Old Things and Bird Watching

We don't have any antiques in our house, just one or two old things (plus me and him of course!)

This is my favourite

 It's just a small chest of drawers about 7 inches tall that I've had forever. I don't know where it came from but I believe it was made by someone in the family before I was around. All I remember is using it for plastic dolls cutlery when me and my sister played house. Sometime much later I remember buying and fixing the little brass knobs as before that the only way to get the drawers open was to tip them out. The key is even older and it came from the very old wattle and daub cottage we renovated in 1983. The key lives in the drawers along with random foreign and old coins, fuses and picture hooks.It deserves being used for something better.

Here's something much younger. This little fella crashed into the window as I stood here making a cuppa. It clung on - stunned - long enough for me to go and get my camera and take this picture.

I'm surprised we didn't have more crashes because our neighbour is away, her feeders must be empty and all the blue tits in Knodishall are round at our place eating us out of house and home!

Col didn't sit outside to do the RSPB Garden Bird watch as he did in 2015 but watched from 3 different windows and over the hour saw 

Blue tit 30+

Great Tit 30+

Coal Tit 2

Longtail Tit 6

Greenfinch 2

Chaffinch 12

Goldfinch 9

 Redpoll 2

Blackbird 8

Field fare 2

Wren 6

Robin 4

Dunnock 2

Green Woodpecker 1

Greater Spotted woodpecker 3

Collard Dove 2

Pigeon 6

Jay 1

Magpie 2

Kestrel 1

Sparrow hawk 1

Pheasant 1

Jackdaw 2

Rook 2

Carrion Crow 6

Today the garden is much quieter so our neighbour must be home and has re-filled all her feeders.

Welcome to SusanRD and Christine Grant who have pushed the follower numbers up to 336, thank you for comments yesterday and welcome back to Bridget and Julee two favourite bloggers who've been AWOL for months!

Back again ASAP
Sue

Thrifty Thursday, frost and those birds are back

Thrifty Thursday this week instead of Frugal Friday because tomorrow is library van day - at last - so my library books will feature in tomorrows post,

Have their been any thrifty things this week? Not many

• We took a flask and snack to hospital on Tuesday to save using the cafe ( and thank goodness we did as we were there 2 hours longer than we thought.)
• Free heat and hot water as usual
• Used home grown leeks, squash, Brussels sprouts, apples and beetroot plus apricots from the freezer.
• Home made bread all week
• Several extra portions of various dinners have been popped in the freezer, handy for me when Col is in hospital. 
• Got a discount on feed by asking around for who wanted bird peanuts/feed to make up to 10 sacks

I can't think of anything else.

Today was a big bake day and Col choose sultana buns, I choose coffee sponge and by mutual agreement cheese straws were made too. Some are for the weekend and the rest have gone into the freezer. Plus sausage rolls for dinner and to put in the freezer and 2 mince pies with a scrappy bit of puff pastry that was left over from the sausage rolls. A few years ago that little bit of pastry would have been chucked out but not any more!

We rarely get  a hoar frost, the sort that leaves everywhere covered with  frosted edges, perhaps because the air is dryer or it's windier nearer the coast.This morning just for a while everywhere sparkled and I snapped the sage

and the conifer

but it was soon gone and we had a grey morning until the sun appeared.

I quickly grabbed the camera again later because the redpolls were back on the niger seed feeder and facing the right way to see the colours. They'd gone a second after clicking so only just in time.

Many thanks for comments yesterday, regarding which I have a dilemma. When I was posting just 2 or 3 times a week I had time to answer comments individually. Now I'm posting everyday I seem to have to choose between answering comments or reading other peoples interesting blog posts or spend longer on line which would leave me no time for reading which would be a Disaster! I do read all comments of course but what to do about answering??

Which reminds me to reply to Phil - Knodishall church is thought to be  built  in the 15th century around  an earlier Norman building. The tower is 15th Century, the buttresses 19th century but there are much later improvements. There is no record of a village around the church but it seems that the village as it is now grew in the 19th century around a green and mill  ( a mile away) rather than around the church. The Victorian primary school ( now a house) is actually half way between the church and the newer village almost as if they hadn't decided which part was more important.

Oooops nearly forgot to welcome Marjorie, follower 344 in the google pictures

Back Tomorrow
Sue

Bird Watching and Other Critters

We spend a lot of time bird-watching, usually when washing and wiping up. It's a good thing we don't have a dishwasher.

A few weeks ago I was at the sink, looked up and saw a bird on the path. It looked a bit stunned like they do sometimes when it's windy and they've crash landed. First glance and I thought it was a small pigeon, second glance I realised it wasn't but what on earth was it? I knew if I moved to get the camera or bird book it would be off, so I just stood still and looked hard. It's back was grey but the wings were lighter and all had dark edges to the feathers. After a minute a car pulled up and the bird was off. I went and got the bird book but couldn't see anything that fitted the description. When I told Col he suggested a  Cuckoo which was something I hadn't considered as I've never seen one before. So the bird book came out again and yes, that's probably what it was. Wow! It must have been on it's way out of the country. Wish I could have got the camera.
If we get the cold winter that several newspapers are forecasting the Blackbirds and Fieldfare will soon appear to find the windfall apples. I'm glad there are so many apples on the trees this year that we don't need to pick up many windfalls to use. Our Pyracantha is something else they they will feed on when the going gets tough.

This dead dragonfly  was on the floor in the craft-room a few days ago. How did it get in? No windows open in there.. Would a cat have brought it in through the cat-flap? There's always windows open upstairs and in the kitchen but they are not very close to the  craft-room. It was sad to see it but good to be able to get a really close look at the colours.

There were not many butterflies around here this year but Red Admirals love to feed off the fallen plums and to sunbathe. I managed to sneak up on this one on the Bramley apple tree.

This was a sad but interesting surprise. I found it laying on the path early one morning. We have 16 different types of bat in this country and I'm not really sure which one this is but it has big ears!

Then of course there is this bushy-tailed creature who I spot almost every time I look out of the window, usually carrying a walnut!

 So cute......BUT he's nicked all the good walnuts straight off the tree.

I'm so pleased that I can take close up photos like this with the camera everyone got me for my 60th last April.

Back Soon 

Sue

Alarm calls

For a very small bird the Wren is incredibly LOUD ( info here for readers from elsewhere). We have a pair feeding 4 young in a nest in the old shed by the back door. We also have more with a nest somewhere else in the garden, and at least one more pair somewhere near the chicken shed at the top of the field. They get very agitated at everything and even at nothing, so at the moment we are being deafened by alarm calls " TECK, TECK, TECK, they shout continuously. Our cat spends her time outside trying to find a way into the shed, where we have wedged the door open with just room for the wrens to get in and out but even when she's not outside the wrens are still annoyed at something. It's interesting to hear them to start with but after 3 days  with hardly a break in their shouting I shall be quite glad when their young have fledged and flown.

I've been very lucky and another giveaway arrived in the post today. This was a very old book dating from 1908, called The School of Health. It's fascinating and surprising, as even then, the Author Alfred B Olsen MD, was advising that people give up smoking as it was bad for their health. Thank you to KATE. I shall enjoy reading it.
I'm feeling slightly guilty as I think that's the 3rd giveaway I've won in just over a year of Blogging. I think I shall have to do a giveaway when I get to a significant  blogging point like my 500th post which should be in about 40 something days.

Also in the post was the summer issue of Craft Creations Magazine and Yippee Do! I have a card featured in the Readers Gallery, I hope they are still giving away a £10 voucher for featured cards, then I shall have fun choosing some more card supplies from their catalogue.

After  so many gloomy days we had sunshine At Last this afternoon so I hopped on my bike and went down to the village for the  Bowls Club Fete. Unfortunately there were only 2 stalls, a raffle and the tea stall, so I came home again!

Many thanks to Gill at Frugal in Derbyshire who explained how I should cook the trout.  There was more info in Hugh Fearnley Whittingstalls - A cook on the wild side, which I think was the book that went with the first TV series he ever appeared in. It turned out to be quite tasty..... I mean the Trout, not Hugh FW!

Back tomorrow
Sue

Frogs Legs

There are still dozens of tadpoles in our little sink pond and for weeks they didn't seem to be changing but at last I spotted legs.  What a dreadful photo! but you can just see legs, back and front.

Today 1lb of red gooseberries and 2lb of green have been picked, topped and tailed and put in the freezer. There are still several on the bushes but they are all small. We need some more rain like the good downpour we had yesterday afternoon. It went several inches into the soil and filled one of the big 1000 lt tanks on the back of the workshop.
 A good lot of raspberries were picked too and a couple of punnets plus 1 punnet of Tayberries went out on the stall.

Things are still quiet here, so not much to post about , C is doing the shed, there are 5 caravans/motorhomes on the campsite and I'm watching tennis and thinking that I really ought to be cleaning or ironing or something useful!

I thought I would give you an easy puzzle picture.
What will these flowers turn into?

Answer tomorrow.

Then I will leave you with this information.
If ever you get the urge to find out if you can make Paneer cheese from powdered milk. I can tell you it doesn't work!

Back Tomorrow
Sue

What a lovely day

It's been a really beautiful day here. If every Autumn day was like this it would make winter seem much shorter.

I took a wheelbarrow out to the field to start the harvesting of pumpkins and squash to put out for sale. These small pumpkins are bright orange already and much smaller than I wanted. There are some bigger which are still green.  There are also a few plants of some that are slightly different- not quite round, and paler orange ( the one on the right) I don't know what they are as they don't fit any of the descriptions on the packets of seeds I planted.
Some of the butternut squash are HUGE, much bigger than I wanted for selling. I spent ages last year trying to find a variety that wouldn't get that big and with the dry weather we have had I'm surprised at their size. I have no idea how much squash cost in the shops so put these out at £1 each - because I sell everything at multiples of 50p to make accounting easier - and they soon all went.

 It's a really good time for seasonal eating with both the end of the summer and now autumn produce available. Today from our garden we could have tomatoes, sweet peppers, green and red peppers, chilli peppers, cucumber, white cabbage, red cabbage, chard,  lettuce, radish, courgettes, butternut squash, pumpkin, potatoes, parsnip, sweetcorn, leeks, onions,  red beet, runner beans, pears, autumn raspberries, apples, figs, greengages, plums and the herbs of course - parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme ! and oregano too.

Him Outside has been resting and as I had nothing that desperately needed doing I thought I would have a lazy-ish afternoon too. So when I fished a heap of our local newspaper - The East Anglian Daily Times, out of the campsite bin I sat down and had a good read. It's interesting to see what local news we miss by not having a  paper.

Making a cuppa this afternoon, I glanced up to see a weasel trying to carry something through the orchard. I realised after a second look that it was a pigeon. He was really struggling with it. Who knew weasels could catch pigeons?