March 2012 at FTC

Its another one of those occasions when I'm so far behind with my blogging that its time for something of a picture dump and a catch-up!

This is largely caused due to Bill and I fishing on the 17th where I tried out the HD video setting on the 'point and click' Canon I had recenly purchased.  Now into April I still find myself trying to edit the numerous video clips!

March was the month Tash officially became unemployed, but it also meant it was another lovely month we could all spend together as a family.  Both she and Esme were discharged from hospital, with Tash being told her heart was fine amongst rumours spreading through Bedford hospital that Esme might now be in line for a role in the next Michelin advert!
 
The start of the month was nice and warm and I took the opportunity to get cracking with the garden.  It always seems to go that I spend March and April working in the garden, and then once everything is planted and summer arrives I just enjoy what we've got until the following March rolls round.

To be honest the raising of the beds in the garden would have been completed a while ago but for my drill going MIA at the Gathering in August.  Since using Bills cordless Bosch I knew I had to go cordless and treated myself to a new toy from DeWalt.

I set about cutting, drilling and nailing the scaffold boards in place alongside the path outside the barn.  Following that I sorted the placement of where the step was going to locate.

 

And of course Alfie was close by to lend a hand suring up the location of some crucial nails.

 

 

Over the next few weeks I laid countless kilos of concrete outside the barn to level off the path and raise the path to within a few inches of the step - giving me a suitable platform for the gravel.

I'm lacking photographic evidence, but the gravel is now down in place and it all works a treat!

Meanwhile, Alfie has enjoyed chasing chickens...

Harry has enjoyed laying in the sun ...

 

and with the chickens frequently enjoying freedom in the garden Harry has become best of friends with one of them.  Seriously, he even lets her peck at his back!

and when not cuddled up with a chook the poor dog had a two year old trying to show his love!

Come the end of the month I'd removed the old smashed caravan window, and had hoped to have a plastic replacement sorted by the end of that week.  Sadly I was quoted close on £100 and so thats on hold at the moment.  I either need a cheaper quote or else I'm going to get a sheet of 4mm plastic and do it myself.

Of course Esme is groing up fast, hitting 4 months old during March!  Her personality is really starting to shine now, and her face simply glows when she smiles.  Its wonderful to see her with Alfie too, its so clear to see how much the adore each other.  She simply can't take her eyes off him, and he loves to give her kisses and help where he can by replacing a dummy or giving her a 'ssshhhh ssshhhh sssshhh' when she's upset.

 

Oh yeah, and Sherlocks happy to be home and feeding well!

Spring has Sprung

I will open with an apology, because I feel bad that I have been so quiet on this blog recently. However, like a little place called Naseby on 14th June 1645, the mists are starting to roll back and the situation is about to change – radically.

FTC has been besieged in recent weeks by all manner of deliveries, and a small army of men sucking their teeth, kicking metaphorical tyres and making my inner fishwife come to the fore at the revelation of their estimates. I think what I resent the most is the fact that we could do a lot of this work ourselves. Were it not for my current condition, we probably would. Instead I am relegated to tea making and photographic duties.

On that note, I would just like to say that part of the hold up recently has been around the fact that our camera battery seems to have taken off without leaving a forwarding address, and the collection of snaps Keith had managed to acquire on his new phone was somewhat hindered by the incompatibility of mobile phones with brake fluid. Now that both have been put to rights, hopefully the flow of photos will pick up.

So to open the batting for the next few months, I give you the progress of the garden (selected highlights).


First, I want to point out the fact that our Rhubarb, seems to be slightly in love with our soil. Before any smartypants decides to inform me that I should have cut the flower off to encourage growth, I didn’t want to, so there.

The rest of the veg beds are starting to yawn and stretch into life after the recent sunny spell too. I am especially proud to announce that the asparagus has made a return visit, although it has displayed a distinct lack of progress from last year.










The blueberry and strawberries have shown no such coyness and have embraced flowering with admirable gusto. I give the blueberry about 5 months until Harry rediscovers it and chews it to matchsticks.





Finally for the garden roundup, I have to mention the chilli plants. Not because I actually care about them, but because my beloved is still obsessed by all things chilli-fied and will whinge at me if I don’t. As you can see we are growing a range of tongue killers, some I have high hopes for, some I suspect are heading for the compost heap. I try not to interfere in this area of the gardening however, that way divorce lies.

January - Who's stupid idea was that then?

January really is a rotten month, with the dark and the gloom and the cold and the unremitting bad news. It feels to me like swimming through treacle and everything seems like more hassle than it is worth.

You’ll be in no way surprised to learn that progress has been conducted at a leisurely pace this month.

I took a spade to the garden in a bid to prepare the ground for a frenzied attack of “planning” from the male half of the partnership, and then I planted sticks. I was proud.

Only joking, I have in fact planted broad beans – they just look like sticks.

I also fixed the fence after the recent high winds. It was long overdue really but still slightly depressing to see the garden take a step back. Not to be deterred though, I went round to the Social Club side (which is on higher ground) armed with a pair of garden canes and some cable ties to splint the trellis back into place. Luckily for me, two fine examples of Arlesey localdom were stood outside at the time smoking and contemplating life. Better still, they were in the mood to “chat” ... by which I mean they insisted on walking up and down the length of the wall identifying each of my plants to me (Yes I know what they are, I planted them!!) and then commenting on the fact that the fence was, in fact, broken (do you think???) and needed something to tie it up (thanks, because quite clearly I was standing here trying to play the bagpipes). I found myself thanking the good lord for his bountiful gift of cable ties and the speed with which they allowed me to make my escape.

Inside the house, I decided to attack an unsuspecting hallway wall in the hope that I might have a quick and easy morale boost.

Foolish, foolish child.

When we moved in, the textured wallpaper in the hallway looked for all the world like it was put up by the first owners of the house. I had visions of blushing maidens being heaved over the threshold in full skirts and excitedly furnishing her new house (before a few decades of domestic drudgery and child bearing took over) and that the paper had been part of that first flush of domestic bliss.

Well, it might have been I suppose, but only if the house were previously owned by the “El Gringo” family because, when I had stripped the paper, I was faced with an English approximation to Mexican Cantina. Seriously people, it’s Room 101 time here. Who under the big blue sky goes into a DIY shop and says “I know darling, we’ll use sponges and bits of cut out plastic and make our house look like a mud hut in Tijuana”. Does that come shortly before or after you’ve discovered the racy new dish called chicken faj-eye-tas?

On the plus side, at least there was no mould (a first at FTC) and the plaster stayed in place – apart from the corner that Harry had decided to use as a chew toy of course.

Next on the hit list is the plate rack – abandon hope all ye who enter here!!!

Random acts of kindness

This is a bit of a general waffle on life, due in part to the lack of any significant progress in the house, and also because Keith and I have been away in Gib recently, enjoying at least a few days of sun before the darkness of winter descends.

It didn’t occur to me until earlier this week how much I love autumn. I don’t think it had really occurred to me that autumn was even here, I suspect because it didn’t seem to vary in any way from the previous few months of non-summer.

One sure sign that winter is on the way though is the lighting of the first fire of the year. It was a bit like watching Bambi on ice to start with, as Keith and I had both forgotten the intricacies of tempting our often reluctant fireplace into action. It didn’t help that I had acquired a car full of free wood from Freecycle which had come in 8ft lengths, and I was too tired after a day at work to bother cutting it down to a suitable size. The result? Several 2ft chunks of wood were precariously balanced half in, half out of the fire on the premise that they would eventually fit when the blazing end burned down. I was also making dinner at the time so I was forced to employ my spidey senses and issue bellows of LEEEEEAAAAAVVVVE to the thieving hound at regular intervals. Luckily Keith returned and stopped the madness, stomping laps from the barn to the lounge muttering darkly about women and saws.

On the subject of fires, we are currently trying to purchase one for the barn and it proving to be a lot more difficult than anticipated. Who knew that the market for second hand log burners was so cutthroat?! You bid a sensible price on a fire, and then in the five seconds before the auction ends, there are camels being traded, first born children sacrificed, and you’re left wondering what just happened. Not easily deterred I have now started doing something I hate, contacting the sellers and making deals. I am currently in negotiations for one particular fire and having had my best offer bumped up by £25 I am now trying to play hardball while juggling the fact that I might get it cheaper if I just hold out until the auction ends. Sometimes it’s all a bit too much like hard work.

My favourite moment at this time of year is the Changing of the Duvet (much less popular than the similarly titled ceremony in London, but much more personally satisfying). There is something about putting away the puny covering of summer and stuffing the cumulonimbus of a winter duvet into the arm achingly heavy covers that makes me smile. I find that the chances of me oversleeping at this time of year are dramatically increased, not just by the fading light, but by the fact that I need to build up a serious amount of muscle to even fight my way out from under the weight of the duvet in the mornings!

In keeping with the responsibilities of having a kitchen garden, there was a flurry of activity last weekend as plants were given their winter trim. Keith also weeded the area around the pond in his own inimitable way giving it something of the look of a WWI battlefield. The only job left to do before the frosts is a damn good mulching, which I may attempt this weekend, depending on whether we are taken up with motorbike based activities.

It is around the garden that the title of this entry comes. As most of you will know we live next door to a social club which in the main, has brought us a lot of frustration and annoyance, but it has also brought us a man of what could be called ‘character’. Shamefully, I can’t remember his name right now, but this guy has lived in Arlesey since God was a boy, and was one of the first people to stick his head over the wall and welcome us to our new home. He has kept a weather eye on my gardening and given me advice (wanted or not) about where I was going wrong. He seems to enjoy leaning over the wall and talking to “Henry”, who in return shows his appreciation by not barking at him and occasionally wagging his tail.

Now this lovely old boy collects stamps – so if any of you have any, especially foreign ones then PLEASE may I have them!! – and I have tried to keep him supplied on the odd occasion we’ve received something of interest. The other day I came home to another surprise though. Going down the line of peppers on the top of the plant nursery, I suddenly realised there was one extra, and not one that looked very pepper like either.

It was a jasmine cutting that I vaguely remember I had said I would really appreciate having that he had taken from his yellow flowering jasmine and grown on for me. I was really, really touched. I’m going to plant it this weekend in the area formerly occupied by the rosemary bush so that with any luck, next summer, the side of the barn will be covered with a profusion of flowers and the heady scent of the jasmine will fill the garden.

As long as I can get the social to move the “smoking area” that is. Hmmm.

Oh Happy Day!!

This last week has been a little odd for me, but in many ways very therapeutic. After standing in a drafty tent on Friday night, I somehow managed to come down with the worst cold I can remember. My head was pounding, my neck was agony and my kidneys? Well I hope whoever managed to give them a kicking feels happy at a job well done. Needless to say it put the complete kibosh on anything happening over the Bank Holiday, or in fact for the rest of the week as the cold has now settled into screaming agony in my tonsils and a chest so tight, the Cold Stream Guard are after it for their band.

As you can imagine, after 6 days of lying on the sofa sipping tea and occasionally blowing snot bubbles, I was about ready for the men in white coats - so I made a slightly wobbly venture into the garden to see what's been happening, and I came back in smiling so hard, I almost don't care about my throat ... almost ;-)

I planted three of my favourite vegetables this year in the hope that I might have done enough to the garden for them to grow. First was the asparagus, two crowns lovingly dug in and tucked in with straw at the first chink of Spring. For months I made the trip across the lawn, lovingly rearranged the straw over them when the sparrows stole vast swaths for their nests, and tried not to be disheartened when other food growers have sucked their teeth at the difficulty of growing asparagus in soil as heavy as ours. Life finds a way though, and today, having concentrated on my new seedlings for the last few weeks I walked along the bed to be confronted with this.

This isn't a pathetic weedy purple sprout as it may seem - well it is but it's also a lot more. It's hope, it's the triumph of life over logic, it's a resounding affirmation of my ability to provide for my family, and it feels good.

After I'd spent enough time telling the little asparagus spears how cleaver they are, I moved onto the strawberry bushes which I had noticed were showing flashes of red and so obviously needed to be netted before the birds got any clever ideas. Turns out we have not one (as I though) but almost a dozen luscious, red strawberries that have used the recent rain to literally explode from the pretty white flowers that were there only a week ago.

Next door to the young strawberries was another miracle of the natural world, the blueberry bush. Those of you so inclined may well scroll to the early days of this blog and notice that the photo of the bush looks remarkably similar to how it did when first planted. Ahh! But not so!! Having given us a fair quantity of berries last year, you may remember that it was brutally cut down in its prime by the over eager jaws of young Harry. I thought it was a gonner, but no!! I think in honour of the occasion I shall call it George .... George Bush Jr, the second bush and the one you just can't get rid of ... geddit?

The other two 'favourites' are also doing amazingly well. The broad beans are coming on in leaps, and the bitter little pods of greeny goodness will soon be ready to go into some scrummy risottos, or even better, if I can come by some globe artichokes will be lovingly made into "Chupa y Tira", which you either know, or would take too long to explain to you. Come over in a few months, I'll make you some.

It does, however, give me a beautiful segue into my third favourite planting for the year, the artichoke plants. I remember a month or so ago, I transplanted the sickly little two leaf seedlings into what looked like an enormous bed, and cringed when it rained because their tiny delicate leaves would be pounded into oblivion ... if the slugs didn't finish the job first. Well they gave me another lesson in faith, look at them now, their larger 'adult' saw toothed leaves almost too wide for the bed. I still find it hard to believe that they will one day be 6ft high and will turn that whole wall into a jungle of greenery, but now I have faith that they know what they're doing and one day, I will make Chupa y Tira with the offspring.

The last stop in the miracle walk of the garden is the vine, and this is something I have been waiting to tell you for a few weeks - WE HAVE GRAPES!! It's only the second year of the vine and already there are bunches and bunches of tiny seedling grapes on the vine. Can you believe it?! Well you probably can, and I'm sure this whole entry reads a bit like a first time mum who's snotty toddler has just mashed a couple of lego bricks together for the first time (oh isn't he clever?!?) but please remember, 6 days of sofa and daytime TV, this is a big deal to me!!

Before I let you all return to sanity, I thought it wouldn't be a proper post without a few Harry photos - Subtitles for this series?

I'm far too grown up to pose for your photos woman, leave me alone ... oh OK, gis a kiss.

Red was looking on from the kitchen in resigned disgust at all the carry on. He doesn't fool me though, not for a second, I know he's finding his inner pup - he fell asleep on me today, and after the usual paw twitching and Elvis lip curls he did something incredible - he wagged his tail in his sleep. It was another one of those little moments that you keep close for when you need to remind yourself that something that "one step forward" sticks.