Thursday 31 December 2009

Goodbye

I have written before on this blog about my Dad, about his influence on me and my sister and whether he knew it or not on most of the people he met. I could go on for pages about the sort of guy he was but for the moment I will re frame or I will end up crying all over my Mums laptop!


Our wonderfully Dad died on the 27th of December 2009 aged just 60.


To say we are all heartbroken is an understatement, he will leave a huge hole in our little family that will never be filled.

Bye Dad, we will miss you forever.... I just hope they have Wi-Fi in Heaven.
x

Wednesday 16 December 2009

Are We Feeling Christmasy Yet?!

YES!

Yep, I love Christmas, any excuses to eat to much chocolate and sit around watching cheesy films...oh wait I do that the rest of the year as well! Ok so I get to do it with a Christmas tree in the corner of the living room, which is nice.
We have quite a collection of vintage and glass baubles that I've picked up over the last few years (mostly at car boots and ebay) so I really love decoration the tree.



We also use ivy and holly collected from our lane to decorate the rest of the house...



I just love our tiny little cottage at Christmas, it suddenly feels cozy and warm (thanks to the stove) and very twinkly!



See, whats more Christmasy than a kitten snoozing by her Christmas tree!

Monday 7 December 2009

Apologies!

I seem to have taken a little unscheduled blog break there! A combination of doing jobs on the house we put off till after the wedding, trying to finish my first children's book for the publishers deadline and the fact that our camera seems to have packed up, has meant I either don't have anything to tell you about or cant take pics!

So here's a few bits and pieces we been up to over the last month that I managed to get pictures of before the camera gave up the ghost...

Most of whats in the garden has gone over now, we still got some leeks and cabbages in but that's about it, which is ok by me as it seems to have been raining here none stop for nearly 2 months, and I hate getting soaked while weeding!

I have to say one of the major success of this year for me has been the Sweetcorn, I've never grown if before and once we got over the mice problem, they where wonderful. I was never a huge fan of Sweetcorn but I that has changed now I've eaten home grown, I just wish we'd planted more (on the list again for next year!)
Here it is having just about gone over, I was in the process of pulling the dead stalks up for compost...



I also used up the very last of the tomatoes in October, I was amazed at the size of them (I shouldn't really, there called Giant Delicious, does what it says on the tin!)



I made about a ton of tomato and basil soup (about half of which is still in the freezer!)

We did have one tiny bit of planting to do before the end of the year, back in the summer I ordered 2 hedging plants for the orchard, Cherry Plums. It was the first time I'd heard of them, but apparently they make good shelter hedging for orchards, and produce red or yellow fruit the size of cherries but the shape of plums. At the moment they don't look like much...



...but I'm looking forward to the spring when they come to life!

Another thing we've been trying to do this month is keep warm! As money is tight (as always!) we have been trying not to have the central heating on (thank you British Gas, I do like my fingers blue and my pockets empty!) so we have been relying more and more on our trusty little Stovax wood burner (which is AMAZING! I have probably said it before but nothing get a room cosy and toasty like a wood stove) we've eaten rather quickly through our store of logs so we're having to scrounge up gash wood where we can, luckily our local garden center is happy for us to take old broken pallets off their hands...



see, I knew that Landy would be good for something!



The husbands not bad either!

The Landy has been brilliant this Autumn, she's even managed a couple of trips up to Shropshire to see our parents. Rich's Mum & Dad moved house last month, so we went up to see their lovely new cottage...





Cute isn't it, I'm not jealous in the slightest!



...and here's me stroking the horses who live next door.

So a bit of a hotch potch post, I'll try to do better from now on (and possibly nick Richards phone, which has a descent camera on it!)