The Llanrwst Rural Show

 

Yesterday as soon as we had cleaned ourselves up and got changed from dealing with the concrete we set off for the Llanrwst Rural Show which is held every year in Llanrwst which is our nearest village/small town.

 

The folk were out in force, a nice mix of locals, neighbours and holiday makers filling the fields with the sounds of the farmyard, fairground rides, chatting farmers venturing off hill farms and meeting up with their neighbours for the first time in a while and of course lots of children having fun. 

 

 

There really was something for everyone, but of course this being a rural part of Wales the sheep were the biggest attraction.  Primped and preened to look their best, their woolly coats scrubbed, coloured and combed to show them off to their very best advantage.  Many rosettes were on display around the pens and lots of happy sheep owners were sat relaxing after the trials of the competition ring.

 

We took Charley with us but left the other two dogs at home.  Rosy finds this sort of thing a bit stressful and Suky is not coping well with the hot weather and is currently only having short walks.  We wanted Charley, however to be exposed to all the noise, smells and sights of the show field.  It worked a treat and after a nervous, shivery start she settled down and took it all in her stride.

 

It did mean though that every six yards we were accosted by folk asking all about her and cooing over the 'little puppy'.  She was cuddled by a whole family of small children, much admired in the beer tent and got us speaking to so many people it was lovely.

 

We showed her all the animals both large and small, and introduced her to every dog we came across, which of course meant we heard lots of doggy tales from fellow dog lovers.  It made for a very pleasant few hours.

 

Of course I couldn't leave without having a good look at the competition tent to see the standard of the local entries and to see if I should be tempted to take part next year.

 

Lots of lovely eggs ....

 

... some homemade bread ...

 

and lots of tasty looking pies and shortbread were just some of the exhibits.  There was also of course table after table of vegetables and novelty makes by the local children, as well as a wonderful photography competition and a vast display of hand knits and makes by the local branch of the WI.  But I didn't get to photograph all of them as we were stopped over and over again by people interested in Charley.

 

Seeing all that lovely food on display made me go a bit mad in the food tent, buying us some Bara Brith, some very tasty little Welsh Cakes, a pack of digestive style crackers to go with cheese for supper tonight, and a lovely handmade white loaf to pop in the bread bin ready for toast in the morning, but it's nice to support some of the local businesses and then we won a lovely wall hanging tile on the Tombola stall that was raising money for the local Air Ambulance.

 

So a lovely relaxing few hours after a hard mornings work, some tasty treats to eat at home and an educating day out for Charley.  Can't be bad :-)

 

Sue xx

Concrete Poured

 

This morning saw us up bright and early, and after a quick slice of toast and a cup of coffee we were out on the hillside having a final tidy up of the trenches and holes dug for the base plates of the poly tunnel.

 

 

It's been heavy going for lovely Hubby who has come across lots of huge boulders, annoyingly coinciding with the exact place the polytunnel uprights had to go.  Luckily my man is an engineer and has a brain that thinks inside, outside and all around the box.

 

 

While he had a final tidy at the bottom of the hill I had a bit of a weeding session at the top of the hill.

 

There are a couple of Courgette plant and some Cucumber plants in this bed and I had purposefully left the weeds to hide them from the rabbits.  Now the plants need to get all the sunshine they can get so I have weeded one bed and left the other to see if it makes any difference.

 

This year it's all been about being experimental rather than rushing to grow us food.  I now know that the time frame for outdoor Cucumbers does not work here on our hillside, even with the hot weather we have been having they have come to nothing, so next year they will all be grown in the polytunnel.  I also got the Courgette plants in much too late for them to grow well.  So it means early starts for everything in the future and lots of our food will be grown in the two tunnels rather than on the open hillside which I think instead will be used for tougher crops.

 

With one bed weeded and LH all ready for action the concrete truck arrived and after a false start because there was no fuel to power the mixer, we sprung into action.  (To get things going LH got some tubing and a bucket  from the shed and syphoned some diesel from the trucks main fuel tank into the mixer tank, while the guys stood back and watched.)

 

Once things were pouring freely we all got stuck in to barrowing and shovelling the cement into the trenches and holes, and filling them all in and making sure that the baseplates and their poles were in the exact positions needed.

 

Just over an hour later we were done.

 

And all Lovely Hubby's efforts in getting the trenches so spot on were proved invaluable.

 

Now we just have to wait a day or so for it all to go off and then we can begin to put the framework of the polytunnel together.  Once this is done the raised beds for inside the tunnels will be built and the support for the work bench installed, then all that will be missing will be the polythene and the netting.

 

BUT .... we have decided to wait to get this in place as our driveway will shortly be turned into a building site as the foundations are laid for the garages and workshop and we have decided not to risk our tunnels being damaged whilst all this is going on.

 

Anyway at the moment we are another step closer to have a polytunnel again, I'm happy ... I see homegrown food on the horizon :-)

 

Sue xx

When Chug Meets Chicken

Charley and Caldwell having a face to face meeting today ..... and yes Charley's head is through the netting!!

 



 

She can get it out, she can also push herself right through if she decides she wants to, as she has before now.

 

But today it was just a silent 'hello, who are you, I'm Charley the Chug' kind of conversation.  Caldwell wasn't totally impressed.

 

She even waved goodbye to him before she came back to the house to eat her tea :-)

 

Sue xx

So Much Change

 

I was thinking the other day how much things have changed. 

 

Then I got to thinking how much I had changed.  Life sends us on paths we least expect and unless we rigidly stick to fixed opinions and timetables we can meander down these paths and cherry pick that which we most would like to do.

 

Sat chatting about this to a friend she asked me what had changed the most during the course of my life and one by one these things came to mind.

 

Stay at home Mum to Shop Manager

I volunteered at Oxfam on a Saturday morning when my husband could mind the boys, just to get me out of the house a bit and to meet new people, within six months I was the paid Shop Manager working 30 hours a week.  This was my career path for 20 years, moving from charity to charity.

 

Married with kids to divorcee with one teenager at home.

It had to happen there was no way forward.

 

Cat lover with 4 cats to animal lover in general with 3 dogs and 1 cat.

 

Shop Owner to Small holder/Self Sufficiency Wannabe

 

Girl who ate bacon buns for breakfast and bought a pre cooked chicken breast to zap in the microwave every night for tea on the way home from work to vegetarian (occasionally venturing into Pescatarian territory).

 

Following on from that one ... girl who lived for two years on ready meals and sandwiches (I left my first marriage with only my clothes, books, cats and son so we didn't have a cooker) to one who cooks from scratch with veggies from the garden.

 

Girl with a back concreted yard to one with 5 acres.

 

And I realised this morning how much my food tastes had changed in the last few years, when I decided to make myself some Oatbran Porridge for breakfast.   I haven't had it for ages and yet when I did the Dukan Diet I ate it every single day for a year and loved it.  This morning it made me feel totally yucky and very ill afterwards, me and milk no longer get on AT ALL.  I have drunk my last Latte and ate my last milky porridge.

 

I could go on and on and on and bore you all senseless but you get the picture.  Life threw me curveballs and I just went with them,  even my food and drink tastes have changed dramatically.  I mean I'm even sat here drinking black, unsweetened coffee when I used to be a white with two sweeteners girl.

 

  So much has changed, most of it for the best and I just rolled with the changes.  I think you have to don't you to keep yourself sane.  I know now I am more self reliant than ever before, I have little or no regard for material possessions.  I could watch my house burn down and not shed a tear as long as those I love, both human and animal were safe with me.  Starting again would not phase me in the slightest.

 

I know what's important in life ... family, friends, health and happiness, a bit of financial security helps to but is not the be all and end all.  We are so lucky in this country with what we have, mostly a roof over our heads, food in our tummies and people that love us.  There are so many that have none of that, and we that do have the ability to be able to help those that do not.

 

Gosh so much whizzing around my head today not the usual sort of post at all ....

 

 

... oh and by the way Karon's Pickled Radish recipe worked very well.

 

The remains of the pickled radish are sitting very prettily in the fridge with the vinegar now a beautiful shade of pink.

 

What has been the biggest change in your life, or maybe it was a small change that made the biggest difference ?

 

Sue xx

 

The Weekend

 

It's been a busy weekend, not much work done here on our patch of Welsh hillside but lots of fun, family and time spent outdoors.  We spent Friday evening Ten Pin Bowling and eating out in Llandudno with Jason my youngest son, and then on Saturday when he had to set off for home, we went to the Eglwysbach Show.

 

As to be expected in any Welsh show sheep dominated the day, and there were hundreds there being judged on their woolly merits.  Rather cruelly, in my vegetarian opinion, there was a huge van selling Lamb Burgers on the sheep field, I wonder if the sheep recognised the smell of their own kind cooking :-(

 

 

Lovely Hubby drooled over a vast array of old tractors, none of his first love the John Deere tractors in sight though very strangely but enough to keep my man happy with his big boys toys.  We made a couple of purchases, a couple of gorgeous hand thrown bowls for me and a ships porthole for Lovely Hubby, it will be the window on the door of his workshop .... once it is built.

The weather stayed lovely and warm for the day, and as we left at around 2pm the crowds were still flooding in causing traffic chaos on the narrow winding hillside lanes.  I pitied the bus driver held up in the slow moving line of traffic his timetable surely gone completely to pot!!

Sunday saw us welcoming to our home Charley's Dads, the human ones ...... they were on holiday in Wales and had made the 90 minutes drive to come and see where one of their puppies had made her home.  It was lovely to meet them both and Alwin's Mum who they were staying with on their trip to Wales.  They were delighted to see her looking so big and happy in her new home and it was lovely to talk doggy talk with such nice new friends over coffee and homemade shortbread.

Then this morning while I took Charley to the vets for her second vaccination and micro chipping, Lovely Hubby had a meeting with our architect to discuss the next phase of our plans and how they are developing.  All's well in both departments and work will begin in earnest if and when we get the planning permission.

The concrete has now been ordered for the footings of the polytunnels and will be delivered and poured next Saturday after another day of digging the final few holes ready for filling.  Bertha and her winds told us that we are doing exactly the right thing in anchoring the tunnels so securely to our little section of Welsh hillside.

So a busy, fun and productive weekend.  I hope you will forgive the lack of postings but now you know where I was.

Sue xx

As I forgot my camera (bad Blogger) the show pictures have been taken from Google Images.

Radishes

 

The tub that contained the potatoes that were doomed from the start, chickens dust-bathing a certain little doggie ...

 

 

...mentioning no names

 

.... burying half eaten rabbits and bones at every opportunity, was then planted up with a whole packet of Radish seeds.  It was a well out of date packet and I thought only half of them would come up, but it's sods law and they virtually ALL did!!  We ate some of the young thinnings in our salads to make room for the rest to grow, but now all the others are ready to be picked at the same time.

 

I picked the bunch in the photo above, to go in a salad the other day and now I need to lift the rest as I spotted that the leaves are covered in caterpillars .... which will make a tasty snack for the chickens when I pull them up.

 

 

I wondered what I would do with all those Radishes, there really are only so many you want in a salad and then I came across this on fellow Blogger Karon's Facebook page.  A link to a recipe on her Larder Love blog.

 

How timely was that then, guess what I'm making tomorrow :-)

 

Sue xx

 

 

 

Sleepy Doggies

Chatting on the phone the other night I looked to my side and this is the sight I saw.

Two sleepy doggies happy and relaxed snoozing away.  How I resisted tickling those tummies I'll never know :-)

When she's not on the sofa snoozing away she's in one of the beds, she doesn't mind which one and the other dogs and Ginger don't seem to mind either, it's like musical dog beds here, you never know who will be in which one when.  The others do object slightly, however, to the mass of toys she takes to bed with her and refuse to use the bed again until all the offending items are removed.

She met her Uncle Jason for the first time yesterday and he wore her out, no wonder she sleeps so well.  The only thing she has not used since being here is her doggy crate.  We have used this for all pups, preferring them to be behind bars if we are going out anywhere or overnight, but she is such a independent and clean little dog and has motherly Suky looking after her so we have not forced the issue as she was really scared the first couple of times we tried her in it.

Oh well we can pack it away until the next pup arrives!!

Sue xx