At home 22 July 2018

With the continuous sunshine, and the faithful watering by a kind friend while we were away, we returned to find our veg patch happily blooming. The lettuces in particular are good, and the girls enjoy picking them before mealtimes.

Our field is terribly overgrown.  I’m feeling bad about it, as I don’t think it shows great stewardship of our precious land.  The boys normally cut the grass, but with Lanky Dude’s exams and exceptionally bad hayfever for Rhythm Dude, it is now long and unkept.  Lanky Dude thinks he may still be able to cut it with our small mower, otherwise I’ll have to beg a kindness from a local farmer to top it with his tractor.

I did, however, fight my way through the knee length, scratchy grass to the fruit cage where, despite absolutely no pruning or weeding this year, gooseberrries, black currants and red currants hang, sparkling like jewels.

We also have bees! Bee Keeping Buddy has yet again managed to procure some of us; a small nucleus which we transferred into our hive a couple of weeks ago.  When we  checked them recently we found both eggs and the queen.  She is the one with the long pointy abdomen, in the photo.  We’ve named her Bodiciea, hoping she will lead her bee colony well.

Our new hens are laying nicely,  producing small, brown eggs. Their feathers are so soft.  However, instead of going into thier henhouse at night, they join our crazy hen up in the apple tree, and we have to fight through the branches, leaves and growing apples to catch them and stuff them into the safety of their home. It’s a real palaver, a job which HWH or the boys usually do, and I find  almost impossible to do by myself as they climb out of my reach!