Mega bonfire

Blimey, doesn't time fly?!  When I last reported in, we had just laid a bit of hedge and had a huge pile of brash to burn.  Well, right after that we all got really horrible colds (I even had a day off work which is very rare) and we had to postpone Bob's stepmum's visit.  So, bonfires weren't a good idea with tickly coughs really, but on Sunday Ben and I finally got round to having a mega-huge bonfire.  It took a little while to get going properly because it has rained quite a bit here so it was a bit soggy.  Once we got it going though it was brilliant.  It took three hours solid of both of us piling branches on to get rid of it all!  We got quite a routine going piling on loads of branches then weighting them down with ivy-covered logs or holly.  That green stuff burns surprisingly well - it does nothing but crackle for a few minutes while it dries out and then whoosh, up it goes.  There wasn't any breeze so when the holly whooshed you could see the holly-leaf-shaped bits of ash shooting straight up about 20' in the air.  Oh, I do like a good bonfire.  We were left with a very sizeable pile of ashes at the end - about waist high!

As well as all the hedge, we got rid of two massive bags of
wood chips from Bob's workshop.  You can only put a bit on at a
time or it smothers the fire . . . . 

. . . . but just a handful produces an impressive flare.
Fun, fun, fun!

As well as the hedge and two bags of chips, we also put the
last bits of the caravan on.  We had saved some of the thin wood
to cut up for kindling, but to be honest it's a pain as it has so many
staples and nails in it and Bob produces a plentiful supply of kindling.
So, onto the bonfire with it.  This, then, is the very last bit of our caravan
going on - oh, except the kitchen unit we're still using . . . forgot that!

So, what else has been happening?  Well, Ben now has a job as a Christmas temp at M&S, lucky lad!  He's been given plenty of hours which is good and works mostly backstage in the warehouse.  Trouble is, none of his hours match mine . . . ever.  We have to have a nightly transport meeting to sort out who has which car or who needs a lift if Bob needs a car.

Here's Graham's rocker finished and
polished and getting plenty of use.  I
think they can be proud of that between
them, don't you?

Bob had a show at one of the museums at Ironbridge at the weekend.  It was a Christmas craft and food fair in one of the old engine houses and had a really nice atmosphere.  Bob did quite well and sold everything except four pieces of furniture!  That includes the child's chair we've been trugging around shows for the last ten years.  Can you believe it that the very next day someone else e-mailed to ask if they could buy it having seen it at another show a few weeks ago!  Weird.  So, Bob will now have to make some new stock I think.  He just has one more market stall in  a couple of weeks and then that's it until the Spring, so hopefully he'll get chance to come up with some nice new things. 

Just look at this picture Ben took on
his phone.  Can you see the steam
shooting out of the end of one of the
branches? Fascinating!

Hedge Laying

In my last post I said we were going to lay the hedge round the carpark . . . . . well, we've done that now!  Carol and Graham came for a couple of days and wanted a bit of a project for while they were here, so this seemed like a good one.  Ben is here as well, so there were plenty of us to haul on the taller trees and to chop up the brash and stack it ready for a mega bonfire.  We got quite an efficient team going after a while with Bob on the chainsaw, whoever was necessary persuading the tree to fall in the right direction and then clearing away to the log pile or bonfire pile.

The planning meeting - chop here, pull that way, check
escape route

OK, take the strain . . . gently now . . . . and . . .

. . . . . RUN AWAY!
This was quite funny to watch!

This bit of hedge didn't have much in it that we could lay and so looks a bit sparse to say the least.  We have photos taken about 50 years ago showing a lovely, thick well tended hedge all around this field, but it hasn't been touched for at least 30 years and so the thick bushes had turned into very leggy, tall trees.  So, along this bit we have just had to chop the trees down and they should sprout again from the base and we can fill in the gaps with new plants when we plant the new hedge across the field.  The other bit we did, along the lane, had much more usable material in it and doesn't look too bad considering.  Again there were some quite big trees we had to just chop down and we had the added excitement of the telephone cable the other side of the lane to spice things up a bit.  At one point there was a small tree we wanted to lay growing right alongside a bigger, split trunk we had to take out, but the tops were all tangled up.  So Ben grabbed the smaller one and was pulling it back and forth to free the tops, to add a bit of extra force he pushed on the bigger trunk with his foot while he pulled on the smaller one.  Once they were free he let go of the smaller one which pinged back towards the smaller one trapping his foot between the two about 5 feet in the air!  Oh, it did look so funny!

This does look better, but it could have done with more little trunks to lay which makes the hedge thicker and higher, but you can only work with what you've got - it'll grow.  Now that the hedge has been reduced by about 25 feet in height, it does make everywhere look a bit open and vulnerable - it'll take a bit of getting used to, but it definitely needed doing and will look fine in a couple of years.  I think I now need to tidy up the builders yard that has built up and was hidden by these bits of hedges and is now in plain view.

We now have a huge pile of brash to burn (doesn't look very
big on this picture, but believe me it is!).  Luckily, Ben and
I had managed to burn all the previous pile (from clearing back
to lay the carpark) a couple of days ago in readiness for this next lot.

Work-wise, Bob has just finished making a big, round oak table.  It's a good job Ben was here to help as it was very heavy and Bob couldn't have kept turning it over to sand, etc without his help.  It took the three of us to cut it into a circular shape with Ben and I taking the weight and feeding it round while Bob manned the bandsaw and made sure it kept to the line.  The finished article looked really good and the customers were really happy with it.  Phew!  Bob was quite nervous as it is a bit of a leap of faith on their part to tell you what they want and hope you can interpret their ideas.  He needn't have worried though.  This table was to go in a winter house (as opposed to a summer house) in the garden and has a hole in the middle for a Japanese cooking plate so you sit around and cook your own food as you go.  Bit different, eh?

While Carol and Graham were here, Graham and Bob finished off the rocking chair Graham has been making for the last 6 months on odd weekends here.  Bob hasn't made a rocking chair before, but people are always asking about them, so good to now be able to say he has made one and Graham will send us some photos when he's oiled and waxed it at home.

We are in the middle of a visitor frenzy - Mum and Dad were here last weekend, followed by Carol and Graham and then Bob's stepmum, Jan, is coming on Monday.  So, the washer's working hard and the pub in the village is doing quite well out of us as each set of visitors wanted to eat there.  Funny how we go for months and months with no visitors and then everyone comes within a few days of each other . . . do you think they plan it?!

How to build a carpark!

And so the landscaping continues.  This time on a larger scale with machinery and a professional!  Now that we have bought part of the field nextdoor, we have room to park the cars on our own land (up until now they have been on a little slope at the side of the track).  So Bob's brother-in-law, Chris, came over on Saturday to get on with it.  He does groundworks and landscaping for a living and is just much better than us at knowing what needs moving where to make a flat bit, etc.  This was all decided at quite short notice, but we arranged to borrow a neighbour's digger and sorted out a delivery of stone from our quarry.  Chris was impressed that we could sort that out so quickly and for a Saturday morning too.  Bob and I had an afternoon in the week cutting down hedge and clearing back overhanging branches and marking out and measuring so we were ready to go.

On Saturday morning Chris arrived at about the same time as the neighbour, Dave, with his digger.  Dave gave Chris a run through of all the little quirks of his digger, like that all the controls are the opposite way round to a normal digger.  I could see Chris looking more and more dubious as he went on and when Dave left saying to give him a ring if the tracks came off, Chris looked even more troubled.  Well, within two minutes one of the tracks had come off and that was that.  A quick discussion led to the decision to try and hire a digger as we'd get nowhere fast if we had to keep putting the tracks back on.  Bless him, it was really kind of Dave to lend it to us, but because the first bit was on quite rough ground, it just wouldn't have worked and so he came and took it back again.  Bearing in mind that it was now about 10 o'clock on a Saturday morning, I think we did quite well to get a digger delivered.  We do know the people from the hire shop quite well and have always got on well with them, so that probably helped.  Bob always gets me to do the ringing for these things because he thinks I can get away with being cheeky!  So, the digger arrived at about 11.30 and by the time we'd had a cuppa and a chat with the driver (having just had a cuppa and a chat with the lad who delivered the stone), it wasn't worth starting anything before lunch!  I'd forgotten how much time you spend socialising when you're having deliveries.

The hired digger suited Chris very well and he soon got
on with spreading out all the hardcore we'd accumulated to
help fill in the dip along the hedge.

There we are, he is happy in his work.

I had a go at a bit of bucket work - takes a lot of thinking about
you know.  I'm sure it'd soon become second nature and
you'd do it without thinking about it, but not in the 10 minute
session I had!

None of us had thought about a membrane to put between the soil
and stone so we had a hunt round and found enough roof breather
membrane, hessian, old tarpaulins and builders bags to lay out (having
stabbed them with a garden fork to allow drainage).  By the end of Saturday
the site was cleared and we'd laid some of the membranes and spread some
of the stone.

I was working and Bob was out on Sunday, so we left Chris to it
and he finished spreading, levelling and compacting the stone
and started on the path down from the workshop.  This will be
how Bob gets his motorbikes up and down eventually, but we
ran out of stone.

We can now park side by side and reverse in.  Our visitors should
be pleased about that, it's surprising how many people ask us to
reverse their cars out!  Behind the cars we will store the trailer and
also build another log store.  It all looks a bit new and harsh just now,
but once we've sorted the edges out and the stone has mellowed a
bit it should look fine.  We will also lay the hedge to thicken it up so
it should be more hidden from the track.

Ancient herb-stones and elephants

Next border's finished!  Yep, we've finished the building part of the terraced herb border and here it is.  Towards the top are little stone walls going across just to stop the soil all sliding downhill.  We now need to get some ericaceous compost and horse muck to put in the top two sections for the blueberries.  Then the next bit is going to be a bit rockery-like for the rosemary, etc and, surprisingly,  the bottom bit has turned out to be quite good soil.  There used to be a path up the side of the house with a little wall to the side and the bit this side of it ended up being a real dumping ground for us.  Because we used what is now the lounge as our builders yard/workshop, it was handy just to empty the last bit of mortar or plaster outside the door.  We used old sacks of cement that had gone hard as steps for quite a while and all sorts of other bits of stone and wood got dumped on the pile, so all that had to be cleared.  Once we'd built the walls we forked over the soil in the bottom bit and found all sorts of bits of metal, toys bits of clothes and bottles (a really sweet little bottle which is in almost perfect condition as well as broken bits of a bottle with Castle Hotel, Oswestry on the side - shame that was broken).  So we weren't the first to dump stuff there.  
Buried under the middle of the bed was the remains of the old wall so we managed to get some sizeable stones out including this one which took absolutely ages to get out as it was buried quite deep.  We could just have left it because I'm sure herbs don't need that much depth for their roots, but once we started we had to finish and I'm glad we did.  It's a bit difficult to see from this picture, but it is a perfectly triangular wedge shape and is bigger than it looks.  We've always thought some standing stones would be nice in the garden and so we decided to stand it where it was (rather than lugging it around!) and I'm now calling it our ancient herb-stone - I don't think there is really such a thing, but it sounds quite authentic!  Not quite Stonehenge, but it looks quite good.

Last week we went to see some friends the other side of Oswestry who said they had a bit of timber Bob may be interested in.  Well, yes, but not really just a bit!  They had some very straight Ash which will be perfect for legs for things and some nice straight Cherry.  So we ended up with a trailer and boot full. They have planted an orchard of heritage fruit trees and so we had a tour trying the various apples straight off the trees - when they said they'd get a bag so we could take some home I thought they meant a carrier bag, but they meant a farm sack!  So we ended up with a kitchen full of apples and I spent the afternoon peeling and cooking them for the freezer.  I also made some juice from each type and we had a juice tasting session which was interesting - all very different.  The courgettes went into a courgette cake and some apples went into a crumble-pie.  The wood is in a pile and Bob was amazed at how beautifully it split - just like in the books!   This week we went back to get some more wood (they are trying to clear a shed so they can concrete the floor) and ended up with more apples!  I get the feeling they are a bit overwhelmed by how much fruit they have and are quite glad to give some away so they don't have to peel and stew it!

The route to see these friends takes you across country past the Old Racecourse and when we got to a little crossroads in the middle of nowhere it was all cordened off by police with police cars and flashing lights all over the place.  One of the policemen came over to explain that we couldn't get through because of 'that' (pointing to a little post box on a post).  He was obviously not impressed!  Apparently some youths had posted a firework and blown up the post box, but because all their calls are co-ordinated centrally in Worcester, the Bomb Squad from Birmingham had been alerted and were on their way and no-one was allowed near until they gave the all-clear.  He was really disgruntled about the waste of time, money and resources but said it was because the whole country was on heightened terrorist alert at the moment.  I guess they have to be careful, but a little post box in the middle of nowhere is not really likely to be a prime terrorist target for bringing the whole country to a standstill is it?

Yesterday we had a Green Deal Assessment.  Because we have solar tubes on the roof, we should be able to claim a payment from the Government for 7 years.  They just don't make it easy though - surprise, surprise.  You have to have this assessment done which to a degree I can understand - they have to be sure you actually have the product you're claiming for and also that you have done everything you can to make your home energy efficient.  For Building Control sign-off you have to get, and pay for, an EPC (Energy Performance Certificate) which tells you how energy efficient your house is and how you could improve it.  Ours came out at a C which is as good as it could be for the type of house and much better than most of the old cottages you see for sale.  Now wouldn't you think we could have used that to support our claim for the Govt payout (especially as it was done by a Govt employee)?  Oh, no, no, no.  You have to have another one done, and pay for it again.  It's all people making money and just not a joined-up system at all.  So, we forked out again and the girl came and spent 2 hours measuring, photographing and questioning and when she sends her report, we can file that along with our solar tube installation certificate on some website and then, hopefully, get a bit of money back from it.  Watch this space!

We also had a visit yesterday from the lady who did our bat survey right back at the beginning of this project.  She was really excited to see the house finished as she was there when we started taking the roof off in the snow and doesn't usually get to see the finished property.  She was even more excited when we told her about the bat that has taken up residence under the eves of Bob's workshop.  She brought a colleague from the Small Mammals Conservation Group because they have discovered evidence of doormice near here which, again, they were very excited about.  She thought Ben might be interested in getting involved if he's around when they are doing their surveying - all good experience and I'm sure he will be interested.  They had a look at our bit of woodland behind the top barns and declared it perfect habitat for doormice, if they can find it.  So, anyway, one of our next projects now is to make and install some doormice boxes.  When we were knocking the hole through the wall for the stairs, we found a hoard of nibbled hazelnuts in the wall and wondered if it had been where building had stopped for the Winter and doormice had overwintered.  The nuts had a very round hole in one end which we thought was characterisitc of doormice.  I managed to find the shells to show the chap, but he said they were from woodmice which is a little disappointing.  Again though, they were really excited to think that those nuts were nearly 200 years old and he's going to send us some photos of a doormouse hazelnut so we know what to look out for.

A few days ago we had a visit from an elephant!  Can you believe it?  Well, actually, not quite.  Having seen a Hummingbird Hawk Moth a couple of weeks ago, Bob found an Elephant Hawk Moth caterpillar making its way up the drive - quite impressive I'm told, but it had run away before I got home from work.  We'll have to look out for the moth next year - they're pink I think!

As well as the apples we have been given, we
have quite a good fruit crop of our own.  This is a tiny
pear tree, but has loads of fruit.

and this is the plum which is so laden down that the chickens
can just help themselves from the ground which they are quite
happy about!

Gas finally runs out!

Don't worry, I'm not talking about some global crisis, but our never-ending bottled gas!  We, obviously, used bottled gas in the caravan to cook and heat water and a big bottle lasted 8-10 weeks - oh, I remember the joy of having a shower when it was due to run out and wondering if the hot water would last until the shampoo was rinsed off.  Did get caught out a couple of times, but whoever wasn't in the shower was at the ready with the spanner to change the bottles over double quick during the few days when it was due to run out.  So, when we moved into the house we took our bottled gas with us, but just for the hob on the cooker (there is no mains gas here) and I do prefer the 'turn-on-and-offableness' of a gas hob.  Friends and neighbours do the same and the concensus seemed to be that a bottle lasts about 18 months which didn't seem too bad.  Our bottle was part-used from the caravan and so we thought we'd get about a year out of it . . . . next week it will be three years since we moved into the house and it has only just run out!  AMAZING!  We didn't think it'd ever run out.  Recently, we've started using the whistling kettle we bought for on the woodburner instead of the electric kettle as I'm sure it's got to be cheaper.  I suppose we do most of our cooking on the woodburner through the Winter and so that is why the gas has lasted so long.

We have started building another garden wall - it's never-ending!  We have started on the herb bed which is in front of the lounge windows, so we wanted that bit of wall to look good which meant using some really big stones - it does grow quickly that way though!  We're still managing to use stone we have lying around, but they are getting smaller and more awkward in shape - you just can't help using the easiest ones first.

This border will be terraced within itself to make it go down the slope.  If we can get our heads round it properly, it should work quite well because we can have different soil conditions in each bit to suit different plants - stoney and free-draining for the mediterranean-type herbs, normal for others and acidic at the top where we will plant the two blueberry bushes which are currently in pots.  Once the herbs and blueberries are planted out, we'll be able to put something solid down outside the lounge - maybe cobbles or maybe we'll have to bite the bullet and actually buy something.  We've got so used to having all sorts of materials lying around and thinking of ways to use them that it seems very odd to have to contemplate going out and buying something . . . . maybe we'll come up with a plan to save us the trauma!  While we were building this wall, I noticed a very strange (and quite large) insect hovering over the sweet peas just behind Bob.  It had a big long body and a very long nose and, apparently, no wings?  Weird!  Bob turned and got a better look, but it flew off before I could get there to look at it properly.  We had a look in the book though and it would seem that it was a Hummingbird Hawk Moth which flies during the day.  It does have wings by the way, but it moves them so fast that you can hardly see them (hence the name I guess).  They are Summer visitors and some years are very scarce and others not - don't know if this is a rare year or an abundance year.

We just had a weekend in bonny Scotland visiting Laura who lives between Edinburgh and Glasgow.  It wasn't actually so bonny on Friday because it was piddling down, but the rest of the weekend was lovely and warm - I kept finding myself thinking 'You know, it could almost be Summer'  and then realising that it was actually still August!  We have had a very chilly couple of weeks haven't we?  We've had the fire lit a few times and Laura said she had to scrape ice off her car one morning!  We had a day in Edinburgh and took an open-top bus tour to introduce us to the sights although Laura did a pretty good job of pointing things out to us too.  We had a lovely couple of hours in the Botanic Gardens in the sun and then a quick run around the museum before closing time.  You know, there are quite a lot of tartan, cashmere and whiskey shops in Edinburgh!

On the way home we passed a couple of convoys of Police minibuses just before the motorway gets to England.  We were a bit worried that they were on their way to close the border before the election in a couple of weeks and had to try to overtake them (at about 71mph!).  We made it back across the border just in time though - phew!  Before we went, a chap in the pub told us to look out for a special woodland on the way up the M6 which we had never noticed before.  Apparently, in the war a German plane crashed into a hillside killing the pilot and after the war his widow managed to buy the piece of land where he'd come down.  She planted a woodland in the shape of a heart to mark the spot - how romantic.  I don't know if that is true, but going north on the M6 about a mile before J38 you can definitely see a heart-shaped woodland on the steep hillside to your right - have a look if you're ever passing.

Ta dah!

So, here's the first bit of terracing finished.  This is taken from our bedroom window and actually makes it look a lot smaller than it really is - the wall at the front is about chest high.  We didn't have to add any extra soil because the stuff Bob dug out at the back for the little retaining wall brought the level about right.  We did add a trailer full of horse muck though and the chickens enjoyed helping us mix that in!

Then on Saturday we had to deliver a garden bench that Bob had made to someone just outside Shrewsbury (actually Prince William's helicopter instructor don't you know!) and a couple of miles from there is the yard where we got the untreated railway sleepers for the big retaining wall round the extension.  So much nicer than the ones that ooze creosote whenever the sun shines.  We had three left and thought they'd work for the back of this border and so we got another one while we were close by.  And here's the finished wall.  Bob is drilling all the way through both sleepers (they're quite hard you know) and then we knocked lengths of reinforcing bar through and into the ground below.  We have also planted some plants as you can see, although they look a bit sparse just now.  Unless you've got hundreds of pounds to spend on lots of plants including some bigger mature shrubs it is always going to look a bit bare for the first couple of years I suppose.  We had bought some shrubs a few months ago in readiness - mostly for Winter interest like a Sweet Box and a Japanese Holly (which is the spike of green in the foreground).  There was also a white Buddlejah for the butterflies and another mystery shrub with very little detail on the label except that the leaves turn bright red in Autumn/Winter which will be the reason we bought it.  When I googled it though it turns out to grow 1.5m high and 2m wide . . . . oh . . . . . . and it likes acidic soil . . . . . oh!  Nothing about that on the label and as we live on the edge of a limestone quarry, the soil's hardly likely to be acidic and it would completely dominate this border.  So, quick rethink and we've decided it can eventually replace the blackcurrants which are planted on an awkward slope at the edge of the path.  We'll have to dig a big hole and fork through lots of ericaceaous compost and if it grows as big as it says it will be a really useful way to fill a very awkward spot.  We went to the garden centre yesterday and got a tall grass to go in the back corner which will look quite pretty, some light orange Crocosmia, a white Campanula to trail over the front and some yellow daisy things.  I'm most excited about the Bergamont we bought - it's used to flavour Earl Grey tea, but if you eat the petals they have the most amazing intense, sweet flavour and the flowers are a lovely dark red and bees and butterflies absolutely love it (it is also known a Bee Balm) so tick, tick, tick!  From our existing border we are going to move a Wych Hazel and a Potentilla which really aren't happy and we'll split all sorts of things like Rudbekia, Penstemon and Euphorbia.  I've also got lots of bits of Thyme and Sedum to plant in the wall.  I also sprinkled loads of seeds from our Mexican Daisy into a seed tray and there are loads of little seedlings coming through - trouble is, I haven't a clue if they're weeds or the little daisies.  Those daisies are amazing and bush out and trail with tonnes of tiny daisy flowers that start off pink and then turn white.  Normally they flower from early Spring until the first harsh frosts, but because we had such a mild Winter last year ours has flowered non-stop since March 2013!

Well, we're off to a barbeque on Wednesday evening and I red in the paper today that snow is forecast - admittedly that is in the highlands and unlikely to reach Shropshire, but ground frost is a real possibility.  Must remember to take a jumper!

More weeding!

Yes, more weeding has been done, but this time I imported some help!  Carol and Graham came briefly so that Graham could do a bit more to his rocking chair.  It's really coming on and all the bits are shaped and all the joints are cut and have been tested.  Now, Graham's a precision engineer and Bob has reverted to his old precision ways now he's making furniture (things in an old house can't be done with that much precision) so you won't be surprised to know that one of the joints was so tight that they couldn't pull it apart again and Bob has blisters on his hands from the effort!  Anyway, Graham has gone away with sanding homework and if he has time to do that they can start guleing it together next time they come.

So, while they were doing that Carol and I did some garden jobs.  Bob and I have just about finished the stone wall for our forst bit of terracing and so behind it were all the reject stones that didn't get used so we sorted them and moved them to their appropriate places and then pulled all the weeds out.  Now it's ready to have a dose of well-rotted horse muck and some topsoil from our mountain (the one we had to move to lay the lawn).  Course, since we laid the lawn, the mountain of soil had grown its own forest of lush weeds. 

 At least they stopped the chickens from spreading the soil all over the place and so we do still have some left.  So that was another job to do.  That was actually quite good fun because the weeds were big and thick, but because the soil was quite loose they came up easily and it was quite satisfying.  So, good job done.  That's the finished wall behind Carol, ready to backfill with soil and plant.

Last weekend we had a working party to Mum and Dad's.  To make things more manageable in their garden they have taken out the hedge and wanted to put a fence in, so Carol, Graham, Bob and I launched ourselves at the task.  Mum and Dad had done all the planning and got the timber roughly cut to size and with its first coat of fence treatment and the posts and rails were already in.  So over the two days we nailed the boards on cut the top level and put all the top pieces on and gave it another coat of treatment.  We also re-treated their two little sheds, made a new handle for one and dug over the border that had got well and truly trampled in the process.  It ended up a bit like that old program 'Ground Force' as Mum took the opportunity to do some inside jobs and we ended up racing against the clock to get the border dug, stones picked out, raked and swept up before Mum came out to offer a cup of tea at 3.30 (she didn't know we were doing that bit so we wanted to surprise her with a job finished)!  It was actually quite good fun and everyone worked well together and around each other and we got a satisfying amount done.  There were quite a lot of people walking past when Carol and I were nailing the boards on (Bob, Graham and Dad were doing the more technical 'boy jobs' like cutting joints on the top rail).  I think people were quite surprised to see 'girls' doing that sort of thing.  One elderly lady looked quite horrified as she asked her friend if that was 'ladies doing fencing'!  Oh, if only she knew . . . fencing, roofing, building, underpinning, demolition (and barely a broken nail in the whole time!).

We're off to the proverbial p***-up in a brewery tonight.  Stonehouse brewery where we buy our beer from are having a bit of a do to raise money for charity.  They have a couple of local bands playing (I think some of the lads that work there are in a band), a hog roast and beer - naturally.  Should be good I think - they've sold 160 tickets - just a shame I have to work tomorrow!

Weeding, weeding, weeding!

Weeding, weeding, weeding!  That seems to be what my life has consisted of for the last couple of weeks.  In some places they were way taller than me and so it has been quite a satisfying job.  I have pretty much been over the whole garden.  Course, the first bit I did is now sprouting again.  I'm hoping now that we'll just be able to keep strimming them until they give in!
About a year after we moved here Mum gave us three Catoneasters which we planted, but they didn't thrive we didn't see them again.  When I was pulling up weeds along the side of the path, what do you think I found?  Yep, two little Catoneasters looking surprisingly healthy and since being uncovered they've grown about six inches!  What have they been doing for the last three years?!  We also have lots of Evening Primrose - again we planted some in the first year or so and then they disappeared for a few years and now they're back.  Even more of a mystery is very bright red little snapdragon that has appeared at the side of the gateway into the field, where we walk quite often.  We have no snapdragons, nor never have we and we've never seen it before.  Who knows what will pop up next - keeps it interesting.

We've had a couple of meal's worth of peas
from the garden - yum, they're so much nicer
than bought ones.  Mind you most don't make
to the pan - I just love the little baby ones straight
from the pod!

We've also harvested our first batch of garlic and I plaited them
to hang in the kitchen to keep vampires away - well, it's worked
so far!  We did an experiment planting some in the Autumn and
some in the Spring.  These are the some of the Autumn ones - the
Spring ones are really weedy and will have to pull their socks up
big time if they are going to make anything of themselves!

Bob has had a stand at the Big Art Show on the showground in Shrewsbury this weekend.  I went with him yesterday and it was a complete washout - literally!  It poured most of the day with thunder to go with it.  So, that coupled with the lack of advertising meant that it was a bit of a disaster.  It should have been so good - there were four big marquees full of stands as well as lots of individual stalls.  There was live music (the poor chaps had an audience of two most of the time), a Pimms tent (I didn't see anyone there at all), several food stalls (at 1pm when everyone should have been queuing for their lunch the queue was about one person long at each) and someone had to wake the girl up on the ice-cream van to buy a cone!  It was hard to guage how many people were visitors because I think most of the people we spoke to were actually other stallholders having a look around.  Oh well, maybe with the sunshine today Bob will have had a really good day and sold everything on the stall!  You never know.

I didn't go to help Bob today so that I could do some cooking for the freezer - it's looking a bit bare as I've been lost in the jungle of weeds for so much of the last two weeks.  So, I've made a bakers dozen chicken and veg pies, a huge batch of chilli to be divided up, beefburgers, cheesecake, tiffin and a pastry case and got the stuff ready for tea . . . . what a lot of washing up!

Ready for a beer now . . . . . come home Bob!

Dolphins and snakes

Well, we've been on us 'olidays and 'ad a reet good time!  Yes, we've had our few days away in New Quay (Wales not Cornwall) and had a lovely time.  It rained the few days before we went and then again when we got home, but we had wonderful weather while we were away.  We stayed in a very nice pub/hotel (The Black Lion if anyone feels the need of a visit) which was at the top of the steep hill down to the harbour and so had really good views of the harbour and Cardigan Bay from the beer garden.  We called to see Ben and have lunch in Aberystwyth on the way down, but then once we got there we didn't get in the car again until it was time to come home which was really good.  We went for a good long walk one day along the coastal path to the south with a pasty from the pasty shop for lunch.  We were chatting to an ex-lifeboatman in the pasty shop and he recommended a little diversion inland from the coastal path, so we took his advice and that was so pretty along a stream in a wooded valley.  We did get quite lost going back to the coastal path and ended up in a very jungley bit and so had to retrace our steps to find the proper path, so that added about 15 miles on (not really, and it was so pretty that it didn't matter anyway).

We detoured onto a little beach where we could
see someone had built towers out of the big
pebbles.  They looked really good so, of course,
we had to build some of our own.  

They did look quite Buddhist-like and could easily have
fitted in at Samye Ling where Laura used to live.

On the way back we saw this little Adder right in the middle of
the path.  It just sat there flicking it's tongue out at us and only
wriggled away when we stepped right back.  I think it must have
been one of last year's young as it was only 8 or 9 inches long, but it
was too early for this year's batch to be out and about.  Good job
we didn't step on it!

So, all that was lovely and interesting, but by far the best thing was seeing the dolphins - and we saw loads.  We didn't go on a boat trip to see them, they were just there right near the harbour wall.  One of the Marine Conservation people we were talking to did let slip that the best times to see them are first thing and at dusk and that they tend to go further out when the boats are coming in and out.  He probably wasn't supposed to say that as that must be how they get most of their money!  One morning I was awake at normal work time and thought 'You know, I know we're on holiday, but I can actually have a lie-in at home, but I can't see dolphins' and so I got up and was sat on the harbour wall by 6.30am with just me, the sun on the water (warm enough for just a t-shirt) and the dolphins - truly spectacular, but so peaceful and quiet, what a priviledge.  Bob came down a bit later and a few other people.  The dolphins were just right there below us fishing and playing including a baby and one came right into the harbour among the boats.  The next morning we got up early again and this time there were more of them and they were herding the fish in towards the harbour wall.  All of a sudden there was a lot of splashing at various places and you could see the fishes jumping out of the water in front of the dolphins as they chased them in.  Definitely a co-ordinated attack - very clever.  One evening we took a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses from our room, got fish and chips and sat on the harbour wall for dinner watching out for dolphins - how cool is that and in Britain too, who needs to go abroad!

Back home again we had a few days to potter around here before Bob's Ludlow market on Saturday and me back to work today.  We mostly did garden stuff.  We prepared a bed for the leeks which was quite a mammouth task.  It had been really weedy and so we sprayed it last week and then pulled them all out before we went away.  Then we had to dig it all over and get all the roots and stones out.  I ended up seiving the soil with a riddle because there were so many stones - three wheelbarrowsful in just that small bed (it's only about the size of a large dining table!).  While I did that, Bob built the wall on one side up a bit, then we put new rabbit wire around. We then added lots of compost and finally planted the leeks.  I don't think it's supposed to take almost a day to plant a few leeks!  We have also done some more to the wall Ben and Bob started at Christmas and we now just have a bit left to do on one side and then we'll be able to clear the stones out of that (!!!!! more stones!!!!) and put top soil and compost in there too and we'll have another finished border.  Well, apart from making a bit of a retaining wall at the back of it, it'll be finished.  Just need to think what to put in it!

While we were on holiday the blackcurrants started to ripen properly and so I picked enough of them to make a batch of jam and I've picked some more today to freeze.  The raspberries which, until last week, were lost in shoulder high weeds are also ripening (amazing that there are so many on there after being so neglected!) so I had a bowl of them with yoghurt one lunchtime and Bob had some tiny wild strawberries with his (he doesn't really like raspberries).  When we first moved here and were digging out for the septic tank, I was devastated that we'd destroyed two wild strawberry plants . . . I needn't have worried as we have loads and loads of them and I literally pull them up like weeds.  I just spent a nice few minutes gathering bluebell seeds to scatter around while eating tiny little strawberries straight off the plants - it's a hard life sometimes!

The pressure's on!

Nah, it's not, it's the weekend!  No work, no furniture shows, no visitors and nothing planned - a whole weekend off is quite rare at the moment you know - and the sun's shining so all's well with the world.  

Here's the new water butt all plumbed in and everything - looks a bit Heath Robinson, but I quite like that.  The overflow isn't really half way down (that wouldn't be good use of a huge barrel), but the wooden slats are widest at this point so better for drilling through and inside it's connected to a pipe which goes to almost the top of the barrel.  On the outside it goes into standard orange plastic pipe which leads to a soakaway, but that would look horrible so we've hidden that inside and old piece of salt-glaze pipe we had lying around.  We then cut a circle of slate with a hole in it which sits inside the lip of the old pipe with the overflow pipe going through it and then we've put a bit of soil on top and planted lemon thyme in it which should trail down and look lovely.  Eventually the little wall here will probably be a course or two higher and there'll be some plants the other side of it, but that'll have to wait until we know what we're doing with the pathway there.  This seems to be how we have done the garden (and the house for that matter).  We can't plan it all in advance like a lot of people do - we get an idea for one bit and then when that bit is done it helps us decide what to do with the next bit and so on - seems to have worked out OK so far.  

Now that we have two water butts, we thought it was important to monitor the pressure in at least one of them and so we have fitted a pressure guage to the one near the kitchen as it's easier to keep an eye on that one.

Not really!  What would be the point in that?!  Bob's dad used to work for a firm that made water pumps or something and when we were clearing his shed out, we found this lovely one and didn't want to throw it away and so we've had it lying around ever since.  We thought it'd look quite funny on one of the water butts and make people wonder what on earth it's for and so here it is.  You have to tap it as you go past and slightly adjust the handle just to make sure everything's fine - like they do on films.  Well, it makes me smile anyway!

Oops a daisy!  This is what underground drain pipes look like after you've put a pick axe through them!  Bob was digging out for a bit more of the wall he and Ben started at Christmas and then said 'Erm, I think I might have hit a pipe or something' - guess the echoing, booming noise underground is a bit of a giveaway!  Luckily, this pipe isn't being used at the moment - we just put it in in case we ever put any plumbing in the top barns - so there was no need to panic.  It is now repaired which is a little awkward when the pipe is in situ, but it's done.

Guess what!  Bob actually had a phone call from someone in Surrey who had seen his website (sheltonfurniture.co.uk) and wanted to order a chair!  How exciting is that?  It all seems a bit strange really - generally Bob has at least met anyone who buys a chair, so this is all a bit remote.  Apparently though Shropshire is this chap's favourite part of the country and he has family not too far away, so he may actually come and collect it when the time comes.

We've spent the day so far in the garden with me part way though a mega weeding session and Bob sorting the pipe and wall out.  I came in for a cool-down to write this and now I'm feeling the call of a nice cool bottle of cider from the fridge!  Enjoy the sunshine!

One man went to mow . . . .

. . . . .went to mow a meadow, one man and his dog chicken (cluck, cluck) went to mow a meadow.

As if having a lawn that keeps growing isn't enough, our end of the field keeps growing too!  Last year Bob used the strimmer to keep on top of the nettles and brambles, but now that we have the lawn mower out and usable he thought it was time to give it a go in the field.  I think it was hard work, but not as hard as using the strimmer and there weren't as many obstacles hidden in the grass as we expected, just loads of molehills.  Course, the grass was a bit long for this little mower so Bob had to keep unclogging it, but it looks much better and should get easier now it's been done once.  We are a bit envious of Rob, who owns the rest of the field, as he whizzes up and down on his ride-on mower - we can't really justify one of those, but it looks like more fun!  Can you just see the stick standing to the left of Bob on this photo?  Well that is to mark a wild orchid that we didn't know we had and it is now flowering - I wonder if they do much multiplying and one day we'll have a carpet of them?

We now have the second whiskey barrel in place as a water butt.  The steps up the side of the house are now finished and pointed (at last!) and so we could roll the barrel into place at the top.  For quite a while we were worried that the barrel would look too big at that end of the house as the walls are much shorter up there, but now it's there it looks fine and makes the steps look pretty good too.  We had a scout around the local salvage yards to find cast iron pipes and bends to connect the gutter and the downpipe and they are all cut to size and we're just waiting for the paint to dry so we can connect it all up.  Once that's done we can finally get rid of the plastic middle from a roll of carpet that we've been using as a downpipe for the past few years - well, it was free and it's done the job (not sure it was quite what the Planning Dept had in mind when they were specifying what the guttering should be made of though!).

We had a good weekend with Ben and I think he enjoyed relaxing, lying in (after being woken by the crows at 4am), a beer or two and home cooking - both eating and doing.  He's a really good cook and enjoys experimenting so we invented a lemon truffle chocolate bar for a Father's Day present - worked out really well I think.  I don't think he enjoyed the sudden attack of hayfever after a short walk which left his eyes streaming and him working his way through a box of tissues - living by the sea he's escaped quite lightly I think and forgot to take any tablets.  I took him back to Aberystwyth on the Sunday and we sat on the beach with a huge icecream each which was nice.  Talking of beaches, Bob and I are having a little holiday at the seaside in a couple of weeks.  We're staying in a pub in Newquay in Cardigan Bay which comes highly recommended by someone at work.  I'm really looking forward to it and we're hoping to see those elusive dolphins this time.  My friend said they spent a whole afternoon sat on the harbour wall watching them play, including a baby!

So, the crows are still a real nuisance and we're thinking of putting razor-wire on all the window sills so they can't land!!  Not really, but we'll have to think of something like that.  Yesterday evening we sat with a beer watching two baby woodpeckers trying to come to grips with the peanut feeder, Mum was helpful and gave them bits of peanuts, but Dad just argued with them and chased them around, poor things (maybe they forgot Father's Day!).

This has been day six of seven solid days at work - don't like!!!

The Birds (as in Alfred Hitchcock's horror film!)

Well, we didn't need to worry too much about watering the lawn!  We had a couple of days of watering it morning and evening and then nature took over and we have had soooo much rain!  Saved us a job I suppose (and undoubtedly did a much more thorough job of it), but we are a little fed up with it now.  After the statutory three weeks of not walking on the lawn, we couldn't walk on it anyway because it was so wet.  The grass was certainly lush and green . . . . and very long.  The chickens stopped walking on it too because it was longer than their legs and they got soaked every time they tried.  Eventually we had a night without rain and so I got on and cut it.  Because I didn't want to do too much tramping about on it, I did it very quickly and not very carefully and it ended up looking a real mess.  It reminded me of a little lad at one of the schools I worked at years ago whose dad decided to do a home job on his hair with the clippers, but the poor boy ended up looking like a badly shorn sheep with short bits and tufty bits.  Anyway, the lawn has now had its second cut and looks much neater.

 Elsewhere the garden is looking quite cottagey (basically, the geraniums have taken over - that's the more natural pink, blue and lilac ones rather than the bright red hanging basket types).  Laura and I had a good old weeding session on this border which makes it look much better.  So, now we need to sort out the bit between this and the lawn.  The plum and damson trees have absolutely loads of fruit on them (all little and green at the moment of course), so barring disasters it should be a good year.  The peas are growing well, we have loads of garlic, beans just shooting and tomato plants ready to go in the baskets against the sunny lounge wall.


We have had an incredibly busy time with visitors recently.  Laura went off to Edinburgh to start the next episode in her life just over a week ago, but during her last week Jan (Bob's stepmum) came to visit on the Monday, then on the Wednesday Mum and Dad came on their way back from the Lake District.  They stayed until Friday and then a couple of hours after they left, Carol and Graham came. 

In addition to Graham wanting to do a bit more to the rocking chair he's making, they came to do the annual hillwalk in the next village.  It is a lovely walk (although as it's name suggests, it's very up and downy), but this year it was very, very muddy.  We did the 10 mile walk (there is an option to add another 6 miles in the middle up a very steep hill) but as the weather was pretty rubbish we didn't do that.  Well, that's why the rest of them didn't do it, I just don't think I'm fit enough!  Next visitor is Ben who is arriving tomorrow for the weekend for a break between finishing the taught part of his Masters and getting on with all the lab work for his dissertation.

While Laura was here we had a bit of a project going - to knit lots of floppy rabbits.  She then took most of them to Samye Ling on her way to Edinburgh for ROKPA (the charity she worked for there) to sell at their summer teaparty.  They looked quite cute all huddled together.  For quite a while the lounge was a mess off various colours and sizes of rabbit parts.  Talking of rabbits, we've finally put the first length of rabbit wire in the garden, all along the hedge.  The rabbits can still get in (we have quite a lot more to do!), but it was funny the first couple of mornings to watch them trying to find their way out when we clapped our hands at them.  The chickens were a bit put out by it too!

So, to the birds.  As you know, I'm always going on about all the lovely birds we have around here, but I'm now ready to shoot these particular ones!  When we first moved here, the crow/rooky things all lived on the other side of the quarry which is fine by me as their 'song' is not the most melodious to say the least.  I think last year they started visiting this end occasionally which was still OK.  This last week or so though they have become a major nuisance.  They wake us at 4.30am with their version of the dawn chorus (which totally drowns out the nice tweety version).  Even worse, two of them have taken to pecking persistently at the windows.  Last year and the year before we had a solitary blackbird that used to do that.  These two crows come together though and make a really loud banging on the glass.  As we put string or mesh across one window, they moved to another until we now have stuff up at all the windows to try to deter them.  It really does remind me of that Alfred Hitchcock film as they are very big close-to and could easily be seen as quite menacing . . . prisoners in our own home, bullied by huge black birds  . . . . well, no it's not that bad, but we are both really tired and would love to sleep peacefully until 6am as we used to do!

All that said though, we do still have lots of lovely birds.  The Jay and the Woodpeckers have got very brave and happily come to the peanut feeder even if we are in the garden.  The other evening when Bob went out to say night-night to the chickens, there were two baby Tawny Owls just across the path from the door making very funny squeaky noises.  The grown up Tawny Owl has visited the garden quite a few evenings, sitting in the little Ash tree in perfect view from the lounge.  A few evenings ago, there was a lot of twittering just down the lane so I went to see what was going on and, after I'd stood very still and quiet for about 10 minutes, an ivy-covered tree exploded with baby Wrens.  They seemed to be everywhere flying around and landing haphazardly on anything that got in their way.  We have had baby Great Tits and Blue Tits on the peanuts and are now waiting for the Woodpeckers and Jays to introduce their offspring.

Pimms on the lawn!

The mystery object is the little piece of metal under the
beam by the way!

First of all, here's a mystery object for you to identify - we bought it off a blacksmith at the craft fair in Oswestry where we had a stall - less said about that the better as we didn't even take enough to cover the cost of tea and cake for one!.  The following weekend we had a two day show in Ludlow which was supposed to be a prestigious one run by the Shropshire Guild of Designer Craftsmen (of which Bob is a member).  It was a nice looking show with really good quality stalls and no tat, but again not much happened from our point of view and it was all a bit demoralising.  Seem to do better standing outside on a market stall in the weather!

I went up to Scotland during my week off to collect Laura who has now finished her stint as a Buddhist nun.  She is staying here until the end of the month and is then off to Edinburgh with all sorts of possibilities in the pipeline which is all quite exciting (if a little scary I should think).  Her hair has grown a bit and she has sorted out all her clothes - when we stopped at the service station on the way home she said how strange it was not to be stared at!

So, look what we've been up to!

For the last few years we have had a soil mountain outside the
kitchen.  It was free from the chap who came with his digger to
tidy up around the extension for us.  He was working on another
job and had to get rid of some topsoil and thought of us!  Brill!

We decided it was finally time to do something about this eyesore
and so we put down some gravel boards and . . . .

. . . . with Laura's help we started weeding it and breaking
it up . . . .  

. . . and spreading it out and levelling it . . . . 

. . . . and then moving the remaining mountain (there was quite
a lot of soil there!).  Laura couldn't sleep that night because her
arms ached so much!

And so instead of a weedy mountain to look at, we had a lovely,
clean Gardener's World-type patch of soil - all fine tilth and everything! This has never been known here (well not since we've been here).  It
was quite a novelty for the chickens.  Now, you can guess what's
coming next . . .

Yep - we're making a lawn!

Darn, we were just a tiny bit short - how annoying.

Luckily though we were able to pick up another couple of
pieces and finish the job!

Oh, how strange it seems to have a real, live lawn!  We spent about an hour after we'd finished just looking at it from different vantage points and giggling.  We'll be sitting out drinking Pimms on the lawn before you know it!  Just need to keep watering it and stop the chickens scratching it up.

While we were gazing lovingly at our lawn, Bob got 'buzzed' by a sparrow hawk - it flew at great speed just a few inches from his head - so close that he felt it rather than saw it and didn't realise what it was until he turned to see it flying off and over the quarry.  While we were laying the lawn yesterday there was a cuckoo calling in the woods across the lane.  It was there for most of the day.  Apparently they are really struggling at the moment and are quite rare.  You know I have real mixed feelings - everyone gets so excited at the sound of a cuckoo (indeed it was the talk of the pub last night) and as an iconic sound of the British Spring I'm with them there, but cuckoos are actually really horrible birds when you think about it.  Now, a much cuter bird is the wren and we have them nesting under the eves of Bob's workshop.  In past years they nested in the old wriggly tin barn (which Bob's workshop has replaced) and we wasted hours watching the babies fledge.  So Bob made a little platform for them under the eves and, because we didn't know which way they'd like their nest to face, he put an upright piece of wood in the middle so they could choose which side to build.  Guess what?  They've built a nest each side - so we have semi-detached wren's nests!  I don't suppose they'll both get used, but it'd be nice if they do use one.

Oh, nearly forgot - this is what the mystery piece of metal is for:

CHEERS!!