Back to work day

I have had a couple of days off, I spent Friday morning in the emergency eye clinic at our local hospital having various tests. They confirmed what I thought that I have the re-occurrence of the macular odema I had a few years ago. Basically this is a build up of fluid between the layers of the retina in the area of the eye used for close focus. The result is I am having real problems even reading what I am typing. The good news is that my distance vision is ok (ish), the bad news is there's not a lot they can do. The big problem is that my job is Documentation management which means I am in front of a screen all day, oh well.


I was alone for most of the weekend as Sharron was officiating at the Davis Cup tennis in Scotland. She flew back yesterday and we spent the afternomm at Welney watching the wildfowl.

The flooded grasslands provide a winter haven for migrating birds and now the trust has bought addition farmland adjacent to the main reserve it means the birds have even more space to graze.

Roofs, Beer and Opthalmology

Miscanthus sinensis Ferne Osten

Well the potting shed is still standing after a night of heavy rain and strong winds and the soil is still on the roof and not next door. What I need now are a couple of good hard frosts to break the soil up a bit.

Last night we had the first meeting of the village hall committee this year. We spent the evening planning this years events and working out how to co-ordinate with the other groups in the village. The first event is a pub night on the 13th of March, always a good way to start the year, so if you happen to be near Woodhurst you would be very welcome. If you do get there early as the locals normally finish off the real ale in an hour or so!

We are actually looking to rebuild the hall and replace it with an eco friendly building, it would be a great focus for the community. We have got some ideas but if anyone out there has done anything like this I would love to here about your experiences, good or bad.

I am off to the Doctors later this morning, I think I have got a relapse of an eye problem I had a few years ago, I hope not but I have a bad feeling. I will let you know how I get on.

The new kitchen.

As some of you will know from previous postings we have been installing a new kitchen since Christmas, well apart from a couple of minor tweaks it's finished.

This is what we started with when we moved in:




And this is how it looks now:






A definite improvement I think you will agree. We are really pleased with it, I still have a couple of jobs to do, such as some skirting board to replace and a window pane to change, why would someone replace a pane of glass with a bit of yellow faded plastic??? Oh well no accounting for taste I suppose.

I am back.

Hi everyone,sorry I haven't been writing much in the last couple of weeks, several reasons. We have been working hard finishing the kitchen (photo's to follow later in the week), and work has been really getting to me over the last couple of weeks. one of the problems of being a homeworker is it is actually quite hard to walk away from it and for the last couple of weeks I have been suffering from a bit of stress and winter blues. Anyway enough of that, I have been working in the garden. Regular readers of my blog will remember my list of tasks for the year, well I have almost finished task number 1, putting a green roof on my potting shed.

This is the potting shed, it was used as a small pony stable and is very strongly built (I hope!!), the roof area is about 90 sq feet. In order to make the roof I needed to create a new flowerbed (what a shame!) as I wanted to use the turfs to cover the roof.


I placed the turfs on the roof upside down, I did this for a couple of reasons, firstly it will allow the wild flower seeds I am sowing a head start on the grass and secondly the grass on the underside of the turfs will form a mat helping to stabilise the soil preventing it from washing off the roof.


The roof does slope slightly to the back so if I have got this wrong the whole lot could end up in Ron's garden next door!

As my border fork shows the soil is not what you might describe as light! if anyone knows where I can get a decent, strong fork please let me know, this is the third one in 2 years!



I did also manage to dig over some of the veg patch as well, just in time as they are predicting rain and frosts this week which will break up the lumps a bit.

I have the day off today so I am going to get started on planting some seeds, after all I have a new flowerbed to fill this year.

Just when we thought it was all over!

After last weeks dramas with the snow and all the hassle with transport etc etc, things seemed to be getting back to normal yesterday. I even manage to clear enough of the remaining ice and snow of the veg patch to find the parsnips and manage to dig one out,. managed to get a leek out of the ground too, normality!

Then about tea time....here we go again!




These were taken at about 9pm.

The good news is that it is melting fast this morning. Hopefully it will be a bit warmer over the weekend, I am getting stir crazy as I want to get out into the garden to do some prep work on a couple of beds. I also want to pot up some seeds or at least start stratifying them.

New seeds and old technology

The postman brought me a nice surprise on Saturday, my seeds from the RHS seed share arrived. This is always a lift at this time of year when you find out if you got what you asked for of what substitutes you have got. The next step is to sort out what you need to do with them, unlike seed you buy there are no instructions on the packet, instead you look them up in the Germination guide. This means you end up with piles that need stratication, and piles that need sowing at different times. You also need to look up the varieties and make notes of the size and requirements of the adult plant (assuming they germinate).




They other thing that happened over the weekend was actually due to blogging. One of the things that running my 2 blogs has done is that has has re-kindled my passion for photography. Since we moved I have been so busy with the house etc that I haven't been out taking pictures, as often as I should, and when I have it has been all digital stuff with my Nikon SLR.
Anyway I made a decision yesterday whilst shopping in Cambridge, I bought some 35mmFILM.....remember that?? I have decided to take my lovely Leica M6 out of retirement and prove to myself I can still take real pictures. I know I will end up having to scan the results so I can show them to you and the results aren't instant but what the heck!

A village in bloom day

Cardoon

we woke on Saturday morning to a heavy frost on to of the remaining snow, it was -6.5 outside. We had an early start as Sharron had a Tennis course to go to in bedfordshire and she needed to leave by 8.

my plans for the day were centred around the Village in Bloom project, we had arranged to spend the morning clearing the conservation area and improving the wildlife habitat. We had agreed to meet on site at 10, when I got there peter was already there cutting back the blackthorn, Phil, Ruth and Annabel arrived soon after. We managed to clear the circular path around the site before we decided to retire to the church coffee morning Organised by Sally and Avril. Sally had arranged for a special cake to be made and raffled between the conservation workers it looked fantastic decorated with all sorts of bugs and things.

After coffee the 5 of us walked around the village to identify village trees suitable to be used in the nest box project we are running as part of in bloom. We identified at least 12 now it just down to negotiating with the people on whose land they are growing on.

I spent the rest of the day watching the cricket.... lest said about that the better!