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.

Dumpster Diving ?

Welcome to several new followers over the last couple of weeks, I hope you enjoy my diary from a simple Suffolk smallholding.
I'm not averse to a bit of fishing in skips or bins or dumpster diving as they call it in the States. If we lived in a town I'd probably cruise around on my bike to see what I could find but as we are out in the sticks the only bins I see are the ones on the campsite.
We get campers to sort as much as possible for recycling although being on holiday not everyone can be bothered. Maybe they don't even bother at home - who knows?
I often pull out newspapers or magazines from the paper/ cardboard bin to read and have even found completely new and sealed packets of food occasionally.
Today I checked the glass bin and spotted these, I don't know what they had in them but they look as if they ought to be re-used. Of course! Tea-light holders! If I was arty I could paint them with flowers or something.

 This morning we had cloud and a bit of drizzley sea mist blowing in which nearly  put paid to the plan to get the last two rows of hay baled. Then after lunch we had a spell of sunshine and at 4pm just as I had 6 pages left to read of my book, Him Outside announced that we would go and get it done. It was a bit greener than he would have liked but as long as the person collecting it keeps it separate from the rest and uses it first it should be OK. Him Outside is in hospital on Monday for the angiogram  with at  least two days rest afterwards, so we wanted to get to the end of haymaking before then. I brought  home the trailer with the bale sledge on the back, Him Outside brought home the tractor and baler and just needs to go back tomorrow for the hay turner and then we can say Thank goodness it's over for another year.

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.

Blue sky thinking

Here was my view for an hour this afternoon as I 'forced' myself to do nothing.

I saw swallows and swifts, herring gulls and goldfinches,dragonflies and butterflies, a kestrel and a buzzard. Way up higher I saw metal boxes full of people flying off to foreign parts. Silly fools!

Coming under the heading of things we never buy this is what we had for dinner last night

First of the french beans - so delicious.

A message for all those who are getting themselves into a tizzy, worrying about what they should and shouldn't eat, what they should and shouldn't do, what other people will think, LIFE'S TOO SHORT

Don't Worry- Be Happy!

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.