Things To Do On A Wet Wednesday

Yet again time seems to have run away from me, a combination of my latest illustration project and the wedding now only being 6 weeks away mean finding time for my little blog is a bit hard. However today I have somehow ended up with a day where I'm not at work, I'm waiting for my editor to get back to me and the wedding stuff can wait, this would usually mean a nice day in the garden but this being an English summer, its tipping it down...typical!

So I'm afraid this is rather an indoors post today, that being the case I thought I'd show off a couple of my latest car boot finds...



2 cute little plates, I try not to buy anything to flowery as Rich will only put up with so much chintz (poor love!) but these where pretty simple (and only £1 each!).

Which brings me on to my next bargain of the century...



a hardly used breadmaker for £7!

This was brought last Sunday and I have been waiting to try it out, so this afternoon I sorted out my ingredients and road tested it. I'm always a bit sceptical buy electrical stuff secondhand but the girl who sold me it seemed pretty genuine and assured me it was working fine. I have been wanting to be able to make my own bread for a while, I had tried it in the oven but it never seemed to go well so I'm hoping this will make it easier, its also finding the time to make bread that I struggle with (I don't usually have whole afternoons to fiddle about with it!). I love the smell as it cooks, really yeasty, it reminds me of when my Dad uses to make his own beer when I was younger, their kitchen always smelled the same.

So from now on the neighbours wont have to listen to me shouting "We're out of s*dding bread again!!" at 10.30 at night the day before I have to be in work...



...no, now they'll hear me shout "we're out of s*dding yeast again!!!" instead.

Anyway, the breadmaker took a couple of hours (and makes more noise than my washing machine, not to mention nearly bouncing off the counter top!) so while all this was going on I make one of Richards favourites, Anzac biscuits.



After a long hard day at work and getting drenched cycling home, its amazing what a cup of tea and a few biscuits home made will do!

A day well spent I think!

General Stuff

Where have the last 2 weeks gone? I don't know, you do a few jobs around the house, have a weekend in Shropshire visiting the P's and suddenly 2 weeks of your life have rushed past!

I'm struggling to keep on top of all the jobs that need doing around here, the garden included, what with Illustration jobs, the Library and just general house stuff we never seem to get any time off! I must admit I'm looking forward to our Honeymoon in September!

Last weekend was pretty productive, I managed to finally finish planting up my latest parcel of stuff from Stephen over at Victorian Nursery's.



This lot arrived about 10 days ago, most of the stuff went in straight away, but we got send a varied selection of Chillies which have been sitting on the living room window sill for a week until I brought some more compost!



Anyway their now happy in the greenhouse with the Tomatoes which are shooting up! we have quite a few green fruits on them, I really am looking forward to home made tomato soup!



We also got 10 Chives to put in the dead space down the side of the bed with the Onions and Sweetcorn in like they have here.



We have been having some lovely weather here, just the right amount of warm sun and the odd shower, everything seems to be going mad, for instance here is the Sweetcorn about 10 days ago when I planted the Chives...



and here it is about 10 minuets ago...



It is now hip height, I really hope we get some veg off them!

There are some down sides to the bouts of wet we've been having, the army's of Slug and Snails seem to be massing under the Rhubarb and have once again decimated my brand new Peas! Here they where 2 weeks ago...



and now...



I've had to resort to the old slug pellets to defend the few plants I have left, we've managed to save 6 out of 20 plants! and that was all in one rainy night! Those slimy little b%*@£*$s!!!
Grrr (calming breath!)

We how also have some lovely Beetroot in where my Globe Artichoke was (another minor disaster, ants made a nest under it and eat the middle out of it. It was fine one evening and I came down next morning to find it dead and shriveled, and after I managed to save it from the slugs too!) So the Beetroot has taken over this part of the bed next to the Sweetcorn and seem to be doing well.



Its not just the plants who have been enjoying this nice weather, this little minx has been coming down the veg patch in the mornings to watch me jump up and down and swear when I find something else has been eaten during the night...



The sun has also meant that we managed to get the new shelving unit for the kitchen finished last weekend. After Rich hacked 4 inches out of the back it needed a fresh coat of paint, then the fun task of hang the bloody thing (Rich now has no skin left of his knuckles poor love!) here it is after most of Sunday morning and A LOT of colorful language...



and here it is after I finished putting all the stuff on it (see, I get to do the nice jobs!)



I really love it, and it goes so well with the oak work tops and retro fridge.



So a busy few weeks, although as ever you get 1 job done and there are still 600 to go! I shall go and calm down by looking at my pretty geraniums.