple shoots and only about five of them came out of the ground, they are now firmly back in place. The cauliflower plants are also being nibbled, urgh the struggle is real, I am still thinking mice as they are under cover and just the nice green leafy bits have been eaten, I need to rescue those otherwise they won’t produce anything at all 😏

I indulged myself with an hour or so of reading this morning but then I thought I really ought to do something.

If we dont have our own chicken in the freezer I buy organic or high welfare chicken direct from other farms. These are expensive compared to the mass produced ones from the supermarket but I prefer to know that what I am eating has had a decent life. We are probably talking at about £12-£15 a bird, what! I hear you cry, but for that reason alone I make sure I get every last bit of use from it that I can. From the roast chicken we had on Monday John has taken chicken sandwiches two days in a row and there is a bit for tomorrow’s sandwich as well. Last night John had chicken casserole and I had cold chicken with baked potato and salad, today I have taken the carcass apart and any spare meat has gone into a pan with leeks and vegetables, stock and thickener and is basically a chicken pie filling although I am going to put mashed potatoes on the top much like a shepherds pie. We will have that tonight for dinner and there is a spare single portion that I will freeze for another day, the carcass is now in the slow cooker along with celery, onion, garlic, bay, parsley and black pepper which will make a tasty chicken stock that I can freeze for another day. It doesn’t end there though as I peeled off all the remaining skin and this will be fed to the dogs later, all that will be left is the bones. So that is seven portions of a decent sized meal, three lots of sandwiches and stock, if you only counted the main meals that works out from a £15 bird at £2.15 per person, very good value indeed I reckon, but you have to work at it 😀

This afternoons jobs were a bit of a clock watch game, I had decided not to light the Rayburn until late because it was fairly mild and didn’t feel cold indoors. The problem came when the first go at lighting it failed, I had primed it with a natural firefighter, kindling and wood and lit it, left it to get going came back and it had gone out 🙄 This then put me under a bit of pressure because by now it is about 4.15 and it’s starting to get dark and I need to go and shut the birds up for the night. The dilemma is do I go out and do the birds and light the fire when I get back in and not use the oven to cook the dinner or do I light the fire, wait for it to get up to temperature but risk the birds getting caught by any fox that might be around 🤷‍♀️ In the end I decided to light the fire but it didn’t draw very well and took ages to get going. That’s when I end up clock watching and waiting for it to get going, nervous that the darker it gets the more likely it is that something will come along, eventually the flue got up to temp and I was able to shut it down and go out to put everything away for the night, note to self, light the fire earlier next time 😜

It’s been a long couple of days and I will be glad to see the end of this second lockdown. It hasn’t really been a tight lockdown and many people are still going to work, school etc but if you don’t do the school run and don’t go to an external workplace, only go to the shop once a week and don’t see people it’s a very long day and week!

Friday, or is it Thursday? Well this morning I thought it was Friday so I took my Friday concoction of meds, one of which I only have take on a Friday. Any other day I mixed up would not matter but a Friday lot means I can’t sit or stand still for at least an hour after taking it, not that it’s a problem as I have plenty to do 😀

Anyway it definitely is Thursday which I figured out after about an hour 😜 There was a hard frost this morning and even though the sun came out it was still nippy doing the rounds. The goose door I couldn’t even get open to start with as it was frozen to the frame. None of the water taps are working so I will have to do those later, must remember to do them in the afternoon so I don’t have that problem again 🙄

We have a lot of duck eggs at the minute, at one time we were struggling to keep up with demand for them and now that demand has dropped off the cliff edge, typical, over all our egg customers have reduced in number, probably because it’s winter but I suspect that a farm just up the road which is going the way of a farm shop is where some of our custom has gone. I had a think about this and thought ‘Am I bothered?’ and the answer is no not really, I always knew that a farm shop would take off really well here and if I had wanted to do it I would have but I don’t, I am happy tickling along as we are. In the beginning the plan was only ever to be self sufficient, the fact that it increased to egg and veg sales means that I cover the cost of what we are eating and planting which is a bonus and life is not too stressful at that so all in all that will do.

Gosh it was very chilly at 4.30 when I was putting the birds to bed, I reckon it was very near to freezing then so goodness knows what the overnight temps will go down to.

Some seeds I ordered arrived today, I think I have all I need for next year now, I don’t want to get caught out like I was last spring when the virus hit, this time I think it will be more to do with Brexit though so I’m trying to get ahead of the game.

Friday, definitely Friday today: Jeez if I thought it was cold yesterday it’s totally Baltic this morning. I have just come in from doing the morning rounds and my toes need thawing out 🙄 Very glad I did the water yesterday although I still had to break it all this morning. Everything is covered in white and the air is heavy with fog, it is pretty but only if you are inside looking out. I was feeding the horses in the paddock and just goes to show how much warmth they have in their bodies as Jack finished his breakfast he decided on a roll on the frosty ground, his body heat immediately thawed the grass, then he got up and had a bit of a welly round the paddock, lovely sight to see on a morning like this. Biscuit on the other hand was not so keen to move and I had to go across the paddock to take her breakfast, I am wondering how well she can see actually, just a couple of things she does makes me wonder, like not coming for her food, although she could just be stubborn of course, I will monitor more closely.

The new cladding on the front and insulation has done wonders for the indoor temps because normally on a day like today, when the fire goes out overnight, it would feel cold but it is not at all.

First thing this morning we had a delivery of six tonnes of top soil for the raised bed, grossly underestimated that we are going to need at least another six tonne if not eight 🤔

Had blood tests again this morning, hoping the situation has changed a little bit will have to wait and find out on Monday/Tuesday.

Saturday: Had a pig of a morning tidying up and burning the hawthorn cuttings from the hedge at the side. If you have ever handled it you will know the thorns are long and sharp and the branches intertwine, both these things make moving the stuff hazardous. I got a smack on the head from one particularly thick bit, countless scratches on my legs, hands and face, a thwack to the lip drawing blood and as if that wasn’t enough a burning piece of leaf went down my collar, I could smell my hair singe and feel my neck burning simultaneously. I hastily unzipped my coat and threw it on the floor and at that point all I really wanted to do was cry. Said clipping are now all burnt and we can continue to tidy the side up at our leisure 😜

Sunday: It was foggy when I got up, foggy at lunchtime and still foggy at dark, just a foggy dreary day. We did some bits of tidying out side after doing the rounds but it wasn’t at all nice working in the dank weather so we had the afternoon off apart from feeding and shutting away.

There ends another week and at the end of next week at least all the shops will be open again but also it means we will be able to go out for breakfast again one morning 😀 I didn’t realise how much I have missed a holiday until this week, I really could do with someone else doing the cooking, at least when we do finally get away it will seem like a real treat.

Friesland Farm

Grey days, dark nights, roll on mid winter 🙄

Posted on November 19, 2020November 22, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Thursday 19th November 2020: It’s a dry day with some sunshine although it’s colder and breezier than it has been lately. I have been waiting everyday for the weather to be nice enough to go outside but the rain was persistent and it’s not much fun in the wet. Today however I got up, got on with the morning tasks, went for a brief walk and then returned with the determination to get some stuff done. I cleaned out the quail and the guinea pigs and then went into the greenhouse to sort out seeds and look over the plants that are still in there. I planted up some sweet pea seeds that I had started off on the kitchen windowsill and then bought all the seeds in to go through later today. I seem to have got a huge amount of them 🙄 and I need to go through them all and may as well do it indoors in the warm. I also picked the tiny loofah, cleared the plant foliage and a bought that in to dry on the windowsill, I think that potentially it will go mouldy if I leave it in the greenhouse.

Teeny tiny loofah, pen for comparison, still I will notch that up as a win 😀

I wasn’t going to blog at all this week, on Monday a friend had a tragic and life altering day and I couldn’t bring myself to write about my trivial daily life but I found that as I was going round doing things I kept thinking ‘I must put that in the blog’ and it is a diary so eventually I found myself today writing it down again.

I have also started the list of wildlife we have here and even writing things from the off the top of my head I realise that we have a lot going on. Today a small flock of long tailed tits arrived, they always appear when the temperatures dip. My aim is to also get photographs but the little birds are far quicker than me or my shutter speed 🙄

Friday: Once upon a time I looked forward to Fridays and the weekend just around the corner, now in lockdown every day is pretty much the same except this time round John is out working and the weather is s**t. This morning we have the grey drizzle again and it’s noticeably colder no wonder people are putting up their Christmas decs early lol. I still won’t be putting mine up until Christmas week though 🙄 John asked if we are having a tree this year 🤷‍♀️ not sure if it’s worth the bother to be honest, it’s a squeeze to get a tree in here and still be able to see the tv 😂 but I don’t really want to break with tradition, you can’t beat the smell of a real tree indoors lol. I briefly considered an artificial one (hush my mouth) I have never in my entire life had a fake one, not when we were kids and not as a adult with my own home but I did think about it, then quickly dismissed it, it’s a real one or none at all 😀 I am still planning for a family Christmas though we have no idea if that will actually be the case this year. The Christmas cake is done and needs feeding again, my sister made mincemeat and gave me a big jar and I also have a small jar in the store cupboard from last year, I usually make the pudding and we have ‘stir up’ and the kids make wishes but that won’t happen this year and so I bought one from a posh supermarket instead and I indulged and bought some celebrity chef stollen for me as John hates it. We have discussed Christmas dinner it will be a bit sad if it’s ‘dinner for two’ 🙄 I also just ordered myself some Asbach Brandy, traditionally made in Oak barrels it’s my favourite brandy, not that I drink much of it anymore but I figure a treat is in order this year 🥰

Sometimes life changes drastically in less than a minute and other times it’s a long slow process. This morning I went down the Lane to say goodbye to our nieghbours over the road. We are all about a field or two away from each other here but still we are neighbours, they are moving today to retire to a warmer climate and I will miss having them over the road. They have been there long before us but I used to take Samantha there for riding lessons when she was little, they started out living in a caravan in the field and over the years built up a business and a house and now they are retiring, I wish them a long and happy retirement.

Saturday: Still grey and gloomy outside though not raining but it is damp. John did the feed rounds and then went off to collect more feed, he hasn’t had to do that for nearly nine months as we were having it delivered at the same time we had point of lay hens delivered, but we won’t be having any new birds over Winter. The avian flu that I thought would get out of hand appears to be contained and I haven’t heard of any further outbreaks which is good news. We are however still planning to bring the birds in for a couple weeks, mainly so that the ground can be rested and the mobile coops cleaned out properly, we can also keep a good eye on the health of the birds, worm them if necessary, give them a good dust bath area and see exactly how many eggs we are getting 🙄 With that in mind John also went to get bales of sawdust to deep litter them.

After he had done that we set about the job I really wanted to get done today, chop out the floor in the kitchen by the back door so that I can get a mat down for wiping feet on. Up to now the door was too low to be able to put a mat there and open the door, so that mat had to be about three feet inside which as you can imagine is a pain in the proverbial as that always means muddy foot prints up to it. It’s the little things that make the difference and that is one of them though it did take over an hour to chop it all out 😜 The next job was the electrics in the stable, the wet weather keeps knocking it out and we think it is because of one of the plugs though we can’t pinpoint it. By the time the electrician gets here it’s always dried out and working fine but as soon as it rains heavily it goes again. We will need the lights for the darker evenings and so at the minute the light circuit is on but the socket circuit, which we don’t use very often, has been isolated, another little job that helps the day run smoothly🤞

We nipped into town just to get something and grab a costa while we were there. As we arrived there was an ambulance and it appeared that a car had reversed from a parking space and hit a pedestrian, then a police car arrived on blue lights, then another, then another and then another, I am full of support for our boys in blue but seriously that’s over doing it I think 😂

Back home and get the Rayburn lit, get the eggs collected and sorted, it’s getting dark around 4.15/30 and that will be another day done and dusted, time seems to have shot past today.

Sunday: We have been busy little bees today 😀 first all the morning jobs to get done and then to Witney to pick up my new glasses and a few little pressies. Then back home where John got on with putting the metal coping on the front of the building, it’s a 90 degree piece that goes on the roof then down the front to cover the ends of the roofing sheets. They look good, we got them colour coded to match the paintwork 😀 Meanwhile I spent my time burning the paper rubbish which seemed to grow by the day, feed bags and cardboard boxes etc, after that I got two of the stables ready to move the hens to and the outside POL pen which we will put the light Sussex in for a while as their run has no solid roof and the ground is dire after all the rain. In the afternoon Emma arrived with a delivery of her award winning lamb, that will keep us going for a few months along with the beef we had from her last month.

After collecting the eggs and a bite to eat it will be time to shut the hens away and we will move two lots tonight, maybe three we will se how dark and cold it gets 😝

We are heading towards mid winter and the shortest day, after that the nights will draw out slowly again, the wheel keeps on turning and one thing is for sure, Spring is on its way even though it’s a way off yet 😏

Stay safe and have a good week 🥰

Friesland Farm

Seeds, avian flu & an amazing sunrise.

Posted on November 10, 2020November 15, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 9th November 2020: First thing this morning I have a repeat blood test as my last lot are showing low leucocytes again 😏 That means increased risk of infection so I need to be a bit careful.

Last night I was reading that the house sparrow is on the red list for conservation which surprised me greatly, we have a good flock of them here, around twenty I would say. I need to make sure they have everything they need, food through the winter and housing, I put up new sparrow flats for them when we took the old boxes down but they haven’t been seen in them as yet. What they have been doing is going in the roof where we haven’t put the capping back on (it’s ordered but not arrived yet) and I was complaining that they have pulled out bits of fibreglass which are now on the ground in the front. I think I will look to see where else we can put the old bird boxes until they decided to move into the new ones.

I was quite depressed at the thought that this is only day five of the lockdown, seems longer, and how I was going to pass the time but if this morning is anything to go by I needn’t worry. First the blood test, then Shelley walked over to get eggs so we had a chat over the gate (odd that last week they could all come in and this week they can’t 🙄 but rules is rules) then I thought I will phone Sue and see how she is doing, five minutes in and the straw and hay delivery arrived so I said I would call her back. Went out to sort where it was all going came back in to get the payment and realised I had left my soup on high, luckily it wasn’t burning, called Sue back for the rest of our chat, did some hoovering, sat down for my soup and John popped in between jobs. The time has shot past today and hopefully it will be like that every day.

I was feeling quite anxious and emotional this morning, mainly I think because of these white cells or rather, lack of them. It’s important because they lead to a condition called leucopenia and even when we don’t have a viral pandemic you are advised to wear a mask as you are highly susceptible to bacterial and viral infections as the immune system is not functioning. With the Lupus and the meds you take for it you can swing from a very over aggressive immune system to one that can’t even be bothered 😂 So you can see why it’s a worry, obviously the ideal would be a level system but that never seems to work because too many other factors can intervene. A morning of interaction and I feel more emotionally stable now thank goodness.

I had planned on doing a few things outside but the hours have passed and other things occurred instead, I did water the carrot seedlings, they don’t seem to be growing very fast though and I checked on the oranges which look nearly ready to pick 😀 I hope they are sweet enough and not sharp, that will be very disappointing.

I prepped dinner Nr lit the Rayburn, monitoring the time all the while but John came home early and he did the feed rounds and egg collecting so that was a happy bonus and with the extra time I made a raspberry pudding for dessert 😀

Shelley decided that through hers and Martin’s businesses they would like to spread a little cheer and have donated selection boxes, people can nominate someone they think could do with a little cheer either because they are alone, have lost their job or are struggling for some reason or other. The gift is in the giving and so we have donated from both the farm and the plumbing business as well and she is getting offers from lots of people to also donate, it’s amazing and so many people need to know that others are thinking about them at this difficult time and that although we are all socially distanced they are not on their own.

Helping people out gives you much more pleasure than you can imagine and is good for the soul and at time brings unexpected returns, some of my favourite memories are from people giving me things because I had helped them out. I have told these before but I love them so here they are again, one was when a chap stopped to get duck eggs when we first started out, duck eggs are difficult to find and so he was delighted but he didn’t have enough money. No problem just drop it in next time you are passing and we are talking about 40p or something like that. About 8 weeks later he arrived with his 40p and a trailer full of hay bales, would you like these he asked me, how much I said, for free he replied, I was flabbergasted, amazed, delighted 😁 The other times are also to do with eggs, people often want eggs for hatching but they don’t need many, one lot was for a Duke of Edinburgh award and some other lots were for children to hatch at childcare facilities, for activities like these I give them for free as they are learning opportunities which I am all for 😀 Never expecting anything in return I was humbled when I received chocolates/cards/flowers thanking me. They were such small giving moments but they grow of their own accord, the excitement and the chance to encounter nature doing what it does best and then the learning activities around it and finally the knowledge they gain from the experience, it’s all priceless and very rewarding. So you see a small gesture of kindness naturally grows into bigger things for everyone involved 😀

News just released of a real potential vaccine which gives us hope for the future, 90% effective apparently, obviously they will proceed with caution but it’s a chink of light on the horizon.

Tuesday: It’s lunchtime and it is lovely and sunny and quite mild out there, it wasn’t first thing mind you, the minute I put my coat on to go out it started raining but it soon cleared up. This morning I have spent a large part of the time rearranging electric fencing for the horses, during spring and summer we have an area fenced off for biscuit that she periodically goes into to prevent laminitis and that has worked well this year. Now we don’t need it for her but we need it for Jack, basically to keep him off the yard, as the grass gets more sparse he starts looking further afield which means he breaks out, plus I want to fence off the big side paddock so the hens don’t end up living in a bog. Horses feet churn up the wet ground and basically trash it and it quickly becomes a big muddy puddle, the ground recovers in Spring but it’s good to have some grass for the hens. I took all the fencing down from one area and then put it all up where I need it now, I connected everything up closely watched by Jack who was like my shadow the whole time, I went in to plug into the mains and when I came out he had got two of the slip rails down in that short time 🙄 I put them back up and then turned on the fence energiser, click, click, the minute Jack heard that noise he knew the game was over and he turned and wandered away. Up to that point he was probably thinking wayhay I can escape but the horses are very familiar with electric fencing and once they hear that noise they know there is no use hanging around anymore.

After that and a quick coffee I went into the greenhouse, might as well make good use of a nice day. I spent my time cleaning up the tubers I dug the other day, the dahlias still need to dry off a bit more and I brushed off the dirt from the yacon and Oca. Some off them will come indoors to be used in cooking and some will dry off and I will store them to plant next year. I have hedged my bet four ways with the yacon as I don’t know much about them, first I have put one lot in the ground and will see how they get on through winter, the next I have potted up and that will stay in the greenhouse, the third lot are smaller tubers that I will dry and store and the last lot are the plant roots that I will also dry and store, hopefully out of that lot one or more will be successful. I picked some of the runner beans that are now ready to store, the pod goes brown and papery on the vine, pick them, get the seeds out and dry before storing overwinter somewhere dry. I have dwarf French beans doing the same, and little piles of other seeds drying on the side waiting to be stored in the dry. I usually bring the seeds inside and keep them in the spare room in the dark, it gets too damp anywhere outside and I find that works well. I then did a couple of hardwood cuttings of my fig tree hoping to get a few new plants for next spring.

Collecting seed is a great way to get free plants next spring, it is also an important part of self reliance and sufficiency. We saw shortages of available seed and plants this year, propagating by various means can absorb the shock in times like these and help keep you producing vegetables and flowers 🌸

Wednesday: John knocked on the bedroom window from outside, get a look a the sunrise he said, Wow, it was fiery and orange and usually thats what the sunset looks like but this was first thing in the morning, breathtaking.

An unusual sunrise this morning more in keeping with a sunset.

I got up and dressed and on with the day, various jobs to do, clean the boot room and the back toilet, sort out dinner for this evening, nothing very exciting on the to do list today. Shelley walked over and we stood and had a chat over the gate but apart from that and a hardware delivery nothing much eventful happened. I did decided to make a Slimming World Diet Coke chocolate cake, one word, don’t 😝 It went in the bin it was that bad, I think I would rather have a normal one and eat less of it 😂 It got me thinking about healthy bakes and trying to find recipes that look vaguely like they would taste good but they are all full of weird ingredients. I think the closest I find to a good recipe are probably diabetic recipes, at least the substitutions are usually honey or maple syrup not some reconstituted husk of a hitherto unheard of vegetable or grain 😏

John called, he will be later than normal can I put the birds to bed, looks like I will have to. I hate the early dark evenings when he comes home after dark and then goes to work before the light, it feels like you have no one to share the daylight hours with.

We have worrying confirmation of six different cases of Avian Flu in the country, more worryingly is that they are fairly spread out in different counties all around the UK, many more cases and there will be a lockdown for poultry as well as us 🙄

We went food shopping tonight, I just needed a few things but seemed to end up with a lot of things. When I was packing it away I began to wonder if I was subconsciously stocking up, genuinely not doing it on purpose but I have definitely more than three tins of baked beans in the cupboard 😂

Our egg customers have gone awol again, really weird how it goes through phases, each day this week we have had hardly any customers, other days we are inundated with them, one week we can hardly keep up with duck egg sales and this week they are stacking up in the shed 🤷‍♀️

Thursday: Do you ever think that when things start to go wrong they go wronger and wronger 😏 This morning started off ok as far as the smallholding goes, jobs done, things sorted and all that. I need to get my prescription picked up and the plan was I would call the pharmacy to make sure it was ready then call John and have him collect it later, first fly in the ointment is that John has left his phone here 🤷‍♀️ so that plan goes out the window, luckily I call Shelley and she is in town and collects it for me, I will get John to collect from her later tonight (I need it for the morning). Second is the doctor calls re the blood results but only has half of them in will call again later when they have them, fine I go to the loo and the phone rings again, damn it, luckily they then tried the house phone and having finished my function I was able to answer. Terribly sorry but there has been a mix up at the lab and we will need to redo the full blood count, ffs, I am going to have an arm like a drug addict at this rate, your thinking that I could change the arm, nope the other arm doesn’t appear to have a vein that can be tapped 😂 so I now have to get over first thing in the morning for another blood test. On top of those life misdemeanours we have the more worrying aspect of the Avian Flu to sort out, it is now a legal obligation to make sure our biosecurity is in order. For the hens that means that we need to feed inside (which we do anyway because of the crows) and we will also need to keep their water inside away from wild birds. The ducks will also have to be fed inside but their water is a problem, ducks and water go together like bread and butter so more difficult to implement that, they need constant water to keep their nostrils clean after dabbling in the undergrowth. That is stage one, along with foot baths for anyone coming into the farm but that is not an issue at the minute is it 😜 The next is that I will have to stop feeding the wild birds, this is the saddest bit for me but the idea is to not encourage them to be anywhere near the flock as they will be the carriers/transmitters of the disease. We then need to make plans in case a full lockdown is required which given the spread of it is highly likely this year. That means all birds will be shut in for the foreseeable future, if they have an outdoor run it needs to be netted so that wild birds cannot get in. We have the POL run which is suitably netted after the last outbreak a few years ago, but the rest will be in the stables, luckily we have them spare, not ideal but at least they will have room. I remember last time we tried to tarp the orchard run, gee, we had the wettest, muddiest winter and it was soul destroying stuff but the stable block is dry and has windows so at least they can see outside 😜 Keep chickens they said, it will be fun they said 😏 Apart from all that, the sun is shinning and it’s not a bad day so I will take the good along with the bad today. Sometimes life seems like a scrabble, it’s like scrabbling up the rock face until you get to a level plateau again 🤦‍♀️

Went for a stroll round the village with Mum at lunchtime which was very nice, the sun was shinning and it wasn’t too cold, saw a couple of people to say hello to which lifts the spirits 😀

John came home early and spent a couple of hours cleaning and tidying out his van 🤷‍♀️ still it was nice to know someone else was around.

Friday: Another sunny and not too cold start to the day although it rained heavily during the night. Got a few bits done then off to get yet another blood test done 😜 hopefully this one will come back all in one piece and I can move forward in whatever direction I need to go.

I heard a couple of very strange wildlife stories this week, the first was of a fox taking a small dog somewhere near where Mum lives, this was witnessed by a gentleman although it seems they don’t know who’s dog it was. The second was the discovery of a dead otter, what is curious about that is that to my knowledge we don’t have otters around here, not for miles as far as I know. I have seen the photo and agree that it does not look like and English otter, it’s a mystery as to how it got there and why it died but it has been called in to wildlife experts and a university is taking it to do a post mortem to find out more if they can.

I have decided that I will keep feeding the wild birds but I will be moving the feeders to an area that is about as far from the hens as I can get it, it’s likely that the poultry industry will go into lockdown if reports of confirmed cases keep coming in anyway and once they are shut away there will be little risk of contamination. Worrying times with two major viruses in the country, if the two collide 😳 (and that could happen) we would be up shit creek without a paddle!

Saturday: The weather started off ok and then took a complete dive until it was vile out there. John was busy digging out the rest of the raised bed area on the tractor until it began to rain so heavily he had to stop, there is no cab so he was getting pretty wet. I went out and put new bedding in the geese, duck and light Sussex housing and then put up the hooks for the bird feeders and moved them well out of the way, hopefully the birds will soon find them. I also put up the remaining old nest boxes give them somewhere to roost over winter. I then spent two hours looking for something I knew we had but I couldn’t find it anywhere. It’s a leather stamping kit, so basically letters on the end of metal sticks in a box, you hit the stamp and it punches it into leather, marking it with a postcode or name. I wanted it to make some Christmas decorations but I can’t find it anywhere and I had pulled out boxes, opened drawers, looked inside everything, nope nowhere to be seen. I have ordered a new set but you can bet your bottom dollar it will now appear.

We came in for lunch and lit the Rayburn, drank tea and watched the news, hopefully the weather will clear a little and we can carry on outside. 😏

It didn’t clear up much but John went out to do what he could anyway, me I stayed in to stoke the Rayburn 😜

I spent an evening do a bit of Christmas craft, I sometimes wish I was more artistic as there are so many things I would like to have a go at. In my minds eye I see what I want but the reality is nothing like it, I still remember my art o level piece, I knew exactly how I wanted it to look right from the beginning but it was a big fat fail lol. Nevertheless I still have a go at a few things when the moment takes me, tonight it was gift tags, I have a large amount of buttons which were in Johns Mum sewing stuff, I doubt I will be sewing buttons on anything any time soon so I made gift tags instead 😀

Sunday: It was vile weather overnight and vile this morning but eventually the rain moved on and the sun even came out at times though it’s a tad cold at around 8 degrees. John did the morning rounds and then attempted inbetween rain showers to carry on with the raised bed, he almost abandoned it altogether when a stiff breeze came along and blew the rain along. Meanwhile I have been doing the usual morning jobs, a bit of washing and sorting dinner for later, I did pop out to feed the guineas and have a look in the polytunnels and then back in to get the Rayburn lit. No point me trying to help John as he is levelling and squaring p, not my strong point and I would probably be more of a hindrance than help on this job. So I supply the cups of tea, a sandwich, make sure there is hot water and a hearty supper for later on 😀 Slow roasted lamb shank today 🥰

Just sitting having a cuppa and have been watching a short video on biodiversity on the smallholding (or it could even be related to a garden/allotment) It became obvious that I have been doing everything that was suggested and this talk was given by someone who gets paid to advise large farms and parks with their biodiversity projects so I am quite chuffed that I am on point with my plans to increase wildlife in all forms. The only thing I haven’t ever done is record it either by writing it down or logging it with various surveys. I will start a log I think, I can recall right back to the beginning when we first came that even though we are surrounded by countryside, there was not much going on here, mostly due to routine spraying I suspect. I have seen a big increase in wildlife especially over the last four or five years and each year I am surprised by more arrivals, like the bees in the hollow this year which incidentally are still going in and out, and the snake, it’s a great feeling to be able to make a difference however small.

Quick update on the kittens, both are doing well, exploring further and further outside but they can often be found curled up on a cushion in the boot room. They get on well will the dogs, by that I mean they tolerate them and are not afraid of them, the dogs don’t take much notice of them unless they go to close to a food bowl with biscuits in or if they make a sudden playful dash, on the whole though it’s lovely to see them all sleeping in the same room together proving that cats and dogs don’t always fight 😀

I went outside about 2pm and helped John, we now have the raised bed finished (except the top soil) and the ground all levelled back out again. Only thing was with the shovelling and raking I have twinged my lower back 😕 Today I did the afternoon feed round and egg collection while John got the tractor round to finished moving and levelling the driveway. We have got a way to go yet, topsoil needs delivering and then we need to build the last bed which is much smaller, then a layer of clean gravel needs to go down, some cutting back of the hazel trees (the planting up will have to wait till spring) then there is the side driveway to start on 😂 always another job on the horizon 😜

Have a good week and stay safe, keep your chin up and keep smiling, we will get through this eventually (the winter & covid) 😃

Friesland Farm

The first frost, the last tea at Nanas (for a while) and turf war in the skies above.

Posted on November 8, 2020November 8, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 2nd November 2020: Morning 😀 It was very windy overnight and still some pretty hefty gusts first thing this morning, we are supposed to get drier weather from Wednesday I will look forward to that. This is the week that we potentially go into another semi lockdown, I say potentially as it still has to go through parliament and who knows what could happen there 🙄 I am pretty chipper about it all because, well there is not much choice really is there, do or die, hopefully not that dramatic but you get my drift! I am also feeling pretty smug because I have all but finished my Christmas shopping (hush my mouth 🤭) normally I would not have even thought about it yet, I usually start mid/end of November but this year I started early, mostly because I did not want to be shopping with thousands of others during a pandemic, I’m glad I made that decision now. I have a feeling this lockdown may last longer than expected, food is not an issue I can rustle up Christmas dinner for two easily enough 😜

Today is kids tea at Nanas but it will be the last one for a while sadly, I have made the jelly already and will get the cake on the go shortly. John did the birds this morning and I just need to do the other animals, cats, dogs, guinea pigs, horses, quail, then a bit of cleaning probably, I am waiting for this dry weather to arrive before I do much outside.

Small businesses are busy cramming their last few appointments and opening hours in as much as they can. I just managed to get a hair appointment for a trim otherwise I can see I will resort to doing my own fringe which never works out well 😜 I feel sorry for these businesses, shut, open with caution and conditions, shut again but I also feel it’s necessary for the NHS. Nobody working on the front line wants to be in a position that they have to choose who lives and who dies, that is potentially what would happen if the cases needing to be admitted outstrip capacity, that’s what we all need to remember 🤔 And it’s not just the elderly and vulnerable that are severely affected, I have heard of youngish, fit people that are suffering long after they had the virus, still struggling to walk any great distance, I wouldn’t wish that on anyone so for those reasons I am for the lockdown not against it. The economy will suffer, yep, but life is about more than the economy, though we have interwoven it so tightly that it doesn’t seem like there is anything else. Perhaps I can say that because it won’t affect me much apart from the inevitable tax, vat and price rises, but that’s because of the lifestyle I have chosen I think, self sufficiency is about more than growing your own food it’s about being able to manage and weather the storm when the shit hits the fan as it has this year. I have been saying for a few years now that an economy bust will come, I didn’t expect it to be disease but it was booming, more disposable income than ever before and some quite frankly astonishing pay packets at the higher end of earning, reality tv ‘celebrities’ that have no talents, ordinary people emanating these wannabes who’s highlight of the week is to go out and get hammered 🤷‍♀️ the climate in desperate need of attention but nobody cares enough to change their habits for the better, if you really looked at each individual cog from an outside perspective you would see how depraved it was all getting and eventually it collapses. Greater civilisations than ours have fallen before, everything has a cycle, we are in the throes of the decline of ours in more ways than one, that’s what I think anyway 🤔 I don’t think that ever before have our hopes for a better future been pinned on the youngest generation like they are now, I hope they are a generation that sees things for what they are and not the dressed up gloss that has infiltrated every aspect of life, every photo is filtered, every news report is one sided, false news, false body bits, false…. oh, I am thinking too much, I will depress myself in a minute 😝

The kids came for tea one last time before the lockdown, that’s the saddest part for me not being able to see them whenever I want or they want but hopefully it will only be for a few weeks, I hope it dose t go on any longer than that.

Tuesday: It is noticeably colder this morning, yesterday it was 20c indoors so I didn’t even light the Rayburn until after 5pm, overnight the rain was at times heavy, it woke me at least once and then this morning Sunshine but colder, hopefully it will be drier as well, I’m getting fed up with the rain even though it’s only been on and off it’s still annoying.

I need to think about what I will be doing during the lockdown, life won’t change much except that I will be by myself most of the time so I need projects to occupy me. I guess there is always reading and Netflix box sets to catch up on, that’s what winter is for isn’t it, I may have to look for some good books to read and order them in, any suggestions? I generally browse the prize lists and see what catches my attention. My fav author, Phillipa Gregory has a release soon which I already have on order so I look forward to that, trouble is I can read her books in a couple of days. I love her style of writing and after going to one of her talks last year I got to understand her passion for the hidden women in history and why she likes to tell their stories.

I’m not sure where the hours went yesterday but I seemed to have used them all up lol, haircut, deliveries, FaceTime, feeding rounds, dinner, household chores, rayburn lighting and a bit of reading.

Wednesday: It was a good frost this morning, let’s hope it’s the first of many for winter, we only had a handful if that last year which is not good. Pests and disease are killed off by the cold snaps and last year that didn’t happen, it’s also good for the soil to have that freeze thaw action on the particles.

I was up before the alarm went off and I turned on the TV straight away, along with a large part of the world, I want to see what is happening in the US elections 🙄

I have to admit I have been doing only two things today really, one, turning the tv on periodically to see the updates in the US and two, reading 😜 I have done a few others things in between but mainly those two. About the reading, I have to confess it’s my addiction, once I pick up a book, one that I engage with, I can’t put it down unless I absolutely have to. It’s why I don’t constantly have a book on the go because I don’t like to be interrupted while I’m reading it 😂 and that includes day to day life 🙄 I am the same with a film, I could never be one of those people who can watch a bit of a film and not the rest 🤷‍♀️ I always want to know how the story is panning out and how it finishes.

I finished the book, a good story, The Binding by Bridget Collins, worth a read if you like a bit of escapism and a little bit of magic and mystery in the mix. The next book I have in my sights is called The New Wilderness, it’s on the Booker shortlist so should be a goodie and it’s climate change, survival, dystopia story so right up my street 😀

Thursday: 2nd Lockdown, day 1 😜 I have been a very busy bee this morning, the weather is lovely and so into the garden I go to get some good work done. First the plants that have been affected by that hard frost we had, the yacon can be dug up after the first frost, the foliage on all these plants go black and limp very quickly. I have never grown them before so wasn’t sure what to expect but there were tubers, not masses but enough. Yacon are very good for you they are prebiotic and full of antioxidant, they are sweet but fructose has no calories so great for diabetics, they can be eaten raw or cooked and apparently make a great syrup but you need a lot of them. I have dug up the whole plant and will put the root somewhere dry over winter and hopefully get them going again next year. The smaller tubers need drying off and only washing just as you use them or they will get mouldy. The next veg to harvest were the Oca, similar in that it’s the tubers you eat, little cream coloured knobbly nuggets, also left to dry off before storing for later use. After that I went on to clear and clean the asparagus bed and the rhubarb, these are the first two harvests to begin appearing next spring so getting those done first is a good idea. I have used one of those darlek type compost bins to ‘force’ one of the rhubarb plants, I will get early, sweeter stalks, at least that’s the plan. The bed still needs to have manure put on there but apart from that it’s done, I did dig up the artichoke plants as they get huge, nobody really wants to fiddle about prepping them so I decided they could go though I did replant one elsewhere out of the way. Then it was the turn of the dahlias to be lifted, again they collapse in the frost and so lifting them over winter means I will still have some next year. After that the herb patch, cutting back, weeding, tidying plants up. By then my back was aching a bit and so I did some more gentle jobs, putting stuff away for the winter and finally pulling a few beetroot which are still growing really well. The temptation is to keep going as there is plenty to do but I know if I do that I won’t be any good for tomorrow so I came in for lunch and a sit down before starting on the afternoon shift.

The rest of the day was spent prepping dinner for cooking later, lighting the Rayburn, feeding the birds, collecting the eggs, feeding cats and dogs, putting clean sheets on the bed, doesn’t sound like much but surprising how many hours it all takes 😀 Once the night draws in and the curtains are closed it’s back to some reading or tv, except that, damn it’s Thursday 9pm and I have forgotten the dustbin AGAIN, well done for volunteering John 😘

Friday: We are still awaiting the results of the presidential election in the US, I have never been interested before, not ever, but with this one I find myself waking early to see if there is a result every morning. They are not my politics but I know who I would be voting for in the circumstances.

It’s cold this morning though the sun is shinning so it should warm up a tad 🙄 I should be getting on with stuff but I have the TV on waiting to see what happens next 😂 Beats corona virus and Brexit chatter anyway!

I lit the Rayburn late morning because I don’t think it’s going to warm up very much before it starts to get cold again. I picked up the wood basket and went to open the door out to the boot room and the door fell off! Well not quite all the way off but the top hinge had come away from the frame. The door had been sticking and Martin had a look last time he was here and said you need some more screws in the hinge, it’s not something you really look at regularly is it. I couldn’t find any sign of screws that had come out and I’m wondering exactly how many were in there, I do have a nick name for John when he puts hinges on anything ‘Johnny two screws’ I’m pretty sure there are four holes for a reason but he only ever uses two, well they had both failed 🤷‍♀️ Luckily I have my own cordless screwdriver and can manage the repair on my own, I wedged the door up so that the hinge was in place and I used three screws 😜 that’s because I couldn’t find a forth, but at least the door can be opened and closed again now and as a bonus it no longer sticks 😂

We appear to have some kind of turf war going on in the skies above us here, for about an hour we have had a pair of Red Kite and a pair of Buzzards screeching overhead with some crows joining in occasionally. It’s quite fascinating as I have not seen this behaviour here before. They don’t usually roost or live here but maybe they are looking for new homes 🤷‍♀️ if I work out what is happening I will let you know.

Just look how glorious that sky is today 🥰

I bought myself a lockdown cup 😂 it’s wonky and perfectly reflects life as it is at the moment. There are not many pleasures to be had at the minute but I am enjoying drinking my tea from this 🥰

The horses are getting hungry now as the grass they have eaten off all summer is no longer growing like it was, time to order in hay. They have the free range of all the paddocks during the summer, the chickens are also out on the paddocks with electric fencing and this is not a problem until the grazing gets less and then the horses try to break into the chicken runs. Biscuit has now got caught up three times in the fence, luckily she just stands there until she is rescued but it’s definitely time for hay and putting electric up so they can’t get into that particular paddock.

Every day at 3pm it’s egg collecting time and the hens get fed as well, but I was thinking on the way round this is a silly system. The reason we do that is to put the eggs out at 4pm so everyone knows when they go out and have a chance to get them if they want some. To start with, as I am always telling John, the hens should be fed an hour before dusk especially in the Winter because the grain is to keep them warm overnight. It’s not so important in the summer but you can’t collect the eggs without being mobbed by the hens which is why they get fed. I am going to make an executive decision and change the system this will allow me to keep on working in the spring, summer and autumn months without having to stop what I am doing to go and do something else which is a real bugbear for me. It also will mean that there is no pressure to get the eggs sorted and into the shed for an allotted time because life does not always go to plan and sometimes the turnaround it tight which is stressful, yep I am going to tell john that is what is going to happen in the New Year 😝

I found out why the door fell off, I found a sheared off head of a screw on the floor, doesn’t explain where any others went to but maybe they came off previously, a bit weird but that’s the kind of thing that happens at ‘the funny Farm’ Another weird thing is flies again, they are infesting the boot room, it started yesterday when there were about twenty of them. I hoovered them up as they are drowsy at this time of year, I hoovered four more times yesterday and then twice already today. I have no idea where they are coming from but I have told John that I want every crack and crevice sealed to stop it happening again. They must be in the wall and when it warms up a bit they crawl out, probably something dead in there though I can’t smell anything.

Saturday: Wow what a day, we have been busy outside from first thing this morning only stopping quickly for a speedy lunch of homemade chicken soup. We have been very busy sorting out the front area, building part of the new raised bed that will go under the windows, moving the remaining topsoil and the leftover ballast. Doesn’t sound like much but it has taken us all day to get stuff tidied and built and swept and chipped, dotted with cups of tea, feeding the hens, collecting the eggs. I will eventually get pictures to show you but I want to wait until it’s all done and we have quite a way to go yet so don’t be expecting them anytime soon. My back is aching from digging, shovelling and even a stint on the pick axe. We had a fish and chip supper followed by a chocolate bar to round the day off, it will probably be an early night as we are both pooped.

I didn’t even come in to find out how the election results were going but it seems they didn’t come in until just before we finished anyway, at least there is now confirmation even if it is going to be contested 🙄 What on Earth will be talk about now 😂

Sunday: The usual jobs to get done this morning before going to town to try for a second week in a row to get my eye test. The town was noticeably quieter now the lockdown has commenced. Success this time though it was a mighty thump to the bank balance 🙄 new glasses, varifocal and light reactive this time, also a new 3D scan of the eyeball which showed that they are in excellent condition, thank goodness for that 😀 Back home in time for lunch and by now the drizzle had started so we haven’t bothered doing any work outside, opting for Netflix instead 😂

Apart from the usual afternoon jobs that will be it for us today as far as the smallholding is concerned so that just leaves me to wish you a good week, stay safe and look after your mental health, I think that is going to be very important with a Winter lockdown, practice some good Hygge (pronounced hoo gah) 🥰

Friesland Farm

Darker nights, Halloween and another lockdown.

Posted on October 26, 2020November 1, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 26th October 2020: Having been somewhat absent from the outside last week I thought I had better do a few bits today. But first there was a cake to cook and jelly to make for the VIPs, chocolate cake today as requested by Josh and strawberry jelly this week. I got some dusting and hoovering done while I was waiting for the cake to cook, put some washing in and got a beef stew on the go for our dinner tonight. I was intending them to go out but first I had to do a couple of invoices and I have reverted to the laptop for those as other methods seem to be failing 🙄 Finally it was time to get out and do those things that had been on my mind, filling the bird feeders for the garden birds was the first job. I stop feeding them in late spring but I want them to stay around and so begin to feed them again now that food is more scarce. This year I have positioned them so that I can get good photographs of them feeding, they were behind the oak tree before and I could never get a good angle without going out and frightening them off. It started raining just as I went out and I figured someone must have been watching and said ‘she is out turn the tap on’ 😜 but it soon passed. Then I had a look and picked and what produce is still left growing, a lonely courgette, a few indigo rose tomatoes, some raspberries, the brassica cage has enormous plants in there and I think they are sprouting broccoli so they won’t be ready until next year, one plant is about six foot tall! There are still lettuce and salad greens growing as well as radicchio, the oranges are almost ready to pick I think and the (one) loofah is still going strong. I fed the blueberry plants some sulphate of iron and replenished the top of the pots with fresh ericaceous compost, that will hopefully make them good and strong next year and produce plenty of blueberries. Then it was onto seed collecting and I gathered, cornflower, marigold, red flax, poppies, geum, bronze amaranth, love in a mist, nepeta, chick peas, achillea and sunflower seeds, bagged them and labeled them because I will have no idea what they are by next spring if I just leave them 😂 There are plenty of other jobs I want to get done but I don’t have time today, now the clocks have change it will be a short afternoon. Time to come in for some lunch and wash up the baking things before the little guests arrive.

Tuesday: Raining 🙄 That means only one thing, paperwork 😂 and I’m pleased to say I have finished and it’s all up together and ready to go to the accountants 😃 I worked on it until 12.45, I had literally just finished and packed everything away when Shelley messaged saying she was taking the kids to the garden centre for cake and would I like to go, yes indeed, I think I’ve have earned it. By the time we got there the kids had fallen asleep in the car and it was hammering down so we sat there for ten minutes before deciding to wake them and make a dash for it.

Back home in time to quickly light the Rayburn and then go and feed the hens and collect the eggs before putting them out into the shed. John came home in time to shut the birds away which is now about 5pm. We had dinner, went to get a bit of shopping and popped in to see Mum and Ken for a cuppa. And that’s another day done, but a good one because I can now think clearly about anything else I have to do rather than having the paperwork at the back of my mind all the time 😌

Wednesday: Time goes by so slowly….🎶 that’s what I have been thinking ever since the clocks went back, time seems to be slower. It’s 9.15am and I have already done all the morning jobs, got a batch of leek and potato soup well on the way and done some of this years accounts. I swear I look at the clock, go and do what seems like a hundred things and then look again and only five minutes have passed 😂 John was up before the alarm went off this morning, had his breakfast and then did the animals, he got caught in the biggest downpour 😣 I have Josh and Flo this morning while Shelley has to work so just having a quick coffee before they arrive, she will be back at lunchtime and then we will go for a walk I think providing it’s not pouring down again.

Walk cancelled, biggest downpour/hailstorm and thunderstorm ever 😂 stay in the warm and watch a film seemed like a much better option. Luckily I managed to dodge the rain showers when I was feeding the hens and collecting the eggs. Not got much done in the way of outside work today, but I had a couple of deliveries of more bird seed and fat balls and seem to have way over ordered, I might put them out for sale in the shed.

Thursday: Finally got my backside into gear to get a bit done. This morning after the usual chores a shower and some meditation I went outside, I cleaned out the guineas and both light Sussex houses. I picked all the remaining green tomatoes and bought in the pumpkin for carving. I carved the pumpkin first and I know I should have made something with the inside but I’m not a pumpkin lover and the flesh is hard to get out when you want it left whole. Faced carved, not scary cos it will frighten the babies, we have some extraordinary pumpkin carvers in the family but I’m not one of them so it’s basic 😜 Next job was the green tomato chutney, I have used the indigo rose toms, it produce loads of fruit but it was late and about 2/3rds of them haven’t ripened and it’s too late now. Out came the cauldron 😀 and in went the ingredients, green tomatoes obviously, cooking apples, red onions, malt vinegar, dark brown sugar and a spice bag with ginger, peppercorns, and chilli in. You can put whatever spices you fancy, cardamom, coriander, all spice, star anise (which I often use) but this time I chose cumin, for a warming taste, to go along with the other flavours, fingers crossed it will be good. You can’t really go wrong with a chutney it just depends on what you put in if it turns out to be a good one or a great one. Chutney has its origins in India but the British love a good chutney, its basically a mix of fruit, spices, sugar and vinegar in whatever blend you like, it’s great for using up gluts and stores well and of course goes brilliantly with cheese and is nearly always ready in time for Christmas. I have a chief taster for the chutney in Macca, he loves it, it is a paradox though (I think I can safely use that word here) because he doesn’t like cheese 🤷‍♀️

You may have noticed that I have already used the C word 🎄 and it’s only October, normally I won’t even entertain it until December BUT we have had a tough year this year and although I won’t be going as far as to put up my decorations this early I concede that we need something to keep us cheery at the moment and so I have relented and I’m going with the flow. That reminds me I must get the cake out and give it a drink of brandy 😜

Halloween is not going to be quite the same this year but we can still make it an occasion at home, get a pic n mix bowl and watch a scary movie 👻 The grandchildren are coming over in the day time and we will be dressing up, apple bobbing and eating doughnuts from a string and of course there will be sweet treats 🎃

Oxford has just moved up a tier 😏 as an outlying shire we are still on tier one but with the cases rising rapidly I don’t think it will be long before we are joining them in further restrictions. The second wave, as widely predicted, is bigger than the initial outbreak but I’m guessing they have more knowledge of how to treat it successfully in most cases now, I hope so anyway. France and Germany have gone into lockdown measures and both countries admit it is out of control, as I keep saying luckily it’s not airborne or that could have been the end of life as we know it, I think the world is finally realising how fragile our existence on this planet really is 🙄

I hate Thursday evenings, I don’t hate it until I have done the dinner, fed the cats and the dogs, got the logs in for the fire and sat down to enjoy the evening, then I hate it because I have usually forgotten to put the bins out 😣 just like this Thursday evening which means having to go out in the dark and the cold to do it. It’s not just a quick nip down a very short path to the kerbside here, it’s not a trek in the Antarctic either but still it’s a chore and a bore if I have forgotten, I’ll see if I can persuade John to do it 😝 (He did bless him)

Had a bit of a Covid scare when the elderly lady next door to Mum went into hospital and tested positive for Covid, Mum had been round there in the week as she had a fall and help was needed to get her up. As soon as she heard she booked a test because, being half term, she had seen quite a few of the family, grandchildren and great grandchildren, and she did have a bit of a cold, luckily the test came back negative 😀

Friday: Not a bad day, a bit spitty and overcast but feels very mild. I did the usual morning tasks and then had blood tests followed by a cheeky visit to costa with Shelley, Josh and Flo. Back home to get some bits done though I haven’t decided what yet 😀

We used to have Sunday roasts with all the girls and partners but since the grandchildren numbers have expanded its difficult to get them all in at the same time so I have decided to do them separately, (and we now have the rule of six of course) it’s a shame as there is nothing better than a full family dinner but there just isn’t room. That’s one of my biggest regrets about moving and not building something big enough but we never gave the expansion of the family a thought really. Hopefully we can get a few in before a lockdown which I think is inevitable 🙄

I spent a bit of time in the greenhouse potting up some allium bulbs that I had been given a couple of months ago. I have not decided where to put them so pot them up until spring and then decide, mind you there are lots of pots so I may sell some of them. I bought the saffron crocus in from outside, I always miss them flowering as they flower late autumn and in my head it should be spring 🙄 I have never managed to harvest saffron from them yet, maybe this year I will get some (if I remember to look 😝) they go over pretty quickly as far as I can tell. The lonely loofah is still doing ok, I’m not sure when to harvest it but I don’t think it’s ready yet, the trouble is that we are getting to the time of the year when things can develop mould when they are under cover so I need to keep a close eye on it over the next few weeks. At the moment there is not much in the greenhouse, I’m mostly overwintering seedlings and cuttings I took back in the summer, drying out seeds ready to bag up and of course the torts are sleeping in a hut in there. The door is open so they can get out if they choose to, Voldy came out one day last week but didn’t eat or drink and I haven’t seen Billy since he went in lol.

Saffron crocus, might get a few strands this year maybe 🤷‍♀️

Now is a good time to take hardwood cuttings and although I am not too good at it I wanted to give a couple of things a go to see if I could increase my plants. Blueberry, cos you can never have too many blueberry bushes, mulberry and olive, it might be a bit late for the olive but nothing ventured nothing gained eh. By now the rain is a bit heavier and it’s not much fun getting a soaking if you don’t need to, there are plenty of times when I have to go out in the rain but choosing to do it is just silly 😜

Hardwood cuttings of blueberry, mulberry and olive

Saturday: It’s 9.45 and it’s turned filthy out there, first thing it wasn’t too bad a bit of fine drizzle but now the rain is heavier and it’s blowy. John did half the rounds this morning and I did the other half, this meant he could then get on with finalising the pathway ready to concrete and even though it’s ready we won’t be doing it in this 🙄 we will wait until it passes over which should be this afternoon. It will be all hands to the deck on the mixer and the wheelbarrow then. Meanwhile I have been doing the usual things, putting washing on, feeding the cats and dogs, washing up, putting the rubbish out , then outside to do the other half of the feed rounds and move the chicken fencing so the horses can eat off the grass that has grown, I also gave them a bit of hay to keep them warm today. They have a shelter, two actually but rarely use them, they are pretty hardy, they don’t come in very often, only in the very worst of the weather. There won’t be many fireworks this year but even then we don’t bring them in, my thinking is that they are better out there where they can see what’s going on than inside where they can only hear frightening noises and have no idea what’s going on, they are fine and they don’t panic because they are used to it.

I did start to bring in the plants that will not survive a harsh winter, dahlias mostly but also some creeping thyme which will do better inside and I think I will bring the olive in (the one in a pot, the other is in the ground) just to see if it brings it on any better than leaving it outside. I say started too but the rain got heavy so the rest can wait until next week when we are supposed to get drier weather 🤞

If we do go into a lockdown, which is looking very likely and as soon as next week, I have plenty to be getting on with but it will be a bit more depressing this time round with the colder days and darker nights 😏 and bang will go my family Sunday roasts though I am doing one tomorrow for Charlie, Macca, Mum and Ken so we will make sure we enjoy it 😀

John went back out to do the concreting and I lit the fire and made bread, I did volunteer but he wanted bread and some warm when he came back in. I got those done and then went out to give him a hand anyway, I did manage to load the cement mixer with around 5 lots before I had to come back in and sort the bread for baking, 56 and I can still shovel into a mixer, I’ll take that 😜 worth my weight in gold as I told John 😉 Josh, Flo and Mia came over for a bit of Halloween fun, doughnut eating, apple bobbing and sweetie hunting then a child friendly, Halloween film.

I am just sat waiting for the Prime Minister to make an announcement any time soon, we are definitely going into a lock down, for a month by the looks of it but how much of a lockdown, that’s the question. Josh was visibly unhappy when we told him that we might not be able to see each other ‘what about Mondays’ he said, meaning teatime at Nanas, I will have send it to them instead 😏

Well that’s it a month of restricted movement from Thursday 🙄 it will be different this time though as John will still be working and I will be here not seeing anyone, not too keen on this but we gotta do what we gotta do, no good moaning about anything just get on with it and hope it slows the infection rate. The good thing is the grandchildren will get one more tea at Nanas in before we can’t see each other for a month.

Sunday: We are having the first and the last (for a month at least) of the Sunday roast evenings tonight so we will make it a good one 😀 Firstly though after we have done all the morning jobs I have an eye test appointment in Witney, not sure if I will be able to pick up my glasses when they are ready though lol. Then I need to pick up a few bits of shopping for dinner later, if there is anything left, reports of panic buying are all over social media, did people not learn anything last time 🤷‍♀️ and then it will be round to Sam and Luke’s for a quick visit as it’s Luke birthday today.

I doubt we will get much done outside here today as it’s raining again but at least the path is down and has cured overnight although the cat has walked all the way along it much to Johns utter disgust 🤣

I went for my eye test, got there gave them my name and they said your appointment is the 5th not the 1st, nope it’s definitely the 1st, here is the email to prove it, a discussion out in the back commenced and finally they said they were fully booked and couldn’t fit me in today 😏 They were apologetic and it will be reported that the online booking system somehow cocked up, I wasn’t too bothered as I have plenty to be getting on with 😀 A bit of shopping though I didn’t really see any signs of panic buying in Waitrose 🤣 and then onto wish Luke a happy birthday and drop some beers to him. Well drop is exactly what happened, as John got them out of the car he appeared to throw them in the air and then not catch them, crash, smash they landed on the floor, luckily only one bottle broke but still a bit of a disaster morning 😜

John spent an hour loading logs into the back area, feeding the birds, collecting the eggs while I prepped and cooked a roast with all the trimmings, a rice pudding and an apple and blackberry crumble for our guests this evening.

And that’s another week done, next week we will be moving towards the partial lockdown in the hope that the disease can be slowed, I do hope so for the sake of the NHS staff 😏 Stay safe everyone and have a good week x

Friesland Farm

The mighty Oak, lots of paperwork 😏 & procrastination 🙄

Posted on October 25, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 19th October 2020: Good morning Monday 😀 here you are again, I don’t get the Monday morning blues mostly because I’m not obligated to be at a place of work 😝 So it’s a lovely morning, dry, not too cold, the sun is trying to shine but there is quite a bit of cloud cover. It’s coffee break time but I have already been very busy this morning, making jelly and a lemon curd cake for the VIPs, getting Johns dinner prepped ready for the oven later and making a healthy version of chicken tikka for me. I have put a wash load on, sorted the kittens, taken the recycling out and tidied some bits and bobs, pretty good before 10.30 I reckon. I need to clean out the Rayburn a little, do some hoovering and wiping round and then I will probably venture outside and find some jobs to do out there.

Here is a fact I heard that I find fascinating, I keep trying it and it’s true 😜 you don’t breathe through both nostrils at the same time, each nostril takes it in turn, one will have a rest while the other is working 😮 how did I get to 56 and not know that 😂 And now you are all trying it aren’t you 🤣🤣 your welcome 😀 And now you are googling it just to check it’s correct 😝

I had a shower this morning and again turned the water to cold to finish, at first I thought I won’t be able to do this but I go in with the idea that I will totally enjoy the hot shower and then embrace the cooler water. This is doubly difficult because we don’t have standard heating and so the house is tad cold in the mornings. As the weather gets colder I don’t think I will carry on doing it, but just this morning I heard a report that a study on older people who go into the cold water seem to develop proteins (I think) that help the brain, the study was looking into dementia specifically, interesting stuff 🤔 The reason I had a go at it in the first place was because Charlie was telling me about Wim Hof and his methods, though they are more extreme than I am willing to do, but the whole breathing techniques (not his specifically) I have been doing for over a year now as a stress reliever or a relaxation method so I thought I might as well add another technique to see what it’s like. It’s true that you can only focus on the then and there, the cold water, you can’t think about anything else so effectively it clears your mind I suppose and I do feel refreshed which is great for the day ahead but I wouldn’t be doing it in the evening when I need to wind down.

The logistics of my Monday afternoons have to be on point with the children arriving for their tea at 3.30. I have the Rayburn to light, the hens to feed and eggs to collect sort and put out, the table to lay and sandwiches to make. Sounds easy right but on days like today when it’s not too cold out but I still need to light the Rayburn, the timing is everything, too early and it’s too hot in here, too late and it’s freezing. So my aim is to light the Rayburn about 1.45 that gives me 45mins to get it going, up to temp and then shut back down for it to continue a slow burn. Then I can whip out and do the hens, collect the eggs and sort them out, after that lay the table and make the sandwiches so that tea is ready when they arrive after a busy day at school 😝

I have just sent for a brochure on electric heating and solar panels as this is what we want to move to, it will make my life a whole lots less complicated I can tell you 😂

Tuesday: A more autumnal day today though the sun was out this morning and it’s not cold by any means. After doing the usual household bits this morning I decided on the task of my wardrobe 🙄 going through it and clearing out which took me most of the morning. Neither John nor I are fashionistas 😂 in fact we both have some clothes that are well over twenty years old and probably older, we are not label people either but I do like clothing that lasts and washes well. There comes a time in every wardrobe though when things are way past their best and when your tiny granddaughter says ‘Nana you’ve got holes in that’ you know it’s time to bin it 😀 Two bagfuls for the charity shop and one for the rag bin because no one wants to wear your holey castoffs. Only two items from Johns wardrobe went, that’s because if I throw things out he will ask where they are even though he hasn’t worn them for years, there was a lot more I would like to get rid of but I would be in big trouble if I did 😂 The wardrobe is now sorted and tidy and I know where to find short sleeve good T-shirts, long sleeve good T-shirt’s, short sleeve work T-shirts, long sleeve work T-shirts, good jumpers, work jumpers, you get the idea 😝 I still have another smaller wardrobe to sort but that one can wait, that is the holiday wardrobe, mostly evening wear and who knows when we will be able to get back on a ship 😏

The woodpecker is back, it’s a great spotted woodpecker and I haven’t seen it through the summer months but I first heard it when I was burning the wood. It’s call is very distinctive once you know it and if they are calling they are usually right at the very top of a tree, then as it takes flight the undulating motion is unmistakable, it looks like an undulating torpedo. This morning it is back exploring the Oak tree outside the kitchen door, they say an Oak trees supports more life forms than any other tree. We have many conifers here as well as other trees and yet the one Oak tree is home and host to more than all the other trees put together. There were a few acorns on it this year, I have only seen one mast year in all the time we have been here, that is a year that has a bumper crop of acorns, it happened to coincide with having pigs that were raised for the freezer, they were happy piggies with all those acorns to eat.

Wednesday: Well what can I say, the weather was appalling, rain all day long but that meant I had the perfect day to do paperwork. Well a whole years books actually for both Johns plumbing and the farm, the farm is simple enough, the plumbing not so 😝 When John had a limited company I did it every Friday because there was PAYE, VAT, CITB and CIS to sort as well as suppliers and customers but once that was closed down there was not anywhere near as much to do so it kinda got left 😏 and then the weeks rolled into months and before you know it that’s a year gone 🙄 I spent the best part of the day getting the paperwork in order that’s before I can even start to get it written down. I know I ought to sort myself out a bit and make sure it’s written every week and I will pledge to do that from here on in but we will see how long it lasts 😉

I did do the usual jobs inbetween the paperwork, that’s what makes it difficult really as I have to keep stopping mid flow to do other jobs at certain times.

Thursday: We (that includes John when he got home) continued to work on the books until 10pm last night and so today I am having some time off. I went out with Shelley and Flo, the aim was to find a two piece skeleton outfit for Josh for Halloween day at school. Most rising five year old boys would not even think about the need to pee and how difficult that might be in a one piece suit, but Josh had and wanted a two piece for comfort breaks 😀 Objective achieved we did a little bit of retail therapy before having lunch out, I have to say everywhere was fairly quiet and it felt safe enough to be out and about. Once back home it was time to do the egg rounds, get the Rayburn lit (although it’s fairly warm today) and get tonight’s dinner sorted. The daylight hours are getting shorter and shorter and the clocks change soon, there is talk about postponing it but I can’t see that happening to be honest, the hens are usually in bed by 6.15ish which gives us our evenings back, not that there is much to do socially 😂

Friday: What have I done today, well I did a few household bits then got the paperwork out, yep I’m still doing it and this is why: I’d done about an hour of sorting out what was what ready to (eventually) get it all down in order, Samantha messaged ‘what are you doing today’ I replied ‘paperwork but I’m happy to pack it away’ 😜 and so she came over with the children and I packed it away 😂 We went to the park, played on the swings and slide, had a whip round the supermarket for a few bits and then back home, that’s why the paperwork is taking so long because I’m happy to stop anytime 🤣 There is always tomorrow 🙄

Saturday: I turned the alarm off this morning as yesterday it was going for ten minutes and John didn’t turn it off (it’s for him not me) eventually I had to get up and do it so I thought this morning I will turn it off. John eventually gets up an hour after it would normally go off and started complaining, he was waiting for it to go off before he got up 🤷‍♀️ The thing is that the light can be seen through the curtains they are not blackout ones and so I said surely you know roughly what time it is by the daylight coming through, or is it just me?

Anyway eventually he got up and he got on with the rounds while I sorted out washing, rubbish bins etc. Then I thought I would get the paperwork out and get on with it, I turned off the radio for total peace and quiet, about half an hour in John comes in to make a cuppa but not quietly, oh no, making as much noise as possible then starts asking me inane questions, I stopped what I was trying to do. Tea drunk I managed to pack him off to get some feed and take some bits to the charity shop, I got back on with the paperwork. He returns and does a bit of cleaning out of chicken huts then comes in and decides he is going to watch the news on the tv 🙄 I am trying to concentrate and all I can hear is a reporter with a very irritating voice going on and on and on, so I packed it all away, I give up trying to get this done in peace 😏

In the afternoon his new phone arrived, the old one wasn’t charging and he was due an upgrade, only problem is he is not gadget savvy and so I have to set it all up for him. The problem with that is it’s android which I am not used to and the transfer of information is not as easy as my device. Luckily Shelley, Martin and the kids arrived for a cuppa and Shelley managed to transfer it all from one phone to another, though she did have to google it first. She then sorted out another problem with my e mail, I could get it on my phone but not my iPad, all very irritating but sorted now 😀

I haven’t actually done very much on the smallholding this week at all have I ? Just the basics, sometimes I have weeks like that and this is one of them.

Tonight I am off round to a friends for dinner to celebrate two of our other friends birthdays, I am looking forward to seeing them all again, haven’t seen them since before the lockdown, lots to catch up on.

Sunday: A dry sunny day, lovely actually until about 3pm when it got colder and started raining. The clocks went back last night giving us an extra hour in bed so when we got up it was light again but the downside is that it will be dark earlier tonight.

We had a chap come round and cut the front hedge as it has got rather big and John couldn’t really do it with the electric hedge trimmer. We had a delivery of beef from Emma’s ewesful acres although I was going to get some lamb off the van but we were out when she delivered so I will have to order it and wait for her to be delivering out this way again.

We went out for breakfast this morning and met my sister and brother in law there, lovely breakfast, a bit later than we are used to having it but it was a nice change not to be working. When we got back John got out the hedge trimmer to do some other bits of hedge but it kept raining on and off and the sky is ‘moody’ so I guess that’s how it is going to be for the rest of the day. Charlie and Macca called in for a cuppa and when they left I got the Rayburn lit and the dinner prepped, quite a bitty kind of day but a lovely one none the less 😀

Consequently after having a week of not getting stuff done I now have a head full of jobs that I am thinking about and that will need doing next week 😝 I suppose, because we are usually constantly doing something, that having an easy week is allowed now and again 😀

That’s another week of 2020 done and dusted, I would say that along with millions of others I will be glad to see the back of this year but I have a feeling that next year may not be as great as we are all hoping, unless they get that vaccine. The numbers are climbing and climbing all over the world and seemingly more rapidly that the first outbreak. I still can’t decide what is the best plan of attack really, let people go about their daily business or keep them locked down in various ways, I guess the first option would overwhelm the hospitals and then we would be in even bigger trouble 🙄

Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, stay safe and have a good week 😀

Friesland Farm

I’ll give the sourdough a miss 😝 butternut squash soup and indigo rose tomatoes 🍅

Posted on October 18, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 12th October 2020: The pandemic continues though I have to say it seems like it is happening elsewhere and I hope they don’t end up being famous last words 🙄 Seriously though we seem to be in a bit of a bubble here, the last outbreak before and during lockdown didn’t really seem to hit our rural area very hard and hopefully the same will be said for this second wave. Today the Prime Minister will announce new measures to try and curb the virus, we wait to see what those will be 😏

Meanwhile life is as normal as is possible and today I have VIP’s coming for tea, the grandchildren are coming after school for sandwiches, cake and jelly and ice cream 😀 I busied myself with getting things tidied, put away (always seems to be things to put away) getting some washing on, sorting the kittens, then making jelly and cake.

The sourdough starter seemed to have a life of its own overnight, it grew so much that it leaked out of the sides, that’s a good thing 😀 I guess it was due to the heat from the Rayburn in the kitchen as this morning it has calmed back down again although it still has life (bubbles) so I have fed it again. The sourdough dough I had in a bowl which didn’t seem to rise was showing signs of activity this morning so I baked it to see how it came out. I can tell you that if I was about to attack a local castle keep I would consider using it in the catapult 😂 it’s a bit solid, however I cut it and it smells like sourdough though heavy in structure, I tasted it and it has that sour taste so I’d say it’s about 70% successful, just need to improve on the technique now.

The measures have been announced and we are going into a three tired system of medium, high and very high risk with various rules for each of those but not a complete lockdown, I’m not sure if any of this will do any good the numbers still seem to be climbing and climbing 🙄

Tuesday: A cold but dry morning this morning. John did the morning rounds before going off to do some proper work 😂 I spent the morning organising food by various means, first I got some butternut squash soup on the go for my lunch today, that’s basically a butternut squash, onion, sweet potato, chicken stock, black pepper and a grating of nutmeg, I will taste it later and see if it needs a sprinkle of anything else such as curry powder or my new fav thing to use smoked paprika 😀 Then I ordered a box of beef from a local smallholder, hhttps://www.emmasewesfulacres.com I have had it from her before and when she delivers I will probably have a look to see what lamb she has on the van. That will keep us going through Autumn and Winter, we have our own chicken and duck in the freezer already plus some venison, goat meat and fish that I still have to use up. Once I had ordered that I sorted out dinner for this evening which tonight is salmon, I will have mine with a honey, sesame oil, soy sauce and balsamic vinegar marinade, then orzo, bell pepper, broccoli, garlic and ginger stir fry while John will have his with potato and veg, we are worlds apart when it comes to food. In light of the fact he will hate having salmon (but will eat it) I got tomorrow’s dinner underway as well (go me) a hearty oxtail stew in the slow cooker. Oxtail isn’t something that many use any more but it has great flavour, it has gone in with carrots, potato, onion, tomato paste, black pepper, beef stock, Worcester sauce and thyme, again I will give it a taste test to see if anything else needs adding. I will slow cook it all day, turn it off over night and then turn it on again around lunchtime tomorrow, stews taste better if they are made one day and eaten the next, so they say anyway, certainly gives it time for all those flavours to mingle.

Butternut squash soup (no filter) lovely vibrant colour packed with vitamin A, C, E & beta carotene, also contains many important minerals 😀

I have let the kittens out this morning, up to now they have only had the run of the boot room but today the door is open to the back undercover area. To begin with they went out and I couldn’t see them anywhere but the next time I went out, there they were and they came in for some dreamies so that’s a good sign that they will stay close by (for the time being) even if I don’t know where they are. Eventually they will get more adventurous and go further afield but hopefully always coming back for some food.

I have come to the conclusion that the sourdough starter does not do very well in our house because we don’t have a stable constant temperature, it gets warm in the evening after we have lit the Rayburn mid afternoon but we let it out mid evening so it doesn’t get too hot over night. The starter seems to be reacting to these temps, first it grows well during the evening but by morning it’s flat again because it’s much colder. I have fed it again this morning and will see what happens later, I thought about making the bread in the evening but again sourdough takes longer to prove than normal bread so that may not work either. I don’t even eat very much bread of any kind so I’m not sure why I am doing it to be honest 😜 just because I wanted to have a go, I may give up on it though and buy the odd loaf now and again 🤷‍♀️

I have also been busy over the last week or so ordering Christmas presents, who knows exactly what is going to happen over the next few months, might as well get ahead just in case it all goes haywire. It’s crazy when you really think about it all, weeks in total lockdown, who ever thought that would happen, now we are all wearing masks when we go out into town, we can only meet a few people at a time, some places have tighter restrictions than others, as I have said before I can’t wait to see the blockbuster film that will inevitably be made about this lol, not quite as scary as The Walking Dead but just as unbelievable (well it will be when they look back in history) Yes indeed we are living through some very strange times 😏

After lunch I went out to the post box and realised it was nice and warm in the sun, it’s often colder indoors than outside here, so I decided to get my gear on and do a bit of garden work. I spent a happy couple of hours cutting back dead stuff and pulling up veg that has now gone over, digging up comfrey (as it’s seeded everywhere) I did stop short on one patch when I spotted ladybirds, probably trying to find a place to hibernate for winter, better make sure I don’t tidy too much 🙄 Back indoors for a quick coffee and a sit down before the afternoon rounds begin. I have seen no more signs of snakes and also sadly I have not seen any frogs all summer, even in the dank areas, I think the snakes have eaten them all 😢 either that or they are hiding well.

While I was working away I was also pondering on what I had learnt this year in the garden, no matter how much you know there is always more to learn. I learnt that yacon are pretty easy to grow here and that they taste very good, I learnt that often when you think a veg plant is ‘spent’ it surprises you with more offerings (I’m thinking about the loofah here) I learnt that the weather can throw you curve balls ( actually I know that but this years was the biggest yet) and that I need to do more to prepare for weather anomalies. I learnt a bit about myself, I like to grow things in order, I am not good with what seems to be chaos in the veg garden but I know I need to learn to cope with it as it’s a better way of growing 😂

I am hearing more and more worrying reports of people who have had COVID for a second time, that’s just plain unlucky and I think we were hoping that if you get it once you won’t get it again. The ‘Long COVID’ is also a worry, people dealing with the effects of it long after they have recovered from it, maybe this virus is every bit as bad as they say it is, I hope we never find out.

I have just googled to see if there is a general trend towards panic buying again, not on the same scale as we saw before but it is there it seems. This would tie in with the increase of egg customers we have had, there have been weeks when we didn’t have a single customer for two or three days and now suddenly we are inundated again, I have seen customers wearing masks again which had all but stopped so there must be some unease out there. Unfortunately it’s the time of year when we have less eggs than usual due to the shortening of daylight time so there will never be enough eggs to go round 🙄 John and I discussed what we would do if we went into another lockdown as the gate sales were crazy and of course we had people who had never been before and haven’t been back since which was really unfair on our regular customers but we were unable to stop it as it came upon us pretty swiftly. It’s a difficult one to determine because although we do know most of our regulars especially the ones that have been coming for years, there are some that we couldn’t readily identify. I think we would initially just shut the gate and have a think about it 😂

Wednesday: Is it only mid week, seems like it’s been a long week already and we are only halfway there 😏 The sun was shinning beautifully this morning but by 9am when I went out to put the rubbish out the sky was looking moody and five minutes later a rain shower appeared, I think that is how the day will unfold today. I thought that perhaps today was not going to be an outside work day so I set about cleaning out the fridge, not a massive task but it’s amazing how many things get left from week to week and before you know it they have been there months. So out went anything that looked well past it’s date, I will keep and use some things that have gone past the best before date especially if they are still sealed but today was a clear out day. Out went a half jar of mincemeat probably used last Christmas, a half jar of plum sauce I made last year and a half jar of pickled onions also probably last used at Christmas, none of them showing any signs of mould but time to throw them anyway. There were the usual culprits in the bottom drawer, soggy cucumbers and shrivelled apples, any thing half decent will go to the geese and guineas the rest will go for composting. Amazing how satisfying it is to see a clean tidy fridge 😂 I also made the decision to abandon the sourdough starter 😭 things were not going well with it and so time to admit defeat, I think if I want sourdough I will buy it 😂

Another thing that occurred to me was that you may be wondering about Ted’s fate as we move closer to Christmas, rest assured he will not be joining us for dinner 😜 he is now part of the smallholding family and has a name so will continue to live freely here. He is totally oblivious to the fate of his fellow turkians though and as a result is not in the least bit grateful still making John walk him back to his pen each night 🙃

Well it didn’t rain in fact it was very pleasant out there and consequently I have had a very productive morning. At first I had no idea what to do, to be fair we have so much to do that it can be overwhelming at times, in those circumstances it’s an idea to pick a starting point and work from there. Did I do that, nope I flitted from job to job BUT I still made progress , or at least I feel like I did. First I tidied up the egg shed area where I put out plants for sale, then I took down some fencing that was screwed to other fencing that will be coming down eventually. I went to put the plant shelves (that were out by the egg shed) away and the shed they go into was a tip so I cleaned out the shed and threw away a wheelbarrow full of ‘crap’ and now I can walk into the shed easily 😀 After that I had a walk round the veg garden and started clearing some bits away, I picked a few tomatoes and then moved onto the big tunnel. I cleared away the cucumber vine which all but spent, there were about five small cues on there so I picked them first, the skins are toughening now and so I could have kept the vine going but the cues would not be very nice. Then I cut back and pulled out the cape gooseberry plants which have turned into triffids over the last two years and I decided I don’t want them in there any more. I must be in a ‘cleansing’ mood at the minute as it feels good to get it all sorted. At times with many diseases but especially Lupus you get ‘brain fog’ this is a real thing just in case you have ever wondered. Brain fog takes away the ability to be able to focus and think clearly hence the standing there wondering where to begin on many occasions 😜 I never used to be like that, I always had a definite plan of attack and some days I still do but others I just have to muddle through as best as possible and hope for a good result 😀

I collected some seeds while I was going about my jobs, some morning glory, which have been splendid and some Sarah Raven California poppies which are just the most beautifully delicate little poppies (must remember that those are still in my jacket pocket 🙄) Seed collecting is one of the pleasures of gardening and an important part of self sustainability, buying the seeds just once should ensure a lifetimes supply of that plant unless something goes horribly wrong. The same can be said with perennials, once you have them they can be divided over and over and you never need to buy it again. Many vegetables will produce seed if left long enough and again collecting those ensure you will have a crop next year, something I need to make more of an effort to do especially after this year when everyone was buying them and suddenly they were scarce. With that in mind, at my trip to the garden centre I bought some seeds that I had not been able to get hold of this year just in case. Red cabbage was one, I tried and tried to find the seeds but I couldn’t get any, the other seeds I picked up were for an indigo tomato. I bought a plant this year and it has been amazing, you may find this in shops but they would have to be niche I think. These toms are delicious and again because of their colour they are packed with vitamins and antioxidants, they have more flesh than a regular tomato and so do not go to mush when they are cut.

I need to go through my veg seeds and see what I have left, what I have collected so far and what needs to be ordered. I have some little gem lettuce that are going to seed at the minute so I will be collecting those hopefully. The French beans are drying in the greenhouse and the runner beans are still on the plant, when they look ready I will get them in to dry, I have pepper seeds drying on the windowsill and there are some chick peas to be harvested which grew from just three seeds, I have trebled them this year 😀 In theory I need never buy seeds again but where is the fun in that 😜

Thursday: A bright, sunny morning but a bit of a chill in the air, so far this morning I have just pottered about doing various household tasks. Sam and the twins are going to come over today so we will probably go out for a walk round the village, got to make the best of the good days while we can and also spend time together while we can as who knows what this winter will be like with Covid lurking round every corner.

I hatched a plan last night, in fact it is something I thought of doing this year but didn’t so I am definitely doing it next year. I will use the ménage to grow pumpkins and squash and to make sure I do I have already ordered a good selection of squash seeds. Butternut, spaghetti, banana, acorn, and a selection of pumpkin varieties, this year because the ménage has not been used the weeds have taken hold, if I use it to grow sprawling veg that will at least lessen that problem. It’s a massive area for growing roughly 40 x 20 metres 😮 the surface has always been woodchip and it constantly breaks down so there should be some good loam under there, probably the best growing site on the Smallholding 😂

Just had a news update come through and London is moving to tier two on the restrictions 🙄

Went on a walk around the village with Sam, George and Lucie, on the way back we stopped and saw Grampy (John) who was in the village working. Sam fed the kids their dinner when we got back and she had literally left when Shelley and Florence arrived 😀

They said it was going to be warmer today than yesterday but I don’t think it is, there is a definite chill in the air even when the sun is out.

Friday: Dry, overcast and not too cold this morning. Just stopped for a coffee, we are total creatures of habit aren’t we? I was working outside and thought, time for coffee, without even looking at my watch I find that it’s exactly the time I would have a coffee if I was indoors 🤷‍♀️ This morning I have meditated, had a shower with a blast of cold water at the end, fed the quail, the horses and the Guineas extra rations, put clean bedding in for the ducks and the geese plus all the usual routine jobs. The horses are being given extra feed now as the grass is getting sparse, you can tell by the way they start to hang around the gateways that they are getting hungrier. We are trying to give biscuit a mix of cod liver oil, turmeric, black pepper and ginger as she is getting on a bit and it might just help her with her old bones. The problem is Jack (greedy git that he is) I feed them and have to guard her feed as Jack scoffs his quickly and she takes a lot longer, he is then trying to get to hers 🙄 I spotted one the kittens up a tree while I was out there, they are getting more adventurous but luckily they do come running back if I appear. We see Diesel every couple of days, I have no idea where he disappears to but he eventually comes home, not much good at keeping the mice down round the farm though if he is off wandering.

The garlic, onions and shallots I ordered a few weeks back have arrived so I need to think about getting those in, hopefully I will do that today.

I have been listening to a pod cast that is very funny, it’s Lee Mack and his friend ‘I can’t believe it’s not Buddha’ it’s a hilarious chat about a path they are both following with serious intention, if you see me laughing out loud with my headphones in, that’s what I will be listening to 😜

I spent a wonderful two hours weeding and clearing the bean bed. The top quarter I had already done as that’s where the cauliflower are now planted but the rest of the bed needed doing. At the beginning of the year I had some self seeded yellow daisies growing in there so I let them carry on but I had forgotten how big the plants got as a consequence they over shadowed a lot of the peas I had growing so I won’t let them stay there next year. I pulled out the remains of these daisies, a Swiss chard ( I dug that up and gave it to the guineas) that had self set, hundreds of weeds of all types and the dead foliage of bean and pea plants. I had intended to put the onions, garlic and shallots in here but the side of the bed has collapsed and needs re doing (cue John 😜) so I will wait until I get that sorted before planting them. I am glad I have cleared it all as there were a lot of white fly probably settling down to overwinter, they tuck themselves right down in the foliage near to the roots ready for a comfy sleep I suspect, not any more 🙄 I say a wonderful two hours because it was lovely, the weather was just right, warm enough, no sun, no wind, no rainy bits and the ground is dry enough to work on without getting very dirty 😀 I still have plenty more work to do out there but that will be enough for today, time for lunch and a sit down before getting on with the afternoon jobs.

The healthy eating is going well (most of the time) I have lost a stone and a half! Impressed, yep me too 😀 I amazed actually 😜 Many years back I started WW and got to goal then spent about 10 years clerking for them but gradually the weight crept back on and then some. I know what to eat I just didn’t know why I wasn’t doing it even though I wanted to shift the ‘back fat’ and the third boob, the girls will know what I mean by that 😉 So when I started seeing ads for Noom I was intrigued by the psychology aspect it was presenting, two weeks free trail, what did I have to lose 🤷‍♀️ The two weeks came to an end and I thought might as well carry this on, so I did, I am. There is no miracle to losing weight, it’s mainly persistence but I think the Noom app helps an awful lot with that, there are lessons and information every single day digging into your own psychology (sometimes you dig so deep you surprise yourself) learning the best food balance for you and your situation, it’s not a diet as such more the re-set of your mind when it comes to food choices. I am obviously not affiliated to them nor do I suggest you rush out and join, just telling you my experience of it, I think it’s a great thing to follow, it took me a while to get my head around it, I thought I knew all there was to know about dieting but it seems not 😝

I babysat Mia and the twins although the twins were already in bed so MIA and I had fun taking photos, dancing and singing 😀

Saturday: Another dry, reasonable day today, John did the animals and then had to go off to do a quick plumbing job. When he got back he began to dig out the last bit of the path, but I needed his help fixing the side of the veg bed that had collapsed. So we sourced some wood, dug it out and put in new sides, I got on with back filling the bed while he went to finish what he started. I raked and riddled the bed, took out as much bindweed root as I could find and then I needed Johns help again 😂 and I wonder why he takes so long over jobs 😝 I wanted to bury the soaker hose in the soil, it was partly buried but over time had come up, it was also too long and curled around on itself in places, first I had to cut it to length which meant the end now had no stop. The stop on the original bit had failed (I always wondered why there was a puddle) so I asked John if he had anything that would work, being a plumber I was pretty sure he would. It did mean filing down the outside of the soaker hose though so the bit could be fitted, once it was done we tested it and voila it works well. He went back to his job (again) and I got on with burying the pipe down the centre of the bed, this will give me a more even watering than I had before. After that I planted all the onions, shallots and garlic bulbs, 20 shallots, 16 garlic and I lost count of the onions after 40 but I think there are about 50 in total. That’s not the end of the job because of course I then have to cover them so that the chickens don’t scratch them all up which given that they love freshly turned soil, is a dead cert. I got some lengths of environmesh and pegged them down this will also stop the birds thinking the tops of the onions are worms and pulling them out, it won’t stop the worms pushing them up and out though 😂 So that’s all done and I probably won’t have to do anything to them until next spring unless it gets very weedy between now and then. Environmesh is great stuff and well worth the investment, don’t use environ fleece as that just breaks up, the mesh lets the light and the rain in but keeps the birds off it also creates a micro climate by trapping any warm air a bit like a string vest 😜

Hopefully there will be more days like these when the weather is favourable enough to be able to get the rest of the beds under control and prepared for next spring. I have done that bed and one third of another bed only four and two thirds more to go 😣 In total I have the fruit cage, the two tunnels, the brassica cage, five very large beds, one long thin one, a separate raised bed and the birds, bees and beer bed, I need to start pulling my finger out I think 🤔

Sunday: Man o man I am knackered 😜 I have spent all day from about 9 this morning, it’s now 4pm, burning wood 🙄 The cladding that came off the front of the building needed burning so that was today’s job, there were a few branches from some trees that had been there a while as well. First I had to sort through the pile as it all just got dumped there, there was a pile of painted stuff that needs to go in the skip, a pile of wood that was ok and would come in handy at some point and a pile of gravel boards. I then sorted the wood into smaller and longer bits, the smaller bits I started off in the burning barrel but about two hours in the side started to give so then I started a pile on the ground. The reason I didn’t do this in the first place was the wood was too close to where I would be burning and I like a controlled burn, John, like most men I suspect, would have just had a twenty foot pile of wood and set fire to it 😜 Also he would not have thought about the insects and any small animals that might be under the wood whereas I do so if I move it then they have a chance of getting away first. In fact I was stood there and a little mouse came creeping out of the ground, saw the fire and high tailed away elsewhere 🐭 Meanwhile John was busy creating next weeks burning load, he has given the hedge, where we had the trees cut down, a good pruning both the top and the sides as the branches had got long and straggly. Come spring they should bush out really well as well as grow higher, they have good big roots on them so that will help.

Charlie and Macca called in for a cuppa before go out for the afternoon, we should do something I said to John but in the end we carried on working 😂

Friesland Farm

Sourdough starter, Christmas cake & a couple of little failures 🙄

Posted on October 5, 2020October 11, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 5th October 2020: After the dismal weather at the weekend, this morning the sun was shinning thank goodness, it’s soggy ground underfoot but at least it’s not raining for the moment. John did the morning rounds and my first job was to tidy the boot room and give it a bit of a clean, sort out the kitten area and hoover. From that I went out to give the horses a small breakfast and turn them back out, they won’t appreciate being in when the sun is out, then muck out the stables ready for the next lot of bad weather. I did a quick whip round the veg garden picked some very small courgettes, a handful of runner beans and a couple of punnets of raspberries, I contemplated doing more out there but the ground is so wet I think it’s best left to dry off a bit. It won’t hurt to leave for a while and it will do damage by compact I g the ground if I walk on it while it’s wet so decision made. I had ordered some archive boxes and they arrived yesterday so I went into the office and started to do some sorting out in there. Plenty of paperwork that can be boxed up and stored out in the old caravan until it needs to be burnt ( about 7 years time 🙄) I don’t even know if you need to keep it that long anymore, I guess as most things are now digital it would be possible to find them online if needed but old habits die hard 😂 Why do we keep so much stuff, that’s what I have been wondering over the past couple of weeks, I think I would like to go minimalist but we would need about five skips to get rid of it all I reckon 😜 I am that person that keeps the boxes things come in just in case I decide to sell them, only I never sell them as most things get thoroughly used. Today I have managed to sort all the boxes out and flatten them for recycling, sorted out Christmas decorations I don’t want and put them in an ever growing pile for the charity shop, looked through a pile of other stuff and put it back on the shelf 😏 And still there is plenty of ‘stuff’ I don’t know what to do with lol, I need to get tougher I think and increase the charity pile 😀 You know what it’s like though, the minute you get rid of something, you inexplicably need it!

Good morning sunshine 🌞 nice to see you after a dismal weekend of rain.

I took a break from doing that job and put a home reared chicken in the slow cooker with homegrown garlic and herbs, together with home grown spuds and veg and we will have home grown raspberries for dessert, that’s what I spend my life doing….growing dinner 🥰

I got a sourdough starter on the go, I have been wanting to do this for ages but the process is long and so I could never be bothered, well today I started 😀 I did do it years ago but turned to fast yeast instead for time saving, now we are going into Winter I will have more time so it seems like a good opportunity. It’s very easy, just mix flour with water leave the jar open for a while to ‘catch’ wild yeast (its floating all around us) and then ‘feed’ it for the next six days (not an instant food) then it will be ready to bake with. I put it on the window sill because it needs a bit of warmth to stimulate it, I will close the lid in about an hours time and let it do it’s thing. You can buy fresh starter online but by the time it gets delivered you could be four days into your own batch.

Another thing I spend time doing is getting into discussions on various topics, the latest one was ‘what time does evening begin’? I would say 6pm others have different opinions but of course this then leads to the ‘time does not exist’ theory. Time doesn’t exist, it’s only what man had created in order to…well, keep order 🙄 There is change, change over a day, night, month, year, decade, millennium but it’s not time, I will just leave that there for you to ponder 😂

Something else that I keep meaning to have a go at and that is fruit leathers, today I finally got round to doing it, never done it before but I have a feeling if it works out well I will be doing a lot more. The main reason I have done it now is because we are lighting the Rayburn daily so I may as well use it to it’s full advantage. The fruit leathers are easy enough to prepare, I used raspberries I picked this morning, put them in a sieve and used a spoon to crush them and squeeze the juice through leaving behind all the little seeds. Line a Swiss roll tin with grease proof paper and pour the juice in, this then went into the warming oven at the bottom of the Rayburn to dry. I’m not sure how long they will take, the warming oven doesn’t get direct heat it basically harnesses the heat from the oven above, it’s not a lot of heat as the oven is well lined but it’s a gentle warm, dry heat ideal for this kind of thing. I often put things in there and totally forget they are there mind you 😂 I have just taken the walnuts out as I put them into dry off, if you left them in for weeks they would be shrivelled up 🙄 like the orange slices I did they were more orange bullets when I eventually found them.

Fruit leather (raspberry) going in the Rayburn for drying

I know it’s only October but I am starting to think about Christmas, more specifically the Christmas cake, I need to get it made soon, that will give me plenty of time to feed it 😀 I always made one, then I had a few years when I didn’t bother and now I make them again. It’s true that it lasts for weeks, John has usually gone back to work after the Christmas break and is still having it in his lunchbox 😂 but it’s great to have if you unexpectedly have guests and nothing else in the cupboards. I will probably use our walnuts and hazels instead of almonds and I still have some dried apple rings from last year in the cupboard so I will use those along with the bought dried fruit, mmmm can’t wait to get it started now, I love the smell of the fruit soaking in orange and brandy 🥰 The Winter months are when I get to use all those wonderful things I have been growing/making all year long, that’s as it should be, traditionally long before the time when you could pop to the supermarket or have stuff on next day delivery, you would have worked towards stocking up your winter stores and especially for that marvellous mid winter feast that has now been thoroughly taken over by commercialism 😏 I try, as much as possible, to still have a traditional Christmas, it’s all about good food and good company and I think I have successfully passed on that to my children just as my Mum did to me 😘

I have to do the feed and egg collecting rounds today as John is still working, bloody typical then that it has just started spitting with rain 😜

Tuesday: Dry and sunny again this morning although it did rain a little last night. This morning I got up had breakfast, a shower, sorted the cats out, got something I prepared earlier out of the freezer for dinner tonight, fed my sourdough starter, put some washing on and hoovered up. Now I am off out for a walk around Blenheim, we bought annual passes this time last year 🙄 luckily or unluckily depends on how you see it, they were extended until April next year, not because of Covid and the fact we couldn’t use them for half the year but because they cocked up sending them to me in the first place, not once but three times! Basically the only times we have been able to use them is when the weather is cold 😂 even then we have to advance book an entry place, never mind at least we can 😀

The sun was shinning the rain stayed away and we had a lovely walk around the Blenheim grounds, George even did a little bit of the walk himself 😀

Back home it was time to do the egg rounds, get the Rayburn lit and get the dinner on but not before a lovely cup of tea ☕️

John was telling me that this morning when he went out to do the birds there were two large white birds in the standing water in the paddock, from his description (shame he didn’t have his phone and get a pic) and looking online we think they were a pair of Little Egrets. There is only a heron that looks similar and they are grey, he said these were pure white.

Wednesday: Cold but dry this morning. I have fed the sourdough starter and it’s beginning to take form, you can see the yeast is working that’s producing the bubbles and the smell is acidic which is exactly what we want it to be at this point.

I went outside and picked a few raspberries and a courgette, that’s about all there is as the moment, I bought in a butternut squash and I think I will have some of it roasted for dinner tonight with a lamb chop and other veg. It’s a tad cold and as I don’t have to work in the cold I thought I would wait until it warms up a bit. That’s the joy of being my own boss with nobody waiting for me to do anything 😀 I have the complete freedom to do what I like when I like although as I have mentioned before you do have to be a little bit disciplined otherwise nothing would get done at all.

The fruit leather didn’t work out, my fault as there was not enough pulp so it was a very thin layer which basically just stuck to the greaseproof paper, I will try again at a later date.

Charlie called in for a cup of coffee, she has a week off and so that was a lovely interlude that we don’t get very often 🥰 After that I went out and had a look at the bird boxes that we had taken down when we did the front. I want to put them back up somewhere but I’m not sure where is high enough for their safety, I cleaned them out and I will keep looking for places to put them. Then onto the veg garden, I find if I don’t have a definite plan I bimble a bit, so I started off bimbling 🙄 and then got into my stride. I have now cleared all the small raised beds, put mushroom compost on the top of them and covered them with the bio degradable black plastic, that’s how they will stay for overwintering. I then cleared the rest of the dwarf French beans and put a few of them in the greenhouse for drying, I can use the seeds again next year. Then lunch and a podcast Charlie had sent me a link to. I feel a bit tired today and on those days have to force myself to do things and also to eat well, the temptation to grab anything is high but I got myself something nutritious and so after a small rest I will hopefully be re energised 😀

Next job was to soak the dried fruit for the Christmas cake, it’s an easy five minute job and the fruit can be left until you are ready to get the cake mixed, I will probably leave it 24hrs. I have 1kg dried fruit, orange zest and juice, a good splash of fresh orange juice, and then some alcohol if you like it, if not add more orange juice. I used some rumtopf I had left from last year and a tiny bottle of blackberry wine that I had in the cupboard. You can use whatever you like really, it’s all going to taste great in the end🥰

Various stages, soaking the fruit, the mixture and the end product.

I made a skinny version of banana bread, all I can say is don’t bother not if you are expecting it to taste delicious anyway 🙄 I did have a piece but I squirted some skinny syrup (0 calories) on it and it filled a hole and was ok but only ok 😏

I’ve prepped the dinner, lit the Rayburn, fed the chickens, collected the eggs and then sorted them out to go into the shed. I am feeling tired or glum not sure which one precedes which, I try and chivvy myself along but the pep talk does not work so I guess it’s tiredness.

Butternut squash, ever tried it? I have had it before but usually in a stew or similar, well tonight I roasted it 😮 oh my days that took the taste of it to a whole new level for me, delicious 😋 I will definitely be looking at different ways to have this vegetable though my fav is going to be roasted I can just tell 😀

The nights are drawing in very quickly now, it’s dark by 7pm, we have a few weeks yet before it’s dark by 4.30 😏 and we have the clock change coming at the end of the month, always buggers everyone up doesn’t it 😂 I hate it when people say ‘yeah but really it’s *o’clock’ no, no it’s not because the clocks have changed so that is what time it is 😝 It’s usually the same kind of people that like to let you know that while you were on holiday and the weather was not what it could be, they had glorious sunshine back at home, you know the type, and if that type is you….just don’t 🤣

Thursday: Its raining again and it has been raining overnight but on the upside I feel in good spirits today so I must have been tired yesterday. I need to always remember that even if I look well there are things going on inside my body that upset the balance from time to time, it usually results in feeling tired and grumpy 🤷‍♀️ so a good rest can often sort things out 😀 Not sure what I will get done today, I need to feed the starter and I have got some washing on but apart from that I have not many any definite decisions yet, oh I need to sort the Christmas cake so I will probably get that done this morning.

The kittens will have been here two weeks by the weekend and I think they are getting a little bit bored of being in the boot room so we will have to let them start exploring. Jack is fine I don’t have any worries about him, I think he will come when called but Jill is a different story. She has always been and still is reserved, she doesn’t come to greet any of us when we go into the room, she sits firmly in the corner and her head goes down when we stroke her, it is a bit of progress though as when she first came as she would growl at us. I don’t particularly want them to be over friendly just as long as they come for food and don’t clear off for good 😜

The Christmas cake is mixed and in the oven 😀 once cooked and cooled it will be stored and then bought out weekly to feed it with some alcohol or other. The smell of the mixture was amazing and I tasted the spoon 🙄 delicious, to be honest in my opinion the raw mixture is better than the cooked cake but it’s not very good for you 😂

The sourdough starter is smelling sour, that’s a good thing, it is working a treat. I can remember the first time I had sourdough bread, July 2006, I can be that precise because I was up in the Blue Mountains, I had taken Charlie to Australia to visit my Brother Joe and his wife Monique. We took a trip up to the mountains to have Christmas in July, we had some real laughs due to the place we had booked not being a bit like the online photos 😝 We checked out and went elsewhere and in the process of finding new accommodation we stopped for soup in a little cafe. Soup and sourdough bread with unsalted butter, well I was hooked from then on. At that time over here in the UK it wasn’t something you could find on a regular menu, it seemed to me that the Australians were so far ahead of us with food choices and outlooks, I am glad to say that we have caught up with them, almost 🙄

As I was doing the Christmas cake my thoughts turned to Christmas crafts, I am not terribly artistic (that’s an understatement 😝) but I do like to have a go at something for the occasion. I want to get the office all sorted so that I can sit in there in the evening and do things like crafting or my other passion, ancestry 😀 one day I will get it sorted. I quite like the darker nights for doing that kind of thing, I can’t wait to get started however I have to do the books up for the year first 🥴 I had an email saying they were due (they are very overdue 🙄) so I need to get my house in order before I can begin to enjoy myself.

I have no idea what is going on but we have had an increase in the number of customers coming to get eggs, today it was 19! That is unheard of apart from during lockdown, 2/3rds of them will have been disappointed to find the egg shed empty. For a few weeks now we have always had eggs available most times of the day but over the last three or four days they have sold as soon as they go out 🙄

Friday: Always a welcome day, a happy day and today is a sunny day which makes it even better 😀

Sometimes I get philosophical that’s not always a good thing as it generally occupies all of my thinking for a few hours at least 😜 Why have I chosen to do what I do? It’s not something I always wanted to do it is something that evolved over time and you have to wonder why? Fundamentally I despair of the human race as a collective, not as individuals, there are millions and millions of good people but collectively humans seem to tread the same path I guess I retreated to this lifestyle because (in my opinion) its wholesome, with it comes a responsibility to look after nature or at least to not do it any harm, but then if that were the case you would think I would be vegetarian and I’m not, life is confusing isn’t it. See what I mean, it doesn’t do to start thinking lol. Sometimes I just need to write these things down so thank you for accommodating my thoughts for today, of course the whole subject is wider and deeper than that but it’s a weekly blog not a year long one 😂

“Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning.” – Albert Einstein

Sam and Shelley came over with the little ones that are not at school and we went for a walk down a local lane, I looked for apples on a tree but they had all gone, there are a few blackberries left but most have started to shrivel up, it’s beginning to look and feel like autumn 🍂 Though we do get compensation in the way of awesome sunsets at this time of year 😀

I opened my sourdough starter this morning and it has liquid on the top, this apparently is called hooch and means the starter needs feeding 🙄 it’s like having a baby 😂 The hooch is alcohol produced by the yeast but by all accounts you wouldn’t want to drink it, I don’t think I took enough of the starter away yesterday which meant the ratio wasn’t right which in turn produced the hooch. All is not lost though you just stir it in and feed it more flour, it is a living thing with wants and needs 😝

John left his phone on a job he has been doing in town so in the evening we went back to collect it and then nipped round to see Mum and Ken for a cuppa.

Saturday: A dry day some sunshine now and again, not too cold. John did the rounds and then started on digging out a path along the front of the building. We are putting a flower bed in but I wanted a path so that I can still get to the windows easily to clean them. When we first came there were thorny roses along there which was difficult, then I had to put up a fence around the area as Kai kept digging everything up when he was alive, now we can clear it and have it looking nice, only taken 10 years 😂 Meanwhile I got started on the beginning of winter clearing up in the garden, first all the plants that I have been bringing on, they are now safely in the cold frames, after that onto the tort run and some cutting back and chipping up, putting the clippings back on the ground. Inbetween all that I was making bread so diving backwards and forwards between the garden and the kitchen. I tried the sourdough but I don’t think I paid enough attention to it and it’s not rising at all, I will habe a look later and see if I can salvage it in any way 😏 I also made a regular loaf as I was not sure how the sourdough was going to do, good job I did 😜 More tidying away in the garden and potting up some bits, I really need to dig a few things up and divide them but by lunchtime my hips were hurting, the wind had got up and the sun gone in so I think the cold got into them. Time to come in and do some washing up and tidying, that’s the trouble when I am working out side, the kitchen becomes a dumping ground for everything while I go about my work.

Popped round to have a cuppa with Shelley and the kiddies in the afternoon before coming back and lighting the Rayburn. John did the feed round and I sorted the eggs, he then went out to clean out the hen huts in the paddock…..just as it started to rain and I mean really rain 🥴 luckily for him I had got the fire going nicely and there was plenty of hot water for a nice bath.

The sourdough dough is a bit of a disaster but I’m not giving up just yet, I still have starter so I will continue feeding it and try again on a day when I have more time to apply myself 😜 I may well have to do a fair bit of reading up before I attempt a second go 🙄

Sunday: Today’s plan was to go to the garden centre and get breakfast, actually my plan was to get some new gardening gloves and have a mooch about but to get John to readily agree I have to mention getting breakfast 😜 We picked up a few bits for Christmas but the gloves were all medium and I have very small hands. It’s not much fun gardening in gloves that have about an inch extra as I can’t grab hold of thing properly and the extra bit always gets trapped. The lack of small gloves in one centre meant I had to go to another one as well 😀😀 where I am glad to say I successfully purchased a selection of gloves in a small size. The first centre was relatively quiet, the second more popular and upmarket (and therefore overpriced) centre was very busy 🙄 While I was waiting to pay I was looking at the dried flower collection, I cant believe people pay that much for dead stuff 😂 here is me chopping it down and putting it on the compost heap, I said to John we are missing a trick here 😝

Friesland Farm

Lavender oil, a lovely walk and plenty of walnuts.

Posted on October 4, 2020 by frieslandfarm

Monday 28th September 2020: Would you look at that, we are back round to Monday again 🙄 Some tasks just happen without any planning of them and that’s what I have been doing this morning, an unplanned task, still one that needed doing just wasn’t on my radar. The cleaning out of the greenhouse, two reasons for doing it, one, the season is coming to its end and lots have gone over and need adding to the compost heap, second reason is that the tortoises will need to begin hibernation soon. They hibernate in the greenhouse in a hutch over winter but they need to wind down first, they are already beginning to ‘dig in’ in the outside run, a good sign that they are ready for the long winter sleep. They will probably spend the next three weeks awake and I will slowly withdraw food from them although they are pretty good at regulating themselves. They can’t go into hibernation with food in their stomach as it will either ferment or freeze, neither has a good outcome 😏 On a warm day in the greenhouse they will still be active but as the temps drop they will become less so until they are fully hibernating and then we wrap them up until I can hear them shuffling around next spring.

I spent a few hours in the greenhouse moving things, sweeping down, cleaning and throwing stuff away, discovering many spiders but luckily no mice 😀 There are still a few things hanging on in there, chillies, although I picked most of them this morning, a couple of peppers still growing and again I picked the bigger ones already this morning, I have a few plants that are overwintering in there ready for next spring and there are walnuts, hazelnuts, lavender and tomatoes all either drying or ripening off. I also have some thermal foil ordered to put on the North side to help reflect the heat/light back towards what is still growing. At this time of year it’s easy to lose plants to the cold in the greenhouse so I am doing everything I can to keep them going including standing them on celeotex to stop cold drafts at the base of the plants. I may even make a thermal shelter out of the foil and a cardboard box to protect anything really vulnerable. I did think about heating it but in all honestly it’s a waste of money until the growing season begins again in Spring.

After a spot of lunch I went into the big tunnel to finish tidying up after pulling the tomato plants. Plenty of weeding in there, despite the fact that I put black plastic all round the edges the weeds crept through. I almost got one side finished and decided it was time for a sit down, I spent so much time on my knees each time I stood up I felt dizzy 🥴 that’s not good is it. I also found a clutch of eggs while I was tipping stuff onto the compost, we found a clutch in the straw in the stables but the minute you find them the hens move quarters and it’s hide and seek until you locate them. I can bet my bottom dollar that once I pick them up later they won’t lay there again and it will be back to hunting for them. I said to John we were loads of egg down in the daily count 😂

John came home and set about shifting all the wood we had taken off the front of the building and there was a lot of it. That left me to do the egg/feed rounds, pick some runner beans, pick some raspberries and get the dinner sorted. By 6pm my back was aching and with the washing up done it was time for a sit down thank goodness 😅

The animals we picked up on Saturday in case you hadn’t already guessed were two little black and white kittens. Yes I know I said I was done with cats for a while but we really need them to keep the mouse and potentially rat population under control. So we collected Jack and Jill (original I know 😜) and they have been settling in well. Today for the first time one of them came to meet me when I went through to the boot room which is where they are, sometimes locked in a cage because the dogs also have free range of the room and sometimes the dogs are locked out and the kittens get to stretch. It didn’t take them long to start climbing and finding hidey holes.

Tuesday: I started off the day by burning a bit of rubbish, paper feed sacks and cardboard boxes etc, then I had half an hour to kill so I thought that would be a good time to infuse the lavender I have been drying. I have used almond oil as a base, stuffed the jar three quarters full with lavender heads and covered it with the oil. That will sit on the window sill for about three weeks with the occasional shake and then be ready to bottle, a lovely soothing relaxing oil for all kinds of uses. I finished that and my cup of coffee and went out to the paddocks to bring in the horses ready for the farriers visit. Sam arrived with the twiglets, after the horses were sorted and back out we had some lunch and then went on a walk along the local downs. Again the scenery was beautiful, there was plenty to admire, spindleberry and flax, plus a bonus snack as we saw some great looking apples growing on a tree in the hedge, they were the best apples we had tasted for years 🍎

Spindleberry and flax two of my favourites to see while out walking.

When John came home we took down a chain link fence to the side of the building as we have someone coming to take the trees down tomorrow hopefully, as the weather is supposed to be terrible 🙄 It will be great once they are down as we can finally move the access to the yard, at the minute you drive past the front of the house and round in a big C shape which can be tricky when towing a trailer, this one will go straight up the side and the turning/reversing point will be much easier than it is now. Then it will be a case of a new fence and gate, the jobs are piling up lol.

Wednesday: Today is the day the remaining trees come down at last, I was a bit worried as I hadn’t heard from the people doing it and I hadn’t contacted them but they turned up as planned so that’s brilliant.

The weather is supposed to be awful later this week, high winds and rain urgh I think summer is done 😏 It’s going to be a long Winter what with all the restrictions as well as the long dark nights but I’m sure we will get through it. Funny how spring and summer seem to go faster than the autumn and winter 🙄 I do love autumn mind you, I love Halloween and bonfire night though I don’t think there will be much going on this year, we will have to make it the best we can in the circumstances, maybe a hot chocolate and a scary film (not too scary 😂) with the fire going will help.

I stayed indoors out of the way of machinery and trees being felled 🙄 mostly I did a fair bit of sorting out, things to go to the charity shop, things to throw away, old paperwork to burn. Mid afternoon I lit the Rayburn, it started raining around lunchtime and I think it is supposed to get worse later, might as well have a warm cosy house especially as I will be doing the feeds rounds later and likely to get a soaking 😜

The trees are down and we now have a huge pile of woodchip and tree trunks, it was surprising how oppressive the trees were even just the four that were left.

All this from just four trees, though they were huge 😜

Nice and toasty indoors with the Rayburn going, we will only have it lit for a few hours and then let it out or we will be sweating buckets tonight 😂

We are into the second wave of the virus now, they said it would come, we hoped it wouldn’t but here it is spreading rapidly I expect more restrictions will be added over the next few weeks.

Thursday: After the torrential downpours last night we woke to a beautiful morning, sunny, warm, delightful 😀 I seem to have my clearing out head on at the moment and so went out into the back area and started tidying up and clearing any rubbish, putting things away properly, that sort of thing. Then I got distracted, the daughter of someone I know has started a business transferring old vhs to digital. We have a few that I would like to get done so I went searching for them, our wedding video is the main one and then there are Christmas and holiday videos. Plenty of them have nothing written on them so I needed a player to have a look, I found one in the caravan which must have been dads as it has been here since we first bought the place. No plug on it 😂 this is typical as, like John, Dad probably robbed the plug for something else, however John also takes the plugs off defunct electricals and keeps them so I found one in a drawer. I am of the era that were taught how to wire a plug, I have no idea if they still teach that or not but it was one of the more useful things I ever learnt 😜 and so I put on a new plug and voila it works, I say works, it lights up and turns on anyway, the next phase is to hook up to a tv and see if it actually plays. Oh the fun I am going to have watching all these memories 🥰

After doing that I had to sort out the POL pen as we are expecting a delivery of hens this afternoon, it just needed sweeping out and some weeds pulling, that took me up to lunchtime and time for a half hour sit down I reckon.

I decided to rig up the video recorder and see what was on some of the tapes, the quality is not too good now, well they have been sat there for nearly thirty years (some of them anyway) but they are watchable, I just need to go through all of them and see what is what. It’s a long time since I hooked up a video player to the tv and had to google it 😂

John came home just in time for the arrival of 50 hens and the feed delivery so he sorted all that out

Josh wanted to come over after school and be left here on his own with us so Mummy and Flo had to push off 😂 not quite like that but you get the gist. He helped Grampy with the egg collecting and then he helped me gather some walnuts, I thought the squirrel would have most of them but there were loads on the floor so we picked them all up. Then things got hectic for a couple of hours as we had people arriving to collect hens and some people arriving to collect wood, what with that and answering messages about the wood it was all hands on deck, Josh even helped me load some wood in a wheelbarrow for someone. Eventually everything was done and sorted, Josh went back home, John put the birds to bed and that’s the end of another day 😀

Friday: It couldn’t be a more different day compared to yesterday’s sunshine, it’s been raining through the night and this morning it’s grey, dull, breezy and constant rain, yuk. Luckily I don’t have to be out and about in it at the moment, John did the rounds this morning before going to work, I stayed inside with a cup of tea 😂

I whizzed round and got a few household jobs done and then it was time to go and have my blood tests done, and get my flue jab, after that I went for coffee and cake with Shelley and Flo and then onto have a routine mammogram 😏 Just my luck that the software wasn’t playing ball and had to have one side done three times! If you have never had one before they compress your boob in various positions and it’s pretty uncomfortable so to have to have it done three times is not very nice at all but very necessary 🙄 Back home and light the Rayburn as it’s cold and rainy, if I can get it lit and settled before I have to go out and do the feed rounds I don’t have to nip in halfway round to check on it. Apart from that we have someone coming to pick up hens at 4pm and a cosy night in the warm is in order I think.

Saturday: Wet and rainy overnight, still drizzling this morning, a rather dank, dull day 🙄 John did the animals and then went off to pick up the tractor part that needed repairing, hopefully he will get that fitted today. I pottered around indoors sorting washing, drying, various other tasks, I am thinking of all the jobs to get done outside so that I am not wandering around wondering what needs doing. When it’s raining it’s best to have a clear itinerary that way I don’t end up either coming in and out of the house or standing round outside getting wet and cold.

Yesterday the world was informed that Donald Trump had covid, this morning we were told he has been hospitalised. From his actions and sentiments I don’t think he really believed it was a threat, I hope for his sake that he can overcome it 🙄

Nuts! I haven’t gone nuts but I do have a good haul of them, hazels and walnuts. The hazels are easy as you pick them and put them in a basket, they just keep like that all year. The walnuts though are a different kettle of fish, they need washing and drying successfully, if you just leave them they grow a mould in the outside which permeates inside and that’s not good. I have tried various methods over time but this year I have washed them off and because the Rayburn is lit I have put them in pans on the warming shelf to dry gently. I tried selling some last year but to be honest because you don’t what’s inside them until you crack them open it’s not really fair on customers especially if they get a few with nothing inside. I guess the industry xrays them or something like they do with eggs for cracks or anomalies. I try just picking up what I will use but seeing them on the ground the urge to gather is too strong so now I have quite a lot 😜 I was. Reading that you can freeze them though or even keep them in the fridge so I might have a ‘cracking evening’ soon and then they will be on hand to use quickly in cakes or for snacking. I have no idea how they don’t go rancid in the packing they are sold in 🤷‍♀️ if anyone has a clue let me know.

I decided to have a go at doing something with the nuts so I made some snacking nuts, a Keto recipe to be precise, whatever that is, it uses granulated sweetener instead of sugar. I cup of hazels, 1 cup of walnuts and 1 cup of cashews that I had in the cupboard. 1/4 cup of water, 1 cup of truvia, 1tsp cinnamon, 1tsp sea salt, 1tsp vanilla extract. Put everything except the nuts in a saucepan on medium heat, heat until dissolved then add nuts, keep stirring until the mixture crystallises, cool, eat, but I portioned it at around 15 portions which works out at 165 calories 😂 not for an everyday snack but as a treat it will be well worth it I reckon. It will store for a couple of months in an airtight jar or freeze, can be chopped into smaller pieces to top yoghurt or an apple crumble as always you are only limited by your imagination 😀

A word or two of advice (warnings 😜) don’t leave it in the pan to cool tip it out onto a tray, it’s difficult to get out of the pan once it’s set 🥴 if you like nice flat pastry when you roll, don’t use your rolling pin to bash the bottom of the pan it ends up with dents 🤣 and it’s very moorish so put it away in the cupboard or that will 500 calories gone before you know it 😝

The wood is nearly gone, we have had a couple of people come and cut it up and take it away, actually one bloke has been back three times already 😀

Sunday: Oh my days we have had nearly 48hrs of constant rain some of it pretty heavy at times. I woke about five times in the night and each time I could hear it pouring down, consequently this morning we have our usual river and lake in the fields. My aim was to get the horses in so I got the stables ready, John went off to pick up some hay bales as we haven’t got any in yet and I also bought the quail inside as they were looking rather glum. Biscuit was happy to be coming in, Jack however was a total prat and was adamant he wasn’t going to play ball until I got him a bowl of chaff feed that is then he decided it might be a good idea after all 🙄 we were a bit soggy after the morning out in it all. We came in and lit the fire and then popped round to see Mum and Ken and drop some videos off that are going to be converted to digital. When we got back, Shelley, Martin and the kiddies had dropped round for a cuppa and a chat. Then it was time to do the feed rounds and egg collection, the day has whizzed past today despite the depressing weather.

That’s another week done and dusted, I feel like it was a bit of a bitty week and nothing really consolidated, I don’t know why, it just feels like that. Hopefully next week I will feel a bit more in control, who knows what the week will bring though 😂 Have a good one whatever you are doing 🥰