Hay and other stuff including the C word.... in July! (Sorry)

Col spent several hours over the weekend shifting hay bales from the field up the road. I'm glad to say this didn't involve too much physical work as he was using the front forks on the tractor to lift big round bales onto the trailer and delivering them to a stables 4 miles away, where he just rolled them off. The girl who is having all this hay is going to set up a standing order to pay us each month as she can't afford it all at once. I would really have preferred to have sold it to someone who could pay straight away, so I hope this works out OK. She has also bought some small bales from another farmer and Col will be helping her move those too.We have already been paid for all of our small bales from here, so that cheque has gone into the bank.

After delivering the small bales it was obvious that the wooden part of the sides of the old horse box trailer were falling to bits. Now this is the trailer we want to use to take the garden bits and Col's workshop stuff to wherever, whenever, we move. So mending the trailer is  his job for this week.

It's already had new tires and a new floor so should be good as new(ish) once he's finished.

The other thing he did at the weekend was to help out someone who's writing articles for Smallholder Magazine. This bloke knows us through Suffolk Smallholders Society and needed someone with an old tiller rotovator so he could take some photos of the parts and how they go together. Col also borrowed our neighbours Mantis tiller and that's also been photographed to appear too. As a thank you for his help he was given a bottle of red wine which has gone into the wine cellar ( just a wine crate in the cupboard in the utility room!) I don't drink any alcohol at all and Col only likes an occasional beer and wine at Christmas so most of the bottles we are given end up being passed onto someone else and this one will have a muslin bag of mulled wine spices tied to it and will go into one of the Christmas Hampers I'm putting together. Raspberry Vinegar is another thing I'm making and that  got started on Monday. I've already made the lavender sachets,  whiskey marmalade and two lots of jam. Next will be chutneys and mustard. Then chocolate truffles nearer to Christmas. I've been looking for something to put all the things in but baskets - even second-hand - are silly prices.

Discovered this recipe - on a scrappy bit of paper torn from somewhere - when I was sorting out my recipe folder. It didn't have a name, and I've altered it a bit anyway, so it's been christened.................

Chicken wings in a tasty sauce  
This was the amount I used for 4 chicken wings, served up with noodles and stir fry veg (carrots,onion,courgette and pepper - all home grown of course) it's was enough for us.

Make a few slits  in the fleshy part of the chicken wings
In a bowl mix together 4 tbsp tomato ketchup, 3tbsp clear honey, 2tbsp soy sauce, 1tbsp sweet chilli sauce and 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar. Add the wings to the bowl and mix them round , then pop in fridge for at least an hour, give them another mix round if you remember.
Turn the mix into a roasting tin and cook at 170C Fan oven or Gas 5 for 45 minutes, basting once or twice.
Lift out the wings, add just a little boiling water to the remaining sauce, just to thin and loosen all the sticky bits, stir well and mix with the stir fried veg and noodles.

I've added this recipe to the Recipes From My Suffolk Kitchen page.

Today was weeding day. The long front flower bed was a right ol' mess because lots of  the self seeded annuals had died off. Now it's tidy but with several empty spaces. Do I spend to fill it up when we might not be here to see it? The strawberry bed was another place that got sorted, lots of plants have died  due to the dry weather, we have to do so much watering in the poly tunnels that stuff outside often gets left to fend for itself.
I've potted up 5 of  the Walnut seedlings that popped up this year. I've found 7 so far but one is in the middle of the raspberries so I can't get at it and the other is a bit to close to a buried water pipe.

2 seedlings I found several years ago are now trees 6 foot tall on the edge of the campsite.Now what do I do with these babies? I may have to give them to someone to babysit them until we find a new  home.

( Thanks to Dawn at Doing It For Ourselves for reminding me to dig up the walnut seedlings after reading her post yesterday)

Oh good, new followers to welcome. Hello to Lisanrichard in the Google pictures and Sandy Rebecca, Rita, Jo, Jane,Lizzie and Lee  and maybe some others on Bloglovin'.

Back Soon
Sue

10th March -3 years ago today

3 years ago today Col gave up working full time for the County Council and launched into an unknown world of self- employment.
Actually it wasn't quite as drastic as that sounds because he carried on with his old job of bridge inspecting for 3 - 5 days a month and had several part time things lined up and of course we already had the campsite up and running and  planned to increase  our eggs and veg to sell.
That first spring and summer of 2012 was an unsettling time. Ever since our youngest started school in 1992 I had been used to being at home on my own all day for most of the year. It took a while to get into a new routine. Col still felt he had to be working at something all the time whereas I had been gradually slowing down since our youngest moved out in 2006. Everyone thought he had a pension to live on, which we didn't, but I had been juggling our income for 30+ years, through many tight times and knew we would manage while Col thought he needed to be doing dozens of different jobs to make ends meet.
3 years and two  heart events later and everything is much calmer, he is 58 tomorrow and so glad he finished work when he did. We are a long way out of the rat race and have settled into a  laid back routine. We don't need to earn "loads-a-money"  because we live such a simple quiet sort of lifestyle and  I no longer feel guilty reading instead of doing!

Well, what have we been up to over the last week on the Simple Suffolk smallholding?

Thursday morning was a wood cutting morning followed by a walk. Later I cleared all the small things from the dining room and brought the dust sheets in to cover the table and carpet ready for decorating. I'll get the prep work done bit by bit over a few days.

On Friday Col took the car to the dealers garage for them to look at the wheel bearings as we have a humming noise. The car came with a 3 month warranty - handy. They couldn't get it done Friday so lent Col an old Mondeo for the weekend. Later we shifted a load of shingle mixed with cement into some low parts of the campsite driveway. This sounds hard work but was mostly done with the front bucket on the tractor so not as energetic as it sounds.
Thanks to a reminder on a blog ( sorry not sure whose) I have taken cuttings from my money plant and shoved them into a pot in the hope they will root. Some pepper seeds which had been sitting in the propagator for  weeks suddenly decided to grow. Now I have 13 pepper seedlings - much better.

On Saturday morning our son came over to get the battery  from his old car to put on the newer car. I was doing a bit of baking including the mincemeat cake from Bovey Belle's Blog ( declared very tasty by Col later. I used ordinary SR flour as I didn't have wholewheat).
 Saturday afternoon was a quiet one on my own stitching, knitting and watching the Davis Cup tennis as Col went to Leiston to work for his customer on her allotment.

Sunday morning and spring sprung for a few hours, we lost the cold wind that seems to have been plaguing us since the beginning  of the month. Col wanted to check out that it was OK to borrow the muck spreader so we walked down to Friston by road, then across towards the church,

called in on our friend  and then back along the track, oil seed rape on the right and wheat on the left.

Lots of darts on TV during Sunday - and more tennis. By the end of the day the dining room walls were ready for emulsion after odd bits of filler, sanding down and washing down. We just need to go and get something - pale lemon I think.

Early Monday morning Col set off down the road in the tractor to fetch the muck spreader and was soon flinging all the old chicken muck all over the bit of the field that will be used for pumpkins and squash ( no main-crop potatoes this year.) He will be swapping the muck spreader for a big rotovator to turn it all in.

My Monday jobs were bread baking, ironing and cleaning windows.

Reading all my favourite blogs on Monday evening I saw that many parts of the country had a wet day, whereas it was dusk before we got rain here, and then it was just a shower - the driest part of the country again, so often the clouds have broken up before they get here - I do sometimes  wonder why we are thinking of moving west?

Another book has been finished, and once again it's something written in the 1930s. ( Angela Thirkell - Summer Half, first published 1937, reprinted by Virago in 2014) If anyone had told me a few years back that I would enjoy all these old books I probably wouldn't have believed them!

The new system for car road tax refunds works well. Now you don't sell a car taxed but get a cheque refund automatically  from the date that you transfer ownership to someone else. The road tax on the Hyundai is a bit less than the Jeep Cherokee, (which we had  only just taxed before Col decided on the Hyundai) and on Monday we got the cheque for virtually all the old tax  - enough to cover the new car - handy.

Which brings me back to today.
 Col headed off early for a mornings work in Leiston for his customer finishing the work on her allotment, coming home later with a cheque for £100. I had to stay close to the house as we were waiting for the plumbers to come and service our thermal-solar-hot water thingy

(that's it, on the flat dormer roof of the back bedroom- heating our water for free - as long as you don't count the couple of thousand pounds it cost to install it in the first place!!)

  It's been chugging along nicely since it was installed just over 3 years ago, but when the sun was shining the other day and the temperature of the water was high enough the pump didn't come on as quickly as it should have done. The men arrived eventually and did various complicated things in the airing cupboard to check it. I thought I would rustle up a coffee and walnut sponge for Cols birthday and also made a big batch of shortcakes ( recipe here) to squeeze into the freezer.
When Col got home he brought in a bowl full of salad leaves from the poly-tunnel for our lunch

(some of this yummy stuff) and after it had been rinsed and dried and put in a bag, I weighed it....... 350g, that would have cost us around £3.50 in a supermarket. Yes, growing your own IS worth the effort.

Welcome to Simon a new follower on Google and Kath on Bloglovin'. Hope you enjoy the ramblings of an old Suffolk gal!

Back in a few days
Sue

Not quite as planned

Don't you just "love" days when things don't go quite as they should.

It started yesterday evening when Him Outside looked at the weather forecast and decided to delay the hedge cutting at the second-home-across-the-fields as we were due showers here all day ( That's the third time it's been put off). Except the rain had gone by daybreak and it's been fine all day so he could have gone after all.

I had a physio appointment first thing and had some errands to run while out including posting a couple of things ( I'm still annoyed that last year  someone nicked the post box at the end of our road and it's not to be replaced). When I got home the letters were still in my bag- darn it! so I thought I'd get the bread started and then bike down to the letterbox in Friston. Returning home I put my bike brakes on to stop  and somehow tipped over sideways - and landed in a puddle- unhurt but wet!

So there I was a while later, in the kitchen getting things done when Him Outside who had been working on the lining out of the campsite gents loo came to the door dripping blood from a badly cut finger - caught on the edge of the circular saw ( made me go all peculiar!). He wrapped it up tight and held it up in the air and eventually it stopped bleeding but after another look even he felt a bit faint and  reckoned it might need stitches so the doctor was phoned and down to Leiston we went. After a long wait he went into the nurse and after cleaning things up and a check from the doctor they decided it didn't need stitches after all so just a big dressing was applied and a tetanus injection given. And that means he gets out of the washing up for a week at least. - Not a lot of sympathy from me as you can see!

By the time we got back the bread had risen a bit too much, so it won't be quite as nice as usual and I've been trying to catch up with the missing hour and a half for the rest of the day.

Ho Hum- that's how it goes sometimes - nothing serious - just annoying.

I finished yesterday by mentioning the interesting find at a boot sale.

About once or twice a year we go to the big car boot sale at Kessingland near Lowestoft, we usually go in the winter when there are no boot sales locally. Yesterday I glimpsed this painting laying out of reach. The lady passed it to me to look at and I recognized the signature  B.C.Lilley. She wanted £4 but I offered £3 and she said yes. The reason I'm pleased is because this artist  lives locally to where we used to live in Mid Suffolk and he was actually an Insurance man for years - at the time when they called on people to collect- and used to go to Him Outsides house when he  still lived with his parents during the 1970s to collect the £2 a week that was paid for life insurance. He got well known as an artist and his pictures went up in price,now they are often featured in the regional newspaper and in exhibitions. He is in his 70s now and has got some on show at a framing shop and gallery at the moment. I think I might take it there to get it re framed,  as the frame is falling apart and the pins in the back are rusty, and try and find out more about it. We think it's Kersey in Suffolk, but the date is unreadable. I don't think it's as good as those he paints now so it may have been done several years ago.
(The glass has caught the reflection of the window - It hasn't really got a big light blue blob on the top!)

I love original paintings so it was an interesting find.

Back tomorrow

Finishing the Christmas cakes and another picture for Christmas

Hello and welcome to a new follower - Sally, and many thanks to everyone for comments recently.


Yesterday morning we went to Ipswich. I'm pleased to say that  it wasn't too busy and we got around the charity shops and the other places that we needed to visit and then we headed out of town to B&Q.

Over the weekend while our son was here our shower packed up.We've only had it 2 years  but it's been a bit temperamental for a few months. The problem was the inbuilt thermostat which wasn't always letting enough  hot water through and then stopped completely. The REAL problem is our blinkin' hard water. We really ought to have a water softener. We've managed without one for 20 years and never had this problem before but now that showers have to have a thermostat built in ( 'elf and safety!) we may have frequent trouble. So no point in spending much money on a new one. I'm just so glad that I married a man who could fix almost all the things that go wrong in the house! New shower is fitted and working, it's nowhere near as nice as the old one, but it was "only" £80 instead of the £200 we forked out when we had the extension built and moved the bathroom. If only we had known then what we know now - and how many times have we said that!

Him outside was out early to work for the County Council this morning then this afternoon he was using the borrowed muck spreader and the borrowed rotervator to put some well rotted horse muck onto the big area on the field where we grow pumpkin, potatoes and squash.( It's a good thing that we can borrow all these bits of useful machinery as it would cost an arm and a leg to buy them all ourselves.)Then he came in to do all the computer stuff linked to this mornings inspection work.

In case you don't know what a muck spreader looks like!

I've had a busy day too. Started with the ironing. Then making a wreath for the door ( I found the foam base with decorations already  attached for 99p in a charity shop in Ipswich, so today I just wired on some conifer and holly bits to fill in the gaps) Followed by cooking up a vegetable curry for dinner and putting the marzipan and icing on the 3 Christmas cakes. 1 for us and 2 for gifts.

Several Christmas cards in the post this morning including a mystery one . We didn't recognise the Christian names on the card and can only assume it's from someone who comes to the campsite, mostly I only know people by their surnames as that's what gets written in the bookings diary.
So thank you to Andrew and Irene- whoever you are!

Back Tomorrow.

Back to a bit of "proper" work

Him Outside hasn't done any work for the County Council since before the heart problems in July. Previous to that he had been doing 2 or 3 days a month since he finished full time in March 2012. One of the inspectors has been off work for several months with serious back problems so bridge inspecting is a long way behind schedule and they need him back to help catch up. He wasn't keen to go full time and after a bit of discussion they agreed that he could have a van here and will do whatever he can between now and mid January.
So after lunch I took him to the station to catch the train to Ipswich and he came home with the van a few hours later. Apparently they are so far behind that he could work as many hours as he wants and even weekends- which he has no intention of doing.
This is going to be some unexpected money, which I guess will be saved, because who knows what the weather and the campsite income will be like next year.


Over the years I seem to have collected lots of Christmas decorations that need to stand rather than hang. Only now we have no mantlepiece and the advent calender is almost filling the cupboard, I've got nowhere to put them this year. Then I had a brainwave - The Kitchen dresser!
So I've taken off all the bits that are normally displayed there and replaced them with Christmas stuff. and I thought I might as well enjoy them for longer than the normal couple of weeks.

So here is my next Christmas picture

Not sure why it looks as if its leaning to the left. I hadn't been on the cooking sherry!

30 Ways to Save £1 ---Day 28 + Fence Mending

Number 28 of the 30 Ways to save £1 was
28. Eat less meat- start by swapping one meal a week to veggie things, then 2 or 3.

I'm glad we are getting to the end of the month so I can finish doing these repeats of the April list. It seemed like a good idea at the beginning of the month but it's got a bit tedious!

Had to go for a blood test this morning so biked down to Leiston  in the gloom of yet another nasty November day. I was wanting to buy a pair of small needlework scissors but not one pair to be found in the town anywhere or not where I was expecting to find some.
A pack of reduced-to-clear neck of lamb chops in the Coop was a useful find. We so rarely eat lamb now. Then it was into the Building Society to take out a cheque for that expensive tractor repair. I like putting money into savings but not keen on getting it out!

Meanwhile back at home Him Outside was using that tractor to pull the broken posts out of the ground. This fence was only built about 3 years ago yet several of the posts were completely rotten, no wonder that gale a few weeks ago was able to blow the fence right over. With the hydraulics repaired the tractor lifted out the broken post and the concrete bit easily.

We are going to replace the posts with some bigger ones  and put a few extra in too.

Nothing else to report today, so back tomorrow.

A wet Friday

Thank you to Dc at Frugal in Norfolk, Pam at winkle#39;s Crazy Ideas, Morgan at Growing in the Fens and Cro for comments yesterday. It seems I'm not the only wife who gets landed with all the Christmas organisation and I'm also not the only person who doesn't really need anything for presents anymore.

We had more wild and windy weather over night and again today and we honestly couldn't remember when we last had rain two days running. More cooking apples and peppers have been put into the freezer and the ironing has been done while Him Outside has done a bit of tidying of the workshop.Those last few words ought to be in capital letters as it doesn't happen very often!
He also took the trailer to town and came back with 6 empty IBC 1000lt containers. These will be pressure washed, advertised in the smallholders newsletter and hopefully sold for a good profit. They are ideal for catching large amounts of water from a shed or house roof.
 This afternoon he did a bit of firewood cutting while I lit the woodburner and did some stitching.

First I cut several inches off the sleeves of a Cotton Traders roll neck cotton top. I love these for winter warmth and snap them up from charity shops whenever I see one. Ones for men are best as they are longer. The one I found in the Sue Ryder Shop in town the other day was £3.95 and lavender coloured but the arms were made for a gorilla! It's a bit too big all over really, which is fine except for the sleeves.

It seems there are so many worrying things in the news just lately. Energy companies are putting up their prices and then there is the threat of  blackouts if we have extra cold weather. I heard that in Liverpool the food banks are having to give out food that doesn't need heating as so many people cannot afford to use a cooker.How are so many people slipping through the safety net? As for all the goings on in the US government.....well who knows what effect that will have on the world if they can't sort themselves out.

Then I read that Ilona, the Queen of mean at Life After Money was fed up with reading about money saving, frugal living, debts etc etc and thought " goodness me what is the world coming too".

Seriously though it does look as if more belt tightening may be needed for many people. I sometimes feel overwhelmed by hearing of so much poverty in this country without even thinking about the rest of the world where poor really means having nothing.

Windy weather on the way

Goodness me, now up to 76 followers. Welcome to you, and I haven't even checked the bloglovin bit to see if there is any one new there.
I'm very bad at remembering to say " Thank you" to people who have commented. I sometimes don't find comments on old blogs until several days later. - Hopeless! It's because I'm always in such a rush to do a new blog.

We were watching the weather forecast which is predicting a change to  much colder weather with strong North winds here from Thursday. So it seemed a good idea to get the best of the cooking apples off the smaller of our two Bramley trees and into a box.  I've wrapped them individually in newspaper and put into a good solid cardboard box. Then I found a flower pot carrying  tray to fit tight over the top. When it gets colder we will wrap an old sleeping bag around the box. They usually last pretty well like this right into February. We've sold all the apples off the big Bramley already and all the decent windfalls are in the kitchen or shed waiting for me to get them into the freezer. There are still quite a lot  to sell from the smaller tree.

Him Outside has been turning a small, cheap, wooden, livestock trailer, bought off ebay, into a moveable chicken shed for our newest 24 hens. Bodging something together with bits of wood is his favourite sort of job. At the moment the young hens are still in half of the hay shed but we want to get them out onto grass as soon as possible. The plan was to get rid of the very oldest hens but as they are still laying a few eggs we will hang onto them a bit longer.

We still have a few visitors coming and going on the campsite which is unusual for October. Sometimes we go dead quiet after August Bank holiday but September was good this year. I do begin to get a bid fed up of looking after the toilets and bins, and will be glad when it's all over for another year.

Not a lot of interesting news today.
Back tomorrow.

Apples and pears

I spent a while today putting apple and pear slices into the freezer. We had a storm overnight so there were some windfall cooking apples and |I want to get some of the pears done too before they are also blown off  the tree. I slice them all into slightly salted water, which stops them discolouring, drain and then pop them in freezer bags  and get them into the freezer quickly.
The plums have almost finished, the last few have been picked today and lots of squishy ones picked up off the ground and thrown into the chickens who get really excited, all rushing round with a plum in their beaks trying to avoid another chicken pinching it.

Him Outside had to trek back to Ipswich again to take the 24 hour heart monitor back, he came home via the feed merchants to pick up Octobers chicken feed and the agricultural engineers for some tractor bits. We always try to do two or more errands when using the jeep.
Earlier this week he had just started moving some soil to fill in gaps by the new path at the back of the house, when the water pump on the tractor packed up. Our tractor is an old Fiat and a few years ago he found a parts supplier over in Cardigan in Wales. After emailing and then phoning to pay, the new pump arrived less than 24 hours later - excellent service! So he has been up to his elbows in grease getting the pump fitted.( and then taking it all to bits again to cure another leak!)

Today I did my bike ride down to Friston for the library van. I went down with 3 bags full so it's a good job it was downhill. I came home with not quite so many, mostly crime fiction this month. So for all crime fans here is the regular book picture.

Most of these are ones I've ordered and are new books by favourite authors but one or two  are new-to-me authors who I'm testing out. I spotted the book about Stowmarket on the van shelves and thought I would borrow, as that was our old home town over in Mid Suffolk.
The other day I mentioned how disappointed I was with the book by Susie Hodge - The Home Front in WWII, as it just seemed to skim over things. These two books also about WWII are the complete opposite, well written, lots of details.

I seem to be stuck on WWII and modern or historical crime at the moment. Not sure why, perhaps there is some strange psychological reason!

Thanks to careful spending over the last few months we had a bit of spare money in the "everything else" section of the budget so while he was getting chicken feed he also got a sack of peanuts for bird feeding. We had to stop feeding peanuts when the price shot through the roof last winter but it has dropped back again. Buying a 25kg sack is by far the cheapest way to buy and watching the woodpeckers and all the smaller birds on the feeder while working in the kitchen gives great enjoyment. Now the peanut restaurant is open  I hope it doesn't take too long for them to find it again.

The new patio = threequarters done

When we had the conservatory built several years ago we just put down some old paving slabs by the door because we knew that sometime in the future we were going to have to re-do the paths after having the kitchen extension built. So now at last it was time to sort the patio out. We have lots of reclaimed paving stones, Him Outside had enough energy back to lay them and to load the cement mixer, the forecast was good and I was general dogsbody shifting stuff.
Of course the best laid plans never go exactly right here. We ran short of stones because some were more damaged than we thought and the underlying concrete which was done in a hurry was a bit too high in places. So it's three quarters done and now someone has to sort through a giant rubble heap to find some more usable stones, and take some edges off other stones that are a bit too wide.

But by 3o'clock we had both done enough for one day.

Thank you to Buttercup, Pam, Fran and Morgan for comments left  yesterday. It seems that several people may try the sweetcorn relish so I hope it works out OK. Also a special welcome to another follower ' A Suffolk Girl'. I love finding out about other Suffolk bloggers.

Still no sign of the Sizewell men who were supposed to be coming to the campsite yesterday but we have had a booking for the first weekend in October. It looks as if we may have an empty site after this weekend which will be the first time since early June. So completely different to 2012 when we had more nights empty than we had visitors, thanks to the awful weather and the Olympics.

What a difference a year makes.

This time last year we were away on holiday at Appledore in Devon. We hadn't had a holiday for 2 years so it was a good break. This year our lovely neighbour A picked up Him Outside at 8 am this morning to take him over to Papworth for the second stent. Last year we didn't know the health problems he had although looking back he remembers feeling extra tired after cycling and doing heavy work. Lots of people don't know they have angina until they have a heart attack. He wasn't overweight, he doesn't drink or smoke, he hadn't been ill so hadn't had his blood pressure taken for several years. If you have a other half with a history of heart problems in the family - get them  to check blood pressure  sooner rather than too late.

Odds and ends on Tuesday

Had lots of phone calls yesterday for bookings for the campsite, so from having an almost empty diary a few days ago it is now looking much better. Good news indeed.

Him Outside went to move the irrigator for our farmer friend W this morning so he is really back into the swing of things, then he went back to rolling fields. His work manager ( at his old job where he does 3 or 4 days a month) thought that he would be entitled to some sick pay if he got a doctors sick note. We were very dubious about this and we were right, he isn't going to get any money from the council after all! He might be entitled to some statutory sick pay, we will find out. I didn't think self employed people got given anything. Anyway he is earning a bit of money again so we are not too bothered about it. He will need another couple of weeks rest after the next visit to Papworth (only two weeks away now) so will be able to start odd jobbing again in October.

Popped down to Leiston this morning and amazingly I found some yellow sticker sausages (Locally produced too) in the Coop Solar. £1.30 for 1lb, stocked up on three packs. Didn't bother with their reduced price lamb chops, £1.90 for two of the teeniest chops you did ever see. When we kept sheep and bred our own lamb we ate lots, but I can't remember when we last had some.
 They also had lots of yellow sticker bread rolls so I got a couple of packs of wholemeal to pop in the freezer just in case ( 40p). Although I make bread every week  it's handy to keep something in the freezer too.

I've discovered some comments on old blogs that I didn't know were there, so apologies to various people for not replying or even acknowledging them.( dreamer and Stacey plus Karen for comments on Sunday and Monday) Also welcome to Kev as a follower and there are new followers by Bloglovin too that I keep forgetting to look at - welcome one and all! Apparently I get emails via the blog somewhere too but don't know where they are!, so it's no point anyone emailing me!
 Judith has left a comment now and again and I thought her blog was called Terriersintiaras which is her user name, and was all about dogs!!. But I was being totally thick and her blog is Lemon Drops which I have added to my sidebar. I've deleted The Other Stuff from the list as Scarlet  is not posting anymore which is a shame. I must add Staceys blog to my list too. It's all going on on that sidebar! Kev said he liked the picture at the top of the blog and I know lots have people have been encouraged to  read or reread some of the books from the pile.
Talking of reading, did anyone see on the National News today the pictures of the HUGE new library opening in Birmingham. I wasn't overly impressed by the design of the outside - weird. But inside looks incredible. The thing people are worried about is that the huge expense of this new library will force some of the smaller branches in the city to close. My friend S in Hagley is planning to take a look at the new library when all of the fuss has died down. The news pictures today showed it absolutely packed out.
Having spent my ( only 10) working years in various types of libraries and an awful lot of time in them ever since, I'm always interested to hear about them in various parts of the country. I actually cried when Norwich (Norfolk) City library burnt down about 18 years ago ( maybe more years - time flies) losing all those wonderful books, libraries and people all over the world donated books for the new library.

Spotted these  ready today- figs number 4, 5, 6 and 7 more than we've had for ages. Lovely.

Nothing else of interest to report
Back tomorrow.

Red Hot Relish Recipe + Him Outside playing on a tractor

Yesterday morning was several degrees cooler, we didn't bother to go to a car boot sale so I decided to get started on this years chutney making.

First on the list was a recipe I do most years, which I concocted from two similar recipes.

Red Hot and Sweet Relish
4lb Plum tomatoes, skinned and rough chopped. ( I used the giant Andine tomatoes, only needed about 10!)
2 Very  Large red peppers, finely chopped
1lb Red onions chopped small
1 - 5 red chillies (depending how hot you want it. I use 2.) de-seeded and finely chopped ( Wear rubber gloves!)
2lb Gran sugar
1 tsp each salt,ground ginger, allspice.
1 pint white vinegar.
( For the best colour this really does need the red onions and white vinegar, and it doesn't work very well with normal tomatoes which have too many seeds and are more watery)


Put everything except the vinegar into a pan.
Stir over low heat until sugar is dissolved

 Bring to boil and cook gently for approx 1 hour until thick

I forgot to take a picture of it thickened- this is just after vinegar is added

 Add the vinegar and cook for 30- 50 minutes until thick again.

This picture doesn't show the lovely dark red colour very well

 Put into hot sterilised jars, cover, seal and label

There are 2 problems with this chutney or relish. ( I've never really understood the difference between a chutney and a relish) Firstly it doesn't make very many jars for all the work, although everything except the vinegar,sugar and spices are home grown so doesn't cost too much to make.
Secondly whenever the two oldest children come to stay they ask to take a jar home with them which leaves even less for us!

Meanwhile Him Outside went out to play on a Big(ish) Modern Tractor.
Our farmer friend W. ( he is the one who had to stop farming his land and go to work for someone else because his brother and sister wanted to retire and wanted their share of the farm) asked if HO could do some rolling of fields for the big company that farm everything around us as everyone else was tied up with the harvest and cultivating. He didn't need asking twice!

He is out driving up and down again today.

My long long blog about budgeting resulted in 1 comment! Well that was nearly a waste of time then!
Thanks Pam( and to S for emailing) But I shall not be like poor Scarlet ( The Other Stuff) who has given up blogging, ( I'm sad and will miss reading her blog) I shall carry on regardless!
Back tomorrow
PS Still lovely weather here- look at that blue sky on the tractor pic- beautiful.

 

Getting some work done

After 3 lazy days when the minimum of work was done, it was time to get back to normal.  So I started the day by doing some baking. I made a big batch of currant shortcakes mainly for putting in the freezer for Him Outside.

 SHORTCAKES
8oz SR Flour
4oz Butter
4oz Caster Sugar
3oz currants
1 egg
Egg  for brushing on and caster sugar for sprinkling.

Rub fat into flour stir in sugar and currants, mix in egg.
Roll out as thin as the currants will let you. Cut into squares, oblongs, whatever.
Put on greased baking sheets. Brush with a little beaten egg and then sprinkle just a little sugar.
Bake in medium not TOO hot oven for 10 - 15 minutes until golden. Watch them to make sure the currants don't burn. Leave for just a couple of minutes to cool then use a fish slice to move onto cooling racks.

I also did a plain sponge in square tins. This will also go in the freezer either to be used as a sponge cake or cut into fingers to use  for trifle bases.

My other bake was a packet of the carrot cake mix that came from approved foods when I got the Bread Flour.( Did anyone else take advantage of that offer. I still can't believe I have 12kg of flour in the cupboard for £2 !)
I NEVER usually buy cake mixes but carrot cake is one of my favourites that I don't bother to make very often. So when I saw 4 packs for £1, I thought they were worth a try. They are actually very nice. I was puzzled by the smell of the packet of icing mix - bad feet! It turns out the icing has cheese powder in it to imitate the cream cheese that would normally be used to ice carrot cake. I wondered whether to use it but decided to give it a go and used a few drops of lemon juice to add a tang and that turned out OK too.

I am not converted to ready made cake mixes as I'm not keen on the list of weird ingredients on the packet. But I'm hoping that as a one off ( 4 times!) they will not do me any harm.

After baking it was back to the fruit cage to do some more pruning of raspberry canes. Summer fruiting raspberries have to have all the canes that fruited this year cut out at ground level and the new growth of canes that will fruit next year are gently bent to go up between the wires to hold them in
place. I managed to get to the end of one whole row. So just one more left to do.

While I was baking and it was still foggy outside Him Outside did the downstairs hoovering for me ( he is getting quite handy with the hoover, since he has been helping indoors more so that I can help  him outside with more jobs ) Then he got  busy clearing a veg bed that had finished, covering with compost and turning it in with the rotavator, and finished off the day by transplanting some lettuce plants.

We had three caravans leaving and 3 new ones arriving so quite a busy day on the campsite. By this time next week we will be empty for the first time for months. The September diary is very quiet although we might have a group of teenagers and their teachers coming here while doing their Duke of Edinburgh award.

We had a Once-a-Year dinner tonight!

Pasta, Aubergine and cheese bake.
 For 2 people
1 Large Aubergine or two small.
3oz Pasta penne
3 Tablespoons Tomato Puree in third pint hot water
4oz grated mature cheddar
Salt & Pepper

Cook pasta as usual
Slice aubergine fairly thin and fry in olive oil ( I use rapeseed oil) until browned.
Layer aubergines, pasta, puree mix in a baking dish, with a little cheese, salt and good twist of pepper
Save most of cheese for putting over the top.
Bake for 25 minutes in hottish oven.

Forgot to take picture until we had started eating, so this looks a bit messy but tasted lovely

 The reason we only have this once a year is because it is a bit greasy as the aubergines absorb a lot of oil. Also aubergines are not something I buy as we try to eat only our own vegetables most of the time, so we can only eat this if we've grown them in the first place! Which we did this year and have a good crop mainly to sell or we also roast them in a mixed vegetable roast.

Tonight we will be watching New Tricks. We only "found" this programme about 2 series ago and have no idea why we didn't watch it in the earlier series. I'm interested to see how Nicholas Lyndhurst fits in as he is much younger than the other actors in it. There's also a repeat of Only Connect on in a minute - good brain testing quiz.
Better go and put the TV on and the kettle too I think.

Thankyou for good wishes and more book photos

Many thanks  for all the good wishes for Him Outsides day at hospital. He had to be in Ipswich at 8am so it was an early start. I was very brave and drove the car home after dropping him off (which sounds pathetic but I  learned to drive so long ago that there were no duel-carriage ways! and in the last 20 years have done very little driving except round about here on quiet country roads, although pulling a big trailer load of hay home from Saxmundham doesn't bother me at all!)
He got a work colleague who lives near the hospital to bring him home as he knew that driving up and back yet again would have got me in a dither. The news is not too good and he will need to go to the heart hospital at Papworth to have a stent fitted in the next 6 weeks, unfortunately Ipswich  hospitals department for doing this doesn't open until October and he needs it done before then. So instead of three quarters of an hour away he will be three and a half hours away! We shall have to see how he is once that's done and decide if we can carry on smallholding or not, although it is supposed to be a pretty good solution to artery problems.
Today we have found out what everyone else has been enjoying/suffering for the last two weeks as the weather here has been the hottest this year and no sea breeze. I spent half an hour picking raspberries when I got back from Ipswich and ended up feeling like a wet rag- yuck. Then this afternoon when I went up the field to collect the eggs I had to come in and stick my head under the cold tap! I thought "Oh This is what people inland have been complaining about".
 My penny pincher penfriend S. emailed to tell me she looks forward to my visit to the library van to see the photos of books that I borrow  as it gives her ideas for reading.
So specially for you S. Here is another one!

It was the subjects of this novel that got me interested - Nineteenth Century USA, Quakers, Quilts and slavery. I enjoyed it - another Good Book.
More books, this time all belonging to me and Him Outside ( mostly mine!)

When we had the new kitchen extension a couple of years ago the access to it went through the old bathroom. The third picture under the stairs was where our shower used to be. Now its all my book shelf corridor.
 

Still preparing for winter.

We did some delivering this morning of hay to the lady who bought my goats from me 3 years ago - I still miss them and the everyday fresh milk.( but I know in reality that we will not keep goats again). Then we took 12lb of topped, tailed and frozen gooseberries to our friend P as a swap for sorting out those pictures. ( Monday 17th June blog, if you want to see them). The glass was not big enough for the frames and the backing paper was tatty, so he has replaced both but the frames were OK, so we kept those.
As we happened to be passing a car boot sale of course we stopped in for a look!
This is what I found for £1. Every year there is always at least 1 hot water bottle that perishes so I like to keep one new one in the cupboard as a spare.

Why does the photo sometimes turn around between taking it and uploading?This was not the way I took this photo!

We don't have central heating so I always put  at least 2 and sometimes even 3 hot water bottles in the bed before I get in. Hot water bottles are such comfy things!
I also found a new roll of Christmas wrapping paper for 50p - that's the first one I have seen this year at car boots and I was beginning to worry that I would have to buy some from a shop at Christmas time and I don't like doing that!
The campsite has been busy this weekend but after tonight we have NO bookings for several days, which is odd considering it's the start of the school holidays. I hope we will have some phone calls this week although rather than worrying about it I now look upon an empty site as a break from loo cleaning!
Him outside has done some odd jobs that needed doing before the day at hospital tomorrow and is now resting while listening to cricket. He doesn't admit it but I think he is also glad to get to the end of haymaking. Although most of the time he was riding on the tractor some of the hooking up of machinery etc is  quite hard work.

Haymaking and More Good Books

I spent yesterday afternoon trudging around a VERY hot field, surrounded by high hedges there were very few places with a breeze. We were getting the field baled- the one we rent - at Saxmundham. Because we have an ancient bale sledge that doesn't release the bales properly it means having to chuck the bales out when the sledge is full, so that they are at least roughly in a heap to make it slightly easier for loading them onto a trailer. The whole field was done apart from 2 rows which lay too close to a hedge to dry properly, so needed turning further into the field when the rest was removed. Loading hay bales high onto the trailer is one thing that Him Outside with the new angina problem has found difficult. The people who are buying the hay had to do their own loading this year. So hay making is ALMOST finished and I was too exhausted to do anything as energetic as blogging, and collapsed  on the settee to read by 8.30pm( after a refreshing shower using the oodles of free hot water we are getting from our solar thermal thingy on the roof).

The reason I only ever mention GOOD books is because if I find something not so good I don't bother to finish it. Life is too short and the world is full of good books.

I don't know why this picture is upside down it isn't like this in the file picture! The book is by Mark Sundeen and is the true story of a man known as Daniel Suelo who lives without money, in the USA of course. It is an odd story but well written.

This is an author I hadn't come across before, it is crime, set in the London Blitz of 1940. Seems it is the second in a series of four, so I shall be looking to order the rest from the library and also checking out what else this lady has written.

This book could be considered a bit of a rip off because much of the book has already been published by these people ( Patricia and Robert Malcolmson) in previous books, namely Nella Last's War, Dorset in Wartime: The Diary of Phyllis Walther and Warriors at home 1940-42 and another of their sources is to be turned into another diary book in the next year or so. Luckily I had only read two of the books they had already done and as it's a library book I hadn't paid the £20 it's priced at. I won't be putting it on my list of books to buy sometime as I'm finding it interesting but slightly heavy going. I will read it in bits between other books.

Hay making should be completely finished by tomorrow - God, Health and Machinary willing. Then we will await payment for all 800 or so bales, pay the rent on the two fields and squirrel away the rest for the winter.

Pictures of big irrigation systems- growing onions for the nation!

Him Outside went out three times yesterday to sort out the irrigation system on a field of onions for our farmer friend W. who was away working elsewhere, the last time he went out at 8pm and didn't get back until 10.15. Something had made the massive pipes twisted, everything had come to a halt, by which time W. was back from where he had been hay making right out by the River Deben, so was able to help work out what was wrong.
Here are some pictures of the big system that big farmers use.

 Here's the winding up end, it tows the squirty end slowly up the field  by winding  the pipe around the drum

 Here is the squirty end that starts off at the bottom of the field and gradually gets wound back up to the winding bit then it stops squirting and turns itself off, ready to be moved across the field, towed to the bottom of the field ready to be start all over again.

The big field of light sandy soil where onions are being grown by a huge farming company that farms thousands and thousands of acres, including all the land around our little 5 acre patch and most of the fields to the right of us from here for miles.
If all fields were a nice regular shape it would be easier but this morning he had to go out at 11.30 to switch a switch to stop the spray going all over someones house on its right hand sweep( I went too to take the photos)
Then back again at 1 o'clock to do the big move.
Meanwhile back at the simple Suffolk smallholding, I've been doing all the usual stuff. Starting off by making a couple of jars of jam with the few red gooseberries off our 1 red gooseberry bush. My entry in class 77- Jar of Gooseberry Jam - for the Knodishall flower and produce show.
Picking and preparing more gooseberries for the freezer and more raspberries too, cleaning the loos on the campsite, collecting eggs - the list goes on as usual. It's a good job I don't have any sort of house cleaning fetish as nothing much has been done indoors for weeks!

We can't see the raspberries for the leaves!

First job of the day is always putting yesterdays eggs out on the stall at the gate, next letting the chickens out and checking their water, then it's a zoom around the garden picking and packing stuff to put out for sale with the eggs.Today there were three bags of courgettes, two cucumbers, three bags of fresh dug potatoes and two small punnets of raspberries (and enough for us to eat too of course!)
The problem this year is finding the darn things amongst the leaves and next years new growth which is really lush.

They were far enough apart when we planted them in the autumn before last - little canes about a foot tall. Last summer with all the rain there was plenty of new growth which is now fruiting for the first time this year. At the end of the summer this years fruiting canes will be cut out and all the new canes will be put between the wires to hold them upright.

Something else that's having a good crop this year is the tayberry. I'm not keen - they have a sort of perfume flavour but Him Outside likes them. There are never enough to sell.
Before the kitchen got too hot I made 4 pastry cases to go in the freezer and a batch of peanut biscuits.

Pastry cases made for taste - not for their good looks!

 Then the next job was picking lots more gooseberries ready for our friend P to collect as a swap for redoing the picture frames and glass.  This afternoon I sat out and topped and tailed the gooseberries just in case P doesn't get here tomorrow, then they can go in the freezer until we can do the swap. I may pick a few more when the temperature drops tonight to make it up to 12lb.

Meanwhile Him Outside has been turning the hay at Saxmundham, checking the irrigation system for our farmer friend ( and one of these days I'll explain why our farmer friend W has to be away working some where else so that he has to pay Him Outside to move the irrigation system on his own land), rowing up the hay behind the second home just up the road, Moving the irrigation system when it was time, baling the hay and then driving around the field with a trailer so the person who is buying it ( and his family) could load  it. Then bringing some back here and some to another barn for storage. Then he had just had half an hour sit down tonight  when the phone rang with a message to say that  someone had noticed that the irrigation has stopped so off he has gone again to see why. They are irrigating onions at the moment on the light sandy soils down the road. I wish we had enough water to irrigate our onions, they really need it but our water has to be saved for the polytunnels.

Thoughts on stocking up for winter on a sunny day.

Him Outside loved his job for years. He spent his time driving around Suffolk, inspecting things, organising the repairs and then supervising the men who did the work. Then it all changed, preparing for being contracted out they called it - one of the County Councils ideas for saving money. His job involved just driving round, filling in forms, putting stuff on the computer and listening to the men moaning about the lack of organisation. He decided that at 55 he would pack up, go self employed doing odd jobs. The council put him onto casual hours and now he works just 2 to 4 days a month for them. So most of our income now arrives during the summer and last winter was our first living in this new way. It wasn't easy, we weren't exactly short of money but I did have to take a cut in housekeeping. This meant that by spring the cupboards were not as well stocked as I like to keep them. So as July is always a low spend / good income month I'm planning to re stock the cupboard ready for the winter. We are also stocking up the instant access ISAs with spare bits of cash and best of all we have started stocking up the freezer. We picked more gooseberries and put in the freezer  most of the broad beans have been put into the freezer after a quick blanching and then the very first basin of raspberries.

Delicious raspberries - my favourite fruit

 

 

 

 The raspberries have started just in time as strawberries are finishing. I always put lots of bags of raspberries in the freezer as they go so well with apples to make a pie or crumble in winter.

Him Outside worked like crazy yesterday ( with me checking he felt OK and making sure he had the angina spray with him at all times!) sorting baling of hay and getting it collected, stored here or carted away. Things didn't go as planned- they never do - more breakdowns as usual, but it was done by evening. So today was supposed to be spent turning one more lot of hay and sitting out listening to the cricket. Then his ears pricked up as he heard someone cutting a hay field a way down the road. Did this mean our farmer friends mower was mended? would he be able to cut the field we rent in Saxmundham? If it isn't done this week the opportunity to do it will be gone. He was up the road like a shot, but it wasn't our friend but someone else on yet another borrowed mower doing a favour for our farmer friend. Phone calls were made and yes, this chap could cut the field for us. So off Him Outside went to walk the field ahead of the mower to check for ragwort. Perhaps tomorrow will be restful?