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.
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| 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.
