Things To Do When Your Not Gardening

The post's have been a little light on the ground recently, mostly because there's not much going on in the garden right now and its just too damn cold to go out and sweep up leaves!

Another reason is Rich and I have been desperately trying to save money (like everyone else right now!) and when I go in the greenhouse I realize I need to buy more seed's, compost, a cold frame, the list goes on! So I've been avoiding it!

Anyway, today we decided to have a day out and away from the long list of jobs that needed doing on the cottage and garden and went into Bath. We're very luck in that we live on the outskirts of the city and can walk in, thus avoiding paying through the nose to park or take the bus. As usual for a Saturday near Christmas the place was swarming with tourist's all heading for the Bath Christmas Market, this is a really lovely event held yearly next door to the Abbey and the Roman Baths, marred only slightly by the huge number of people all trying to squeeze in to a very small square. Sadly actually getting to see any on the products on display was damn near impossible so we gave up and went to the Victoria Art Gallery as this free to go in and was decidedly free of tourists! This is the only problem living in a world heritage site, the number of visitor's in summer and Christmas goes through the roof, but I suppose they are bringing much needed money into local businesses so I can't complain too much as I now work part time in one of them!

Anyway, I love going to the Victoria, its quite a hidden little gallery but they always have some amazing stuff on show, in their entrance hall they have one of my favourite sculptors ever...



This is 'Lady-Hare on Dog' by Sophie Ryder, I absolutely love this and have to go and have a look at it every time we go.



You can see where Dog's nose has gone shiny because everyone strokes him as they go in!

After this we have a walk around the city which is looking very pretty with the Christmas decorations up, one of my favourite things in Bath at this time of year is the Merry-go-round which they set up near the Christmas Market.



It looks so beautiful with all its lights on and the old fashioned music, really magical!



And as I love it some much Rich managed to scrap together his last few coppers and got us 2 tickets to have a ride!!



Ooooh look...action shots!





He's so good to me! Maybe I'll do the gardening tomorrow instead!

Here Comes Winter!

You can feel Winter rushing head long at us here, Bath has been cloaked in gray damp coldness for weeks now, which has put me off doing the jobs I should be doing on the veg patch! Another sign of the approaching season is the cat is not happy about being turfed out for the night, she does sort of cling limpet like to Rich.

The veg garden had been getting a bit over run with the Nasturtiums I planted in the spring, they have been wonderful for keeping the slugs, snails and most of the caterpillars aways from my other plants, sadly one morning last week after a particularly hard night frost I came out to see this sight...



I had to clear this up as soon as possible as it looked so bloody awful, the frost turned the Nasturtiums to slimy mush so it was lots of fun pulling all this up and squeezing it into the compost bins.

The Broccoli and the Cauliflowers seem ok, although I thing the Cauli's are suffering from the frost a bit too.



Another little job I've been meaning to finish up was the brick border for the veg patch, I started it weeks ago then the weather closed in, plus I started a new part time job which has thrown my schedule out (excuses, excuses!!).

One of the major off puts of this job was prising out the old rotten wood and concert broads that have been there for years (the wood is lethal slippy when wet). I almost gave myself a hernia trying to lift some of these...



I eventually got it done and was quite please with the finished job, then Rich came out and pointed out the it was a bit wonky in places and some of the bricks needed to be sunk deeper or the would just roll out on to the path, so I generously let him relay a few bits...



Now it looks perfect!



As Rich was out side and quite obviously didn't have anything better to do (like work, sleep or any one of the two hundred jobs on the house) I made him help me tidy up the greenhouse, the tomatoes had just about gone over and the Aubergine had had it, so everything was bagged up to go to the recycling center and my Geraniums from the patio have been put the bed for the Winter in there too.



They are apparently not the only thing trying to sleep through the winter in here...



My poor grape, I hope it survives this tough love!