October - Season of mists and mellow whats'its............ but not in town

The seasons really do disappear in town. Due to roadworks we came home from hospital last Thursday via a back road that took us out to the edge of Ipswich ( and even further out because there was a diversion and more road works!). It's only when we saw the fields ploughed  and the trees changing colour that we realised it was Autumn already.
So  I made a start clearing the dead stuff from the back garden, we've no colour out there now except for the orange berries on the Pyracantha. I'm cutting down lots of Golden Rod and if we were staying I'd dig it out because it's horrible, in fact the only thing nastier than live Golden rod is dead Golden rod -  all dusty and full of mildew!
 Picked up the newest Aldi leaflet......... full of stuff for Halloween, we haven't lived in town on October the 31st since the American tradition was imported by the shops, will we get trick or treaters in our quiet road? It seems strange now that back in 1975 when I worked on a mobile library van we used to go to a USAF housing complex in a village in West Suffolk and I had to ask the ladies who came to the van why on earth they had pumpkins and witches all over their houses.
So from no All Hallows-eve traditions to shops full of junky rubbish in 40 years. If we do get any ghosts/witches knocking on the door we will be out! Bah Humbug to Halloween!
( Although we did do well selling pumpkins at Fareacre, remember this from 2014)

Back Soon
Sue

Black and White

Meeting up with cousins on Saturday brought back lots of memories of their visits to our house when we were all much younger. Our Dad was a builder so we had a builders yard for a back garden, heaps of sand, piles of bricks, sheds full of  bits and pieces but if we played there we were always in the way. Luckily our Dad built us a play-shed. It was about 8 feet square with a proper sized door and window, kitted out with a table with cut down legs and some stools and a large dolls cot. The kitchen was a plank of wood balanced across an old wooden clothes horse. We spent hours playing in it, I wonder if my cousins remember. I hoped to find a photo of the shed but only found this one of me and my sister with the corner of our play-shed behind us. Funny that it was never a play-house always a shed.

Matching dresses.......good grief! What was our mum thinking of. It's 1964 and I'm 9 and my sister 5 years old in this photo. I can quite clearly remember wearing these dresses on holiday and a small child shouting "Look Mummy.....Twins!" Oh the embarrassment we suffered in our youth!

Lacking pictures of us and our cousins playing at home, I only have these...... All 4 of us on holiday at Scratby on the Norfolk coast in 1961. I'm back left with my sister in front and our cousins A back right with S in front.
( I'm not even sure if Scratby still exists, it may well have been washed into the sea sometime in the last 55 years................55 Years!, where did they go for goodness sake?)

Here we are again visiting our Dad's and their Mother's Aunts house in Nacton on the outskirts of Ipswich in 1968. (I'm back right aged 13 and wearing my trendy mock suede jacket). Visiting Great Aunts and Uncles was a regular Sunday afternoon thing back then. Always extremely Boring...........put me off visiting for life!

Happy days lived in black and white.


Back in a trice.
Sue

A favourite post from long ago in a different world! (and other stuff)

 Actually not that long ago but definitely a different lifestyle

 I was fiddling about on the Stats page recently, and discovered this  post has been looked at nearly 2000 times. I wondered what it was, and found again just how busy we were in the summer on the smallholding and campsite.
Missing it ...................................... just a bit, but mainly the raspberries!

[You can see it here]

We've not heard much about the new owners of the smallholding and campsite, no one locally (our old neighbours) has seen anything of them. We know they've moved the roadside stall to the campsite gateway and don't seem to be selling very much. But we heard today that they have put the campsite prices up so much that some of our regulars can't afford to go there anymore, what a shame.

In Aldi the other day I noticed they will have school uniforms in tomorrow. Poor children haven't even finished term for the summer holidays and the shops are wanting them, or their mums to plan for September. Flicking through the leaflet  I discovered a new word - skort - a skirt with hidden shorts. They would have been better for  P.E than we what we had to wear at Stowmarket Grammar School back in the 60's............Thick maroon knickers!!

Thank you for all the comments about doughnuts on the last post, I doubt the walk back pushing my bike up hill made up for the calories in the doughnuts, good job they are not a regular thing on my shopping list!

Whoops, I've forgotten to welcome Rosemary to the followers pictures, she has a blog called Where Five Valleys Meet, including some lovely photos, and I'm not sure if I've said hello to Jomum and Anne who are also new to following- I think.


Back Soon
Sue

A letter from the past and recent diary entries

A few weeks back I had a letter from my penfriend who lives on a windy Scottish island, in the letter she wondered how long we had been writing to each other (although I'm a bad penfriend who doesn't write as often as I ought!). I hadn't had a chance to sort through the drawer where I keep old letters to see if I could find out, when another letter arrived and with it W had included my very first letter written to her in May 2001 and typically it starts by me apologising for being slow to reply to her first letter! She said it would probably be sad to read as back then we had milking goats and we bred sheep, Col was still working for the County Council and our eldest was at uni, our son was taking a gap year between high school and uni and our youngest was just 13.

 It was a bit sad to read but also  interesting and I'm so glad she kept the letter. I know she will read this so Thank you W for that little window into what things were like and I will write to you with our new address very soon and I'll probably still be apologising for taking such an age to write!

Sunday, and  the bloke who had bought the old caravan chassis came to collect it at just the same moment that the man who's been storing a boat here for the last 3 years came to take it away. He owed us £40 so another little bit of money into the kitty.
We Think we have sorted phone connections/un-connections  and abandoning Talk Talk - if it works properly. Sunday seemed a good day to ring. The broad band connection speed is 10 times quicker in Ipswich  than here, which should make loading photos easier.

On Monday I zoomed to Woodbridge to take our signed contracts back to the solicitors, hopefully it shouldn't be too long now before exchange. My sister and brother in law came over to help Col burn some rubbish and load the horsebox trailer with all the stuff that we don't need at the bungalow. Then we took it to a friend who is storing it for us until we need it at a house with bigger garden or to sell it at the auction rooms one day.
That just leaves the things - for garden and workshop - that we will take to the bungalow, to be loaded onto the flat trailer.Then all that will be left in the shed are a few bits waiting for our youngest to collect and smallholding stuff left for the new owners.

Today, Tuesday and a bit more tidying, sorting and packing in the morning.  The most difficult thing to pack?..........a roll of Christmas wrapping paper!  - Too long for any boxes, I've been wondering where to put it for weeks, in the end gave up and chucked it into a cupboard in the caravan.
Found out today that the price of postage stamps is going up again at the end of March. I shall stock up because there will be lots of change of address cards to be posted out soon. Last March, pre last years price rise I bought £20 worth which lasted me right through to Christmas.
This afternoon another trek to hospital for Cols pre-chemo blood test and to see the consultant who decided to send him for an XRay  and then back tomorrow for a scan. Thought I would share the view from the 6th floor of the maternity block where the oncology and blood clinics are being held while they build a new specialist wing.

 Exciting view of part of the hospital car park, the Australia Estate ( so called because the roads are named after Australian cities) and  across Rushmere heath golf course with Foxhall Heath over on the right. The small white dot on the horizon is  BT telecommunications  research centre which looks like this when you get closer.



Welcome to Penny, a new follower in the Google pictures and thank you for lots of comments.

Back Soon
Sue

Ipswich - here we come

Col phoned Friday evening to say I could pick him up Saturday morning as soon as the consultant had done his rounds. So off  to Ipswich again calling at an electrical place on the way to buy a cooker ready for delivering to the bungalow.
 For the first time in 30+ years I shall have to use an electric hob - I'm going to hate it! Although the heating in the bungalow is gas, the cooker that was there was electric. We don't want to go to the expense of having new gas connections and we've been advised not to have a gas cooker in a house that will be rented out (which is the plan for when Col is well again, plan A?). Therefore electric it must be and I'll just have to get used to it I guess. Cookers do seem to be more expensive than a few years ago and freestanding are more than built-in. We don't want to change the kitchen units at the bungalow as they are fairly new and in good condition. I wonder why the elderly lady who lived there had a new kitchen but not a built in oven?

Thank you to Sadie at a life in the English rain  ( another proper Suffolk gal only much younger than me!) for telling me that the library I shall be near in Ipswich has a craft group and other stuff going on - Great excitement. I shall be asking Sadie for all sorts of info about things going on in town because although most of Ipswich is as familiar to me as our little local towns, actually living there will be a whole new experience.

Photo from Mikesbus pages internet

 I've been going to Ipswich for shopping since I was a small child and can just remember these trolley buses which ran in the town centre until 1963. We would catch the 204 big red bus which ran every two hours all the way from Bury St Edmunds to Ipswich. If you look at my header and follow the road from Bury to Ipswich you will see the dotted line which was then the boundary between East and West Suffolk (until Local government reorganisation in 1973 when Suffolk became one county). We lived just into East Suffolk on the main road which was at that time the A45.
Each school holiday mum would take us on the bus to Ipswich and we'd have lunch in a small fish and chip  restaurant right near the bus station. It was always jam packed full because that was before coffee shops and restaurant popped up everywhere. My favourite shop was Cowells

!960s/70s buttermarket Ipswich found on google photos from EADT

because down in the basement was a fantastic toy shop with big trays of farm animals that you could buy one by one and loads of other pocket money toys. (It's strange to see cars in this road in this photo because the town centre is now all pedestrianised).

I'll be sharing lots more old and new photos of Ipswich over the coming months.

We've just spent a "happy" hour trying to contact BT and sort out phone lines for the bungalow. Still have to try and get through to Talk Talk - Oh what fun!

Back Soon
Sue

Monday Memories

I don't really do Facebook - though I am on there somewhere but Col uses his page more often and he said everyone is posting photos of themselves when very young. You can guess where our photo albums are -  In- A- Box - and I refuse to open a box just to find a picture of Col aged 4!


But this is the photo our eldest put on her Facebook page. H and her brother M aged about 3 and 1½, we're not sure which beach, but I think Southwold. Cardi's knitted by Col's mum, a much missed Nana who made so many of their cardigans, jumpers, hats and mittens. Sadly Nana Sue won't be a knitting Nana, maybe I'll be the book Nana!- a wonderful excuse to search out lovely children's books from charity shops!

Son M - the now 6 foot plus archaeologist  will be on Radio Suffolk tomorrow afternoon talking with Leslie Dolphin about the Eighth in the East project. 

Out to Leiston this morning. Col went to the doctors to pick up a couple of things to help with the side effects of chemo, I went in the Co-op and Building Society which put me into temptation because they are fund raising for a charity by selling second-hand books for £1 each, and I found this, a hardback from the 1970's

a few years ago I wouldn't have looked twice at this but Persephone have re-printed 3 of  her books recently which I enjoyed so I thought I would bring this home and add it to the boxes. I looked on Amazon to see what they were selling for and some of her books are crazy prices. Not this one though - it's only worth a fiver!

I've finished the first of my library books - Silent Nights, Christmas Mysteries edited by Martin Edwards. One of the British Library Crime Classic reprints. It is short mystery stories dating from the 1890s (Conan Doyle) to the 1950s. Some were by well known authors  such as Edgar Wallace and Dorothy L Sayers and others long forgotten. A good read.

It's so interesting how the National newspapers have picked up Mean-Queen-Ilona's story from her local paper. I looked at the Daily Mail on line article where there were 100s of comments - some quite nasty and then Col said Radio Suffolk were talking about it this morning and her story had also been featured in The Sun on line. They seem to think she must be miserable living how she does but those of us who read her blog know she's certainly never miserable - a little odd sometimes maybe, but a kind, thoughtful and independent lady. I normally avoid anything to do with national daily papers but decided to register on line to have my tuppence worth and speak up for Ilona's thrifty-ness.
Many years ago we were featured in the local paper as being The Self-sufficient family and a few days later someone from the Daily Mirror turned up on the doorstep ( this was before the age of internet) and wanted an interview. I'm so glad I refused.

Many Thanks for comments yesterday
Back Tomorrow
Sue

The naivety of a 16 year old

I hope you enjoyed the local history links yesterday, it's always odd to go down that end of Aldeburgh and know that between the sea and the river there was once enough land  for a small village, but now all washed away.

Yesterday I finished Rose Cottage,
a short fiction book by Mary Stewart that has been sitting on my bookshelves for umpteen years. When I first started working in libraries aged 16 in 1971, she was a very popular author. Her first book Madam Will You Talk was written in 1955 and was followed by several more which I think are classed as romantic suspense. Then she wrote a trilogy of really large 'meaty' books about Merlin and King Arthur. I think it was the first of these, written in 1970, that I enjoyed so much and thought it so good that I can remember asking the old spinsterish reference librarian  Miss Patterson (it was an old fashioned library and we were all called by our surnames!) if she thought it would become a classic. I can still remember her huge hoot of laughter as she said " I really don't think so!" I remember feeling extremely silly.


But look what is say's on the front of a more recent edition " THE FIRST IN THE CLASSIC MERLIN SERIES.
Ha Ha Miss Patterson, not a classic in the sense she meant but maybe I was right after all.

However, Rose Cottage was definitely not a classic and now I've read it I shall add it to the charity shop bag.

The birds need more peanuts and  the feed mill  does a discount for 10+ bags feed.When we had 100 chickens there was never  any problem buying more than 10 bags, so Col asked around everyone we knew locally and we managed to find enough people wanting bird food to take a trip to Framlingham and stock up on peanuts, wild bird seed and 2 bags of chicken feed for our elderly friend who had our last 8 chickens. It's so much cheaper to buy by the sack from the mill rather than tiny little bags from pet shops or garden centres. Col dropped me off in Framlingham so I could do a tour of the 3 charity shops but no pennies left my purse at all.

Thank you for comments yesterday
Back Tomorrow
Sue

Advent 19 - A Hyacinth

This hyacinth in a pot was bought at a late Autumn sale at the Methodist chapel for 50p. I re-potted it and added some moss and it's been included in the box of gifts for Col's Dad.

Years ago I always bought some hyacinths and did the planting/wrapping/keeping in the dark thing before bringing them in for Christmas. Then one year they all got eaten by mice or something and I've not bothered since. It was only after I had biked home again after buying 1 hyacinth that I thought ......why on earth didn't I get one or two for us

We went to a funeral yesterday. Col's uncle, who was almost 80, had been ill for a while after a stroke and then the dreaded dementia crept in too. It was a sad time but at the same time a lovely funeral (if that doesn't sound too weird). Col's Aunt and Uncle had been baptised into the church family of Wetherden Baptist church in the mid 1990's and by a very strange co-incidence that isn't really a coincidence, Wetherden Baptist church is where I went to Sunday School and Youth groups ( F.O.Y. or Fellowship of Youth) all through the 1960's between the ages of 7 and 15. It was a proper funeral where the people who spoke really knew Col's Uncle, and the chapel was packed out with people who had known him at various times in his life. Unlike some funerals where there are hymns but no one is used to singing, yesterday there were so many chapel people there that the hymns sounded wonderful. Col caught up with his cousins who are all much younger than him and their families. I caught up with people who I knew from Chapel all those years ago and reminisced with the youth leader back then about the time we got stuck in the snow after going to a bible quiz at Hadleigh chapel.
 My Mum and Step-Dad are buried there too so I popped a tiny Christmas tree on Mum's grave while we were there. We saw other members of Col's family who we won't see until after Christmas so that was nice too. It was lovely to see they have a new young pastor, in his 30s with a young family, quite a rare thing.

I'm looking forward to the Strictly final tonight, but I've no idea who will win.

Many thanks for comments yesterday. I sometimes think I mustn't keep mentioning all Col's nasty health things, that wasn't what this blog was supposed to be about, but it's difficult not to when it seems to be taking up so much time. Someone said they liked my blog as it was like chatting over the garden fence which I liked the sound of so I'll just keep chatting about what's happening and apologise if it's a bit tedious.

Back Tomorrow
Sue

Gunpowder,Treason and Plot

Remember, remember the 5th of November

Gunpowder, Treason and Plot.

I see no reason why Gunpowder Treason

Should ever be forgot.

Every year ( or maybe memory deceives) in primary school we would copy out this poem in our best handwriting and decorate around the edges of the page with pictures of fireworks, bonfires and Guy Fawkes.

Once home, after tea we would go outside for a bonfire and fireworks  which would have been bought a few at a time over the last month.Our neighbours on one side would come round and perhaps Grandad would be there too. The fireworks didn't last long then it would be back indoors for hot dogs.

It was such an adventure, looked forward to for weeks -  Simple times.

This year we won't be watching fireworks as Cols outpatients appointment at hospital is at 6.30pm tonight -an  odd time. I have to confess to being a bit concerned at this new problem which has come on rather suddenly. It may upset all our plans regarding house moving and leave us not knowing what to do next.

The fifth £1 money saver from April 2013 was/ is - Buy Refill packs if you can.

Years ago we had a shop locally where we could take Ecover empties and refill with washing up liquid and laundry liquid. No longer there. I used to buy refill packs of the Kenco De-caf coffee, now more often than not I can buy jars on special offer cheaper than the refill packs.

I may be back tomorrow
Sue

June's Library Book Photo and Memories of Childrens Parties

A lovely sunny bike ride down to Friston for the library van and a good collection of booksbrought home. Not sure when I will get time to read this lot with Wimbledon coming up and Gooseberry picking of course.

Some from my favourite modern authors and a couple from the 1940s that have recently been reprinted. I shall try James Oswald again even though I didn't like or finish the last one - can't remember why. A few of the other books here are ones mentioned on The Furrowed Middlebrow Blog - British women authors from the early 20th Century. I shall let you know what I think of them all in due course.

Last month I brought home this lot and some went back unread. I tried Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver twice but just couldn't get into it. The Rafaella Barker - Summertime -was a bit too fluffy for me though I did read Green Grass. I also didn't read Pie 'n' Mash and Prefabs because the Joyce Storey book, that I did read was  about similar subjects. Though I've made a note to borrow it again one day.

  Marguerite Pattern, the very prolific cookery writer, died the other day aged 99. The book that introduced her to me was this one below from 1963.(Edited to say sorry,Picture vanished and I couldn't get it back!) My mum must have bought it to help with parties me and my sister  had at home in those more simple days.  She didn't like childrens parties and they  promptly stopped at aged 11. In fact as I was 4 years older than my sister ( well I still am I guess!) by the time I was about 13 I think she left it to me to organise them for L and her friends . I remember going through this book looking at all the ideas for games. Look at the price... 2/6, that's 12½p ! It's £4.49 upwards now on Amazon. I guess our copy fell apart years and years ago.


I do still have 3 books by Marguerite Pattern, over on the left of one of my WWII shelves.

Thanks to everyone for comments yesterday on the Frugal post. Re-hashing old posts is lazy really but I might do it again!

Back Sooner than later
Sue

May 5th 1992

23 years ago today we became the owners of a dilapidated run down 5 acre smallholding previously owned by a potty woman and an alcoholic Scottish bloke. She had to get him drunk to sign the Sale papers and he spent hours the first night we were here sitting in his van in the driveway!

The grass was knee high all round the house, the house had had almost nothing done to it since 1955 when it was built.It was very scruffy and needed everything that you could think of doing to it. There were 3 big buildings, all looking very rough. 3 old caravans were standing around falling apart  as well as several bits of farm machinery. A local farmer refused to cut the hay field because he didn't know what rubbish was hidden amongst the long grass. The only way to get from the garden to the field was to climb over a stile.There were no fences or gates that opened. Everything was held together or tangled up in old baler twine.There were bits of broken glass all around the garden.The "garden shed" stood on a base of broken rubble.The "fitted" kitchen was an old sink unit and an even older gas cooker and some shelves on the wall.

All the pictures below are photos of photos so not as sharp as they should be, but you get the general idea of what things were like in the summer of  '92

 This is how our son learned to drive aged 10!



I towed over a trailer full of stuff and Col towed the caravan, we arrived early as they were supposed to be moved out the day before.She was still here and the sheds were still full of rubbish.

We lived in a caravan and awning on the back "lawn" for the first two weeks but we had to buy a mower to cut the grass before we could get the caravan in.
The house had to be completely rewired before the Building Society would complete the mortgage so we had a bridging loan for a month to see us through.


BUT
There were apple trees, plum trees, cherry trees, gooseberry bushes, blackcurrant and red currant bushes, raspberry canes, loads of rhubarb and a huge walnut tree.

The electric company were still good old Eastern Electricity and they arrived on time and got the house rewired in two weeks.

The vegetable beds were there ( just buried amongst the grass)

The cattle shed hadn't been cleared out for years so there was a ton of well rotted compost for the garden

There were almost no neighbours, everywhere was quiet. The local schools were smaller.

It was the only thing of this acreage in Suffolk that we could afford, so we made the best of it.

*    *    *    *    *    *

We worked almost non-stop for the first 5 years tidying up and sorting out and it's only in the last 4 years that everything has been done and we can see it as a finished tidy smallholding.

And now we are thinking about moving!

Back Soon
Sue

Baskets, Buckets and Trugs

First of all Bonjour et Ca Va? to Frugal in France. When I learned a minimal amount of French at school ( and failed O level) I think we had to say"Comment allez vous?" but somewhere over the last 40 years that changed to Ca Va ( I think- or I might be talking total rubbish!). Anyway, Welcome!
Also welcome to Undomestic-Diva, Both folks have clicked the Google button.

We have had some really cold weather here over the last few days. A strong North-Easterly straight off the sea, colder than most of the winter. The front flower border desperately needs weeding but it's just too cold to be out there and STILL nothing much is growing outside.

The post about baskets and basket making by Cornish Chickpea ( the pictures of one of the lovely baskets she made are here)  got me thinking about about how many baskets we have around the house and whether they are new or old.
This is the oldest by far

it belonged to my mum and I used it for taking ingredients to school Domestic Science ( as it was called back in the day), so it must be at least 50 years old - maybe more,
then we have a couple of log baskets, one in the kitchen and the other in the living room

and two of those baskets on the right which we keep  newspapers in for lighting the fires, but my favourite is this one

which Col got me many years ago from a local basket making man ( sadly long gone). I've only ever tried basket making once, at a local craft day, but I found it really hard on the hands and wrists.

I went from pondering baskets to thinking about buckets which reminded me of this piece I wrote way back in 2002 for the Suffolk Smallholders Newsletter. ( So many things have changed since then - no goats now of course and no more wine making, but we still have quite a few buckets!)

 If only the number of buckets you possess measured success as a smallholder, we would be champion smallholders!
I don't remember bringing any  when we moved here in 1992 but now, at a rough count ( no I'm not sad enough to actually go around counting buckets)  I think there are about 30 in various locations and performing varied tasks.
First there are the perfect buckets, those with proper handles and no cracks. These include two rubber un-destructibles, which will surely outlast us, probably because the darn things are so heavy that they are rarely used. Most of the proper buckets are used for their proper job, that is, carrying water to and fro to animals and birds.
There are buckets with good handles but cracked at the bottom, "useless" you might say but No! one has straw in  the bottom and is used everyday for collecting eggs, another collects weeds to carry them to the compost heap.
Then there are buckets without cracks but no handles - no problem, they become feed buckets for the goats or are stood on the field inside tyres to become drinking buckets.
Some are special buckets, like the bright red FIRE bucket on the campsite, and the compost bucket outside the back door or the fermentation bucket used for wine-making. Lurking in the shed, awaiting grandchildren, is a bright yellow sandcastle bucket leftover from when A was little .
Colin has buckets too! Stood in his workshop in various stages of yuck, they hold waste oil or a mixture of nus and bolts bought from a farm sale "just in case".
Like he says, whenever I suggest throwing out an old bucket " it might come in handy one day".

There is another item here which is used for carrying things, my lovely trug, handmade by Col several years ago.

I had found the measurements and instructions in a craft book and persuaded him to make a few to sell on our stand at a Suffolk Smallholders Annual Show in about 2007. He doesn't mind making things but these were much more complicated than his usual bodged gates etc and he got crosser and crosser with each one. I painted them, distressed and waxed all 6 and thought they looked really good. But when we came to work out the cost for selling we had to price them at £15 each and we didn't sell a single one. Col was NOT pleased. We gave some away as Christmas presents and I kept two here which I still have and I still love them even if no one else did!

I think the older I get the more I appreciate beautiful old hand made objects.

Thanks to everyone for comments
Back in a few days
Sue

Welcome To Anyone Who Wants To Be Anonymous

I was puzzled how some people get masses of comments from mysterious people so I've been fiddling with the blog set-up and found out why I never got any comments from Ms Anonymous.  Have rectified that. Will I get Trolls now? We will see. It can always be undone.

I see from other blogs that many places have had a bit of snow. No sign of any here on the Suffolk coast in fact we had bright sunshine and blue skies here this morning, though it's pretty chilly and strong winds are forecast for tonight.

 Col got the black grease stuff painted around the trunks of the fruit trees, hopefully that will stop a few nasty creatures climbing up to damage the fruit. I used to spend several £ on buying sticky traps that suspend in special hanging things from the trees later in the year. These are meant to show if there is a problem with codling moth,but as we never did any spraying anyway they seemed a bit pointless, so I've not bought any for a few years. We still seem to get some good apple cropping years and some not so good whatever we do so I think it's more down to the weather than anything else.


I needed a picture for today's post so here are the very last of our own tiny tomatoes eaten by Col for his lunch,

 they've been slowly turning red in a tray in the unheated craft room since they were brought in from the poytunnel several weeks back. He's been able to have a few every day, I can't eat fresh tomatoes unless they are the huge pointy ones with virtually no seeds so they've lasted well for him.


I need to bring to your attention something VERY unusual on BBC TV tonight..... Ipswich Town Football Club in a F.A Cup replay against Southampton. A Must Watch for any Suffolk person! I've followed the fortunes ( and there haven't been many of those lately) of ITFC since I was about 13 and some of the members of the team plus publicity people went round all the villages in the summer holidays with a caravan and handed out photos and fixture lists. All the boys were really excited so of course us girls got interested too. For a couple of years afterwards I cut out everything I could from the newspapers and made Ipswich Town football scrapbooks. I didn't actually get to a game until I was going out with a bloke who often went, so I got to go to. It wasn't the done thing in the early 70's for girls to go to football matches without a bloke! At least not in sleepy Suffolk.


 Thank you to Ilona at Life after Money for suggesting a catchy title for yesterdays post, John Gray    ( Going Gently) said that was what he would have said but Ilona got in first - yeah right! And John Wooldridge at Of Brambles and Bears offered himself for helping with breast screening! - There's always one bright spark. I think it would be bad for his knees!

And Finally

Welcome to new Followers Marie on Bloglovin' and  A Few Pennies in the Google list.

Back Tomorrow
Sue

A little bit of warmth

We've had sunshine and cloud over the last few days but always with a chilly wind, sometimes right off the sea but today the wind dropped and we had a blue sky sunny day.
C has been here all day getting lots of gardening done; preparing beds for runner beans, strimming the edges and grass cutting. We got one bed of runners planted out - I had started them in the greenhouse several weeks ago. The other bed will be seed sown straight into the ground in a couple of weeks time. A friend from a mile away called in today and said there was quite a frost at her house this morning but luckily I think we missed it as everything is looking OK.

Thanks to everyone for comments yesterday about the 10 random things and the Nemesia annual/perennial debate. It was good to find someone ( Tiddles) who had also been on the SS Nevasa for a school educational cruise. I thought no one would believe me as it seems such an unlikely thing nowadays. I looked up the Nevasa on Google and was surprised to find she kept going until 1974, that was 6 years after our trip, as we were told at the time that we were one of the last school trips, but they must have tidied her up a bit and carried on. There was a sister ship the SS Uganda and we passed her somewhere on the way to or from the Med.

Back tomorrow
Sue

Ticked off the list

The temperature today felt about 10 degrees warmer than yesterday as the nasty East wind had gone. We were up and about early and got to the boot sale by 7.30, but even then it was very busy. Loads of car boots there and we went up and down and round and round. C found nothing but I got two things from my 'looking for' list. A nice big mirror in an oldish pine frame for only £2.

  The Hosta I wanted ( green leaves with white edges) was £1.75. A couple of fly swats for 10p each and two new navy blue pillowcases for £1 were the other things I bought. We were home by 9am and after a coffee and doing the jobs we hadn't done before we went - like washing up- it was straight on with gardening.

So much to do! I always start to panic at this time of year, I don't know why because we always end up with something to eat and to sell.
There were Purple sprouting broccoli, calabrese and white cabbage plants to go out.  Then I had  small trays of nasturtiums, sweet peas and snapdragons that needed planting and some parsley plants. French climbing beans were sown in pots and squash plants potted up from modules into pots.
I think the purple sprouting is a bit too early so I've sown some more plus red cabbage, cauliflower, winter cabbage and more calabrese. That leaves sweetcorn to do in a couple of weeks time.
A friend sent a packet of perennial verbena seeds in with my birthday card so those have also been sown.

 It is nice when people appreciate our eggs and the campsite. I found a note through the door yesterday from someone called Suzanne ( not sure who this is) to say she always bought our eggs when passing and they were better than any others. Then this morning I was cleaning the campsite loos when a caravan was just about to leave and the man said we had a really good site, one of the best small sites they've stayed at. It makes all the loo cleaning worthwhile!

C has been sorting out the big IBC  thousand litre water containers that we fill and take up the field for the chickens. One had got a faulty tap so has been swapped over. We have them on a couple of old trailer chassis, such an easy way of moving water round the holding.
We are really short of water this year already, despite catching several thousand litres during the rains earlier, the dry weather over the last few weeks has meant quite a lot of watering has been done. In fact C got a phone call from our farmer friend  W to say they are starting to irrigate the wheat and C will be needed to move the irrigation equipment during the day when W is at work elsewhere.

I have another two followers on Google friends and one is another Suffolk blogger with a brand new blog. So welcome to Musings From a Mid Suffolk Meadow. ( I can't find out who the other new follower is, but welcome whoever you are). Mentioning Mid Suffolk reminds me of a news item on BBC Look East yesterday. The reporter was in the village of Wyverstone which is next door to the village of Bacton where C lived and went to school, and where  we lived  for  several years and where I was Cub Scout Leader for many years. He was reporting on a police 'incident' involving assault and some firearms being found in a cottage, where a 49 year old man had been arrested. " Goodness me" we said "wonder if that would be anyone we knew".  Although as C is 57 it wouldn't have been anyone he was at school with. Then I got a shock when we heard it was someone who was a cub in the pack just at the time I started helping. It seems odd that I thought I was really grown up when I became a leader and yet the cubs were only 10 years younger than me.

Back Tomorrow
Sue

Taking a risk in the poly-tunnel

We are so lucky here. The sun has shone again, the temperature went up to 16 degrees C while Em at Dartmoor ramblings had snow on her photos and Ilona at Life After Money had rain this morning.

The early tomato seeds were sown at the same time as last year, but of course March was bitterly cold here last year, whereas this year the plants in the conservatory have shot up in the warmth. It was a case of either plant them out in the poly-tunnel with some fleece handy to cover them or pot them into even bigger pots. So 18 have gone out today and now I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we don't get any really hard frosts during April.

Today C has been fixing toilets and basins into the gents toilet shed, things are progressing nicely and another booking for just before Easter too - Good.

I had planned to take a photo of the tomato plants and also the leaves opening on our Horse Chestnut  tree but the battery was flat on the camera so that will have to wait until tomorrow.

 Seeing the sticky buds unfurling just takes me straight back 50 years to primary school. I went to a small two roomed school with 60 pupils and back then it was the norm to have a nature table, where we took in interesting things to display. At this time each year there would be vases full of Horse Chestnut sticky buds, primroses, violets, cowslips and something we called Five Fingers which I think were Oxslips or a wild primula/polyantha cross. To get to the wood where they grew we had  to walk  up a lane beside our house and then along the field edges probably a mile or so. We usually went with our next door neighbour and her daughter- I can't remember mum coming and certainly not Dad who would have been at work.
Here I am, aged about 4 or 5, round at our neighbours, just returned from a walk "up the woods" clutching the Five Fingers.

 We might have been  the cause of them dieing out in the wild!

( The car in the background was round the back of the garage/petrol station next door to our neighbour, it must have stood there for years as it certainly predates 1959/60 when this was taken)

Thanks to Jennifer, Dartford Warbler, Angela, Cro, Dc, Bridget, Fat Dormouse and Helen for comments yesterday about cheques, banking and other stuff.

Back Tomorrow

Sue

Living with less?

The joy of reading lots of other peoples blogs is that it can spark a thought or an idea.  Jane at Shoestring Cottage did a post with a short list of 30 things our grans didn't use. The idea for her list came from a visit to a museum that included a Fishermans cottage. That's the sort of museum I like - looking at how real people lived. When we went to Duxford  years ago it wasn't the planes that I enjoyed but  the wartime pre-fab showing how few possessions that people had then.

That made me think about the time in  1983/4 when we lived in a mobile home for a year while we did up an old house. Before that were living in a 3 bed house with our children aged 2 and 4. Most of the stuff from the house wouldn't fit into the caravan so we were quite limited on what possessions we needed for that year. I can't remember a huge amount about the year. I know I enjoyed having virtually no housework because the caravan was such a small space!
 It was a very busy time.  The work on the old house had to be done in 12 months to get the council grant which was available then for bringing a house that had been declared unfit for human habitation back up to scratch. Him Outside was working for the council all day and then came home and worked on the house until 9 most nights. I remember digging out the earth floors to lower the floor level and at the end putting endless amounts  of linseed oil on all the beams.
One thing I DO remember is having just one shelf for books and having to choose which ones to take before all the rest were stored away in boxes at His Nan's house.

That thought led me on to wondering which books would I take now, if I was only allowed one bagful from my book shelves. I would want to take favourites and things that can be read and re-read.
Time for a list!
So I would pack my bag with.......
The 3 Hovel Books by Elizabeth West
The 2 books by Patrick Rivers that are at the top of the blog
(Those 5 are all small so would easily slide into the sides of a bag)
Vere Hodgson - Few eggs and No Oranges.
Juliet Gardiner - Wartime Britain
Frances Woodford - Dear Mr Bigalow
Barbara Kingsolver - Animal, Vegetable, Mineral
( Those 4 are all good fat books with loads of reading)
Amy Dacyczyn - The Complete Tightwad Gazette
( Another giant book that you can find new things in wherever you open it)
Helene Hanff Omnibus.
( The well known 84 Charing Cross Road + 4  others, lots to read there)
One Hundred Favourite British Poems
This is a small book , but full of poems that I ought to read.
Then if there was room I would fill up the corners with as many crime books as possible - things I've not read yet. Or maybe the 5 in the CJ Sansom series, they could be read again and are all huge.

And while I was looking at my bookshelves I spotted a book that took me almost full circle back to the beginning of this blog. It's called " Sucking Eggs, what your Wartime Granny could teach you about Diet, Thrift and Going Green". A book full of information about how women managed their households during the war.

So many things have changed since then that have made us 'need' more of everything. Take yesterday for instance. Because I have a freezer I made 4 pastry cases to store. That means I need 4 flan/quiche dishes to make them in. Without the freezer I would make one at a time.
Because we have 4 bedrooms we have room for all our family who live away to visit all at once,  that means I have lots of extra pillows, duvet, covers etc.
Because I have a big built-in cupboard in the dining room I have room for a whole other set of dinner ware, glasses,fruit dishes etc.

Thinking about living in a small space reminded me of a book that has been on my wish list for a while, it's called "12 by 12, a one room cabin off the grid". This is a book from the states and I'm waiting for the price to drop a bit more so I can order it. It sounds interesting.

That's a whole blog about what happens when someones blog sets you thinking!

By the way,out of Jane's list of 30 things there were 22  that we don't have/use/do and if I keep knitting even the disposable dishcloths/scourers would be off the list!

Back Tomorrow.

Thoughts of Christmas Past.

Christmas Day in just over two weeks time and I really should be doing something useful like putting the marzipan on the cakes. At least the cards are all in the post and the majority of presents wrapped. I'm vaguely organised this year.

At some time I expect most people will have bought a magazine with one of those count down to Christmas charts in, you know what I mean:- 28 days to go = stock up on toilet rolls, 24 days to go = put the sprouts on! |That sort of thing.
I wonder if anyone actually follows them?
I can remember 2 years when I should have been more organised.
The first was 1981. I had a H. a toddler of 19 months and M. a 2 month old baby and hadn't done much planning at all for Christmas and then we had snow in mid December, quite a lot of snow in fact, so that instead of Him Outside being home at 4.30 each afternoon to look after things while I went shopping he was out working on the gritting lorry early and late. I think we managed on what we could get from the village shop that year.
 The second was maybe about 18 years ago. For some reason I had got rather behind and not many preparations had been done with only a couple of weeks left. Then me and the children all went down with an awful flu type colds and I spent a fortnight in a muddle headed fug trying to look after them and sort everything out including making the Christmas crackers.   Since then I've always tried to have things done by early December, just in case!

Christmas was great fun when we had 3 little ones looking forward to the arrival of Father Christmas. When they were a bit older I did after school and holiday child minding so often had 7 under 12s in the house on the days after term ended. Happy Days! Then there was the Cub Scout Christmas Games evening to plan and enjoy and the day itself meant Mum-in-Law, Dad-in-Law and Him Outsides brother round at our house for the day.

Now our children are grown and have plans of their own, which is how it should be, Mum-in-Law passed away on a November day more than 10 years ago and Christmases are quiet. I can no longer cope with a big crowd of people or  several days of family staying ( poor old woman!) so it's just a small celebration,  6 on the day and the other two children plus partners for a weekend get together  in January.

30 Ways to save £1---DAY 13 + Living History Programmes

Thank you to Cro, Janice, Jane, Twiggy, The Domestic storyteller,Vicki, Debbie ,Em, Pam, Angie for comments yesterday.

We have had a lovely day here today after a proper grass frost this morning, there was even  a thin layer of ice on the chicken drinkers.
Him outside was off to work for one of his customers this morning,while I did a bit of baking and boring housework.

I'm looking forward to the new Historical farm recreation - The Monastery Farm on TV tonight. I just hope it's better than the Wartime one which was full of inaccuracies. My favourite ( I think I mentioned this the other day) was " The Green Valley", we have the DVD which I love'

 Going back even further does anyone admit to being old enough to remember this

It was on TV in about 1978 or 9, before Health and Safety regulations! Some people volunteered to live for a year as they would have done in the Iron age.  They had quite a hard time of it.
I came across the book about it many years later in Aldeburgh library and then found a copy one day in a charity shop- this was before Amazon existed.
On the same subject, our neighbour brought around some old newspapers for fire lighting and I spotted an article about English Heritage looking for people to live as Neolithic tribesmen in mud huts at the Stonehenge visitor centre. The unpaid volunteers will have to light and maintain fires and tell stories of the Neolithic people to visitors.(read about it here) but only during the day.

DAY 13 of the 30 ways to save £1 was
13. If you need more than two regular prescriptions a month always buy a NHS prepayment card.
These are available for 3 months or a year and can save a fortune. Him Outside now has to take 6 different things a day, that would be nearly £50 a month but the card is just over £100 a year at the moment. Phew - Thank goodness for that card!

Just a simple Sunday

I hate the day we put the clocks back. It means winter is on the way and I'm not good in the winter. I shall have yet another fight with nasty black depression that sometimes sees me falling into a black hole. It's a lack of a chemical in the brain that does it, easily controlled by a small dose of happy pills but annoying all the same.

Once the rain stopped Him Outside brought in a bookcase that was in the old campsite toilet block. It was painted purple  but he has painted it white and it is now beside the bed with a kettle on it - so I can reach out and switch it on - Luxury!

Next job was to shift some logs that Bts - the tree cutting people, had left behind when they cleared under the pylons. It's not our land but nobody really knows who owns it. We know who farms it but the land was sold off several years ago to some big insurance company or something similar. So we've claimed the logs which have been added to the huge heap that we already have seasoning ready for a few years time.

Other than those jobs and the normal egg collecting etc, we've had a quiet restful day.

We have heeded all the warnings, put things safely inside sheds and generally prepared for whatever weather comes our way tonight and tomorrow. The last I heard the storm had been down graded to a once in 5 year event rather than a once in 200 year storm like we had in 1987. I was 8 months pregnant back then and our electric was off for a week. Because we saw no TV for a week we had no idea what effect the wind had in other parts of the country. Our son remembers unwrapping presents by candlelight on his 6th birthday.
Which reminds me - he didn't get the job that he was interviewed for last week. I'm sure things happen for a reason and as the job was a 3 year contract with one year in Norfolk, one year in Suffolk and another year in Hertfordshire it would have been difficult to know whether to move 3 times or travel which would have made life complicated for them both. I'm sure something will happen that will enable them to move back to this area at sometime - just not yet.

Thank you for comments yesterday, it's lovely to hear from people all around the world who have connections with Suffolk. Also welcome to new followers on here and via Bloglovin'.