Cabbages and kings.......

Cabbage - Golden Acre/Primo (II)

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Today I am mainly.....planting cabbages. Well transplanting cabbages really, from trays and toilet roll tubes. Some to space outdoors in the raised beds, some to their own bed in the polytunnel and the rest into plant pots. Loads of cabbages. Some for us, some for the animals and some for sale at next weeks car boot sale.

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The money I make will more than cover the cost of the seeds and the compost that I have used to plant them, the plant pots are all ones that I have bought other plants in (some from car boot sales funnily enough), therefore, we will be eating free cabbages in the months to come.

When they were babies.....aww!!

Well that's the way I like to look at it. After I have got through this cabbage glut I will be planting some more, ready to see us through the winter months.

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I have decided that from now on, as we will be eating mostly our own produce that our diets should be simpler, so I will be buying from the Farmers Markets and local shops only things that I need to compliment our own produce. And as I can now supply lots of our own vegetables, shopping bills should be cheaper and, therefore, I am going to try to stick to only spending the money that we make on our stall as my housekeeping money.

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If we have a good day it will be steak and salad, if we have a bad day it will be freshly-laid free-range eggs and salad, so really we can't go wrong can we? Either way we will be eating like kings!

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Sue xx

Success and failure......

Yesterday was a mixed day, the bed I planted out on Wednesday was finished and looks promising it's full to capacity really, it may look slightly spacious at the moment but once things get growing that will change.

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I managed to fit in (alongside the established flowers in the front left corner, a Goji Berry bush, 18 Pea plants the established strawberry tub with 14 new strawberry plants in the ground, three Blueberry bushes (thank you Mum and Dad), my big bunch of chives, two curry plants, the Bluebells that were there previously and the main reason for this bed, the three Rhubarb plants that this year will feed us and NOT the chickens. All planted through membrane to discourage the weeds from showing their nasty little faces, with a top covering of bark chips to aid water retention and to make it all look prettier.

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However, in this 'Good Life' you never get a success without a failure being a step away.

Decimation in the Cabbage Patch.

A chicken found it's' way into my little Golden Cabbage bed and within the space of a few minutes ate the lot. It's a shame, the little cabbages were just acclimatised to the great outdoors and growing away nicely, now I have to go and start again, plant the seeds and see if I can make up for lost time.

Todays job (after planting the cabbages....again) is to plant up lots of the seedlings in the polytunnel into bigger pots or into their final beds, one of the new available beds is shown above, and all chicken proof I hope!!

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Sue xx

Bye Bye........and Thank You.

My hard working eldest son has just set off for his journey up the motorway after a few days of hard labour. Unfortunately, like his mother, he is camera phobic and more used to being the one taking the photos, usually of his lovely children and trucks, so getting a shot of him working was not an easy task.

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I only got the one above because he had his visor down and his ear protectors on (he was strimming) and didn't hear me coming. He has worked really hard all the time he was here and helped us enormously, because of this we are ready for this weekend, when we will be finishing off Bettys' new enclosure.

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She now has to make ready for her imminent arrivals (due on the 18th May). Seemingly she has to build a nest, similar to a swans nest, so today I am off around the farm gathering suitably soft twigs, undergrowth and soft bits to leave haphazardly in her new enclosure so she can go round gathering them in, therefore getting the impression it's all her own work.

And this is the best shot I took yesterday (no offence Simon) but hard to resist such lovely little bottoms while their owners are hard at work devouring their dinner.

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Thank you Simon for all your help.

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Sue xx

Many hands.......

Many hands make light work.......especially when one set of them is using all our big boys toys and power tools.

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My son Simon is here to stay for a couple of days and is moving tons of earth and hammering fence posts in with the JCB. Climbing walls and removing overhanging branches of trees with the chainsaw, and is currently attacking the nettles and undergrowth with the petrol strimmer.

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What a difference it makes, a backlog of jobs is being ticked off Lovely Hubbys' never-ending list and I am free to get on with my planting.

Todays' job for me is to put membrane down in the fruit enclosure and plant the last of the strawberries, can I bear to pinch off the flowers so they will fruit stronger next year......we'll see.

Sue xx

What would you like to get in a parcel?

When we arrived home on Saturday we found two parcels in our post box. One rather large and mysterious, (we hadn't ordered anything!) and one whose contents shifted rather strangely.

Driving quickly to the house, we dashed into the kitchen, grabbed the scissors, each opened our respective boxes, and ooh and aahed simultaneously.

Mine contained a gorgeous Treasure Box from Sarah at Landcuckoo.

I had asked her a while ago if she could do me one with a lavender theme, and the lovely lady has been scouring the land for a suitable fabric, when unable to find one she made her own using the most beautiful lavender stencil. And then , to cap it all she gave it me for my birthday, how lovely is that.

She has a lovely website, and when I visit I am often struck by the similarities of our ideas, it's nice when you find someone here in Blogland that is on your wavelength. Not often in this day and age do you find brilliant products AND service, and only here in Blogland do you find such truly generous people. Thank you Sarah for my gorgeous gift, it is to accompany me to Farmers Markets and Craft Fairs from now on as my special (and highly decorative) display box.

Now the contects of Lovely Hubbys' parcel were a different kettle of fish entirely.......worms. A kilo of breeding worms to be exact, the start of his Vermiculture farming business.

Obviously this is a big step forward for us and I should be overjoyed at his lovely box.....but I definitely prefer the contents of mine!!

The worms are now residing, temporarily in the polytunnel in a large plastic crate topped up with compost and little edible goodies that only worms would enjoy, to recover from their little journey through the Royal Mail system, and very happy they are too. As LH said yesterday 'look we have more babies on the farm'.......breeding away they are, I have never seen SO many baby worms.

So, two parcels with very different contents......and both of us VERY happy.

Sue xx

Chickens in trees......

The new girls have settled in well, the lovely little Lavender Pekins are running around chirping away and cuddling up in a huddle every hour or so for a nap, they are only babies after all, just 7 weeks old. It's hard to resist picking them up every time we pass the Eglu, but we are trying.

The Rhode Islanders are running around being bossy, but the older girls are having none of it and the Speckledys are standing their corner and showing that, no, they are the bosses!! It's like chicken wars at times, but they will all sort themselves out in the end.

Last night I went to close up the houses at dusk and there were only 4 of the new girls in their house, two were runnning around outside, so where were the other 6? Up in the trees....that's where!

So, there I was broom in hand moving chickens from branch to henhouse one by one, with rain running down my neck and Lovely Hubby standing at the back door (he had just got out of the bath) laughing his head off. All was going well until the last one, and did that one want to be caught....did she hell!

I followed her, I headed her off, Rosy tried to help but complicated things no end. It took three quarters of an hour in the rapidly fading light with the rain getting heavier and heavier before I finally got her. She did at least has the grace to go calmly and quietly straight to her perch.

And I went to mine, with a nice cold cider in front of a roaring fire watching television for the rest of the evening. (And no LH didn't get a telling off for laughing, because when I finally got in I couldn't stop laughing either, if only I had the photos to show!)

Sue xx

Beautiful birdies........

Yesterdays trip to pick up the new laying birds and my Lavender Pekins was a lovely morning out. The nice man we brought them off gave us a guided tour of his bird empire, lots of Bantams, parrots and parrakeets of every description and some gorgeous Beagles that he has just started to breed from. I have a real soft spot for Beagles, a lovely intelligent dog with such expressionful eyes. He also had a couple of American Black Swans with their day old cygnets, gorgeous.

Anyway we got our birds home and quickly got them instated in their new homes, with much interest being shown by our own birds, dogs and cats. Archie sat on the top of the Eglu and watched with amazement, Rosy managed to get a mouthful of tail feathers, but released her prey on command.....phew!!

The Layers are a hybrid, mostly Rhode Island Red but with a bit of something else thrown in for even better laying potential. They look similar to the Welsummers but have a much more reddish tinge to their glorious plummage. We kept them in the henhouse with mesh over the door for yesterday afternoon and this morning, but now they are out and about establishing a pecking order with the older girls. Surprisingly the Speckledys are showing their authority the most with the Welsummers and the White Stars just taking it all in their stride. It will be interesting to see who sleeps where tonight.

The Lavender Pekin Bantams are just gorgeous bundles of fluff. At the moment they are smaller than a pigeon but when fully grown they should be about twice the size. They are so soft to the touch and chirp constantly. They most likely will not be free-ranging as they are so small, and with the cats, dogs Red Kites and Buzzards around the farm I think they will be to easy to carry off. This is the start of my little Lavender breeding empire and their offspring will be for sale, hopefully in the near future. The final thread that ties the farming side of things with my lavender business.

I hope everyone has a lovely Bank Holiday weekend, I was hoping to start our big de-cluttering offensive this weekend at the Car Boot Sales, but I may be thwarted by the weather!!

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Fingers crossed the sun struggles through.

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Sue xx