A mirage or what

This afternoon, while i was doing a bit of weeding with my apprentice chickens, I thought  I had overworked myself ( not very likely) ,as before me I saw Brian, the grave digger/fencing man. Apparently he will be round in the morning to start the fence..... I have heard it all before. We seem to be making some progress as he has now delivered some machinery and some gates. We shall see what tomorrow brings .Maybe nothing again.

Our social life hots up

 Life in Penboyr is hectic. So many places to go, so many people to see.Last  Friday,David and I attended the local theatre, called The Attic Theatre.... because they used to rehearse in the attic of the local bank. I think its called the attic theatre because they must have found most of the props in someones attic. Its quite quaint, about 100 seats, no curtain to the stage, the actors get changed in the local council office , and at half time ( sorry Intermission ) a lady brings around drinks , sweets and ice cream on a tea trolley. They also had a raffle and one of the prizes was a dozen eggs from a local farm. Had to have a giggle at that.
One Saturday we went to the Welsh Smallholders Show at Beuath Wells. It is a sort of Agricultural show, and we managed to see poultry, sheep, pigs, goats and llamas, as well as quite a few traders stands. It is the first time I have seem an obedience class for pigs, judged by Adam Henson of TV fame. He asked each contestant what they were going to tell the pig to do, and then they had to do it. One young girl had a nice pig, she was in the ring long before any of the others arrived, and her piggy was following close to heel all the time. As soon as the girl announced that she was going to get the pig to heel, sit and lie down, the pig just stood there and looked at her. LOL. We also saw pig agility , when the showman had to guide the pig around a course of hurdles, weave in and out of traffic cones, oer a small jump , through a tunnel and and gate, and be timed. It was hilarious .
Monday evening we went to dinner at another couple who have bought a similar sized smallholding  on the other side of the village. Jill and Harvey and their two dogs made us very welcome, and we had an interesting time exploring their smallholding. It is up hill and down dale, through the stream, and largely overgrown with weeds.I wouldn't have known where to begin, but Jill and Harvey have achieved great things in their 10 months there and have plenty of plans for the future.Dinner was my favourite ( not ) fish pie..... yuk.The company was very good.
Tuesday afternoon we popped across the road to wish one of the neighbours a happy 70th birthday. Apparently it had been as very happy birthday as we popped over at 2.30 pm , and Alan was three sheets to the wind ! We were made very welcome, and the afternoon flew by, our quick visit turned into a 4 hour visit. It was very nice to meet all their family.
Thursday I escaped to patchwork class, I haven't been for about six weeks, and thought it would be nice to have clean hands for a whole day. Once again it was a very enjoyable day, plenty of chatting and cups of tea, a few pointers on how to sew units together on the machine, so that the triangles still have points, and loads of interesting projects to be seem, as each person works on a project of their own choice. I have sew , sorry so much to learn.
Today Friday has been a little mundane, went to the market in Newcastle Emlyn and bought loads of citrus fruit to make marmalade with, and some strawberries to make strawberry conserve, then on to the pet shop to stock up on food for the dogs, cats, birds, chickens etc, and on to the supermarket to stock up on people food and supplies. Did you hear a fog horn blaring ???? Boring, boring , boring. Never mind.
Tomorrow David and I will be helping out another new friend from the garden club Steve. He lives in the next hamlet down the hill, and is holding an open garden for the National Garden Scheme, raising money for a cancer charity Funny thing is, until today I didn't realise that there was another hamlet down this " track",I thought it was someones drive way. Hope David is driving us there, I certainly don't fancy giving the path a go. I  hope the weather is good and loads of people turn out.
Well its 11 30 pm again, so I'm off to bed.
"

The Golden Girls

At long last I am the proud owner of a very swish Chicken Arc, thanks to a generous gift voucher from my work mates at Nuclear Medicine, and also my part time mother, Aunty Dorothy. Well a chicken arc is not much use with out chickens,so we have obtained three young ladies. They are Light Sussex, mainly white with some black feathers around their necks, and are just starting to lay. We have called them the Golden Girls after the TV programme, cant actually distinguish who is who, so not quite sure who is Dorothy, Blanche or Rose. We will see.
The chicken arc has upstairs accomadation, with a nesting box, a fancy stair case that goes up and down to close the chickens in at night, and a run on the ground floor.The general plan was to keep the girls in the run for about a week to make them feel at home, and then gradually let them out for a bit each day. By Day three that plan had gone to the dogs, as one of them managed to escape while I was cleaning out the nest box. After five minutes of playing chase the chicken ( looking a real sight in my nightie and wellies at 07.30) I decided to give up and have let them all out.
They have very gentle characters (so far, I have heard theres another side to chickens, they can be quite vicious) and potter around the field, usually following who ever has a spade as that means we might be doing the digging.Like naughty children, they keep returning to areas you have chased them away from, almost to taunt me. I am trying to convince them that the poly tunnel is not actually a chicken beauty parlour, and they can find other areas to sand bath and snack. They were very interested when were adding some planting around the nature pond, and seem to rather like the taste of hostas. I thought you used chickens to eat the slugs that eat the hostas but we seem to have missed the slugs out, and the chickens just eat the hostas instead. LOL.

Talking of eating, the purpose of getting chickens, apart from the entertainment value , is to have our own eggs.The girls are young and have just started laying, quite impressively I think, one or two eggs most days, and occasionally even three ! They seem to have got the idea of the nesting box, and they might all be scratching around the field, then one dashes back to the arc to lay an egg. When that one comes out, the next one might go in, and the other day I had to have a chuckle when I could only find one girl in the field, had a look in the nesting box, and the other two doing a double decker act together. Only one egg though so dont know who was shirking. Occasionally we find an egg without a shell, and I get the impression that these are sometimes a surprise to the chicken as well as they may not be in the nesting box. We even found an egg in the long grass in the field  when we were cutting it !! Didnt eat that one, gave it too the dogs. Now Seun is very interested when we go to check for eggs, thinks he should have one for breakfast each day. Not likely. I have had to make a plan to deal with all the eggs , so have been baking, which is a bit of a pity as it means we have to eat the baked goodies!!!! I have even had a go at making lemon curd which was yummy. Most surprising  was when I cracked six eggs, I had 8 yolks... well done girls.

The Baaaa bies arrive

Even fields need to be looked after, or they go out of condition in one year ! We had several options, ie, leave the fields to grow into hay, and pay a contractor to come and cut and bale the hay later in the year, and then try and sell it, or get some animals to graze the fields. As we are concertrating on sorting out the vegetable garden ( hopefully market garden)we thought that we would be biting off more than we can chew by adding animals to the equation for this year at least. So we decided to tack the fields out.- this means basically another farmer will put his animals onto our land to graze the fields, we have no responsibilities with regards to feeding, or the health of the animals, our fields get eaten and fertilized, helping to maintain the fertilitly, and we might even get a couple of shillings in the back pocket, or a lamb in the freezer. Farmer Alun from across the road did say he would bring some cows for a while, but we have yet to see them. Cows are quite heavy on the land and can "poach" ( farmer talk for wreck the land ) it quite easily. Another couple (Derek and Heather )who farm quite near us ( so they say, across the road at Five Roads, not sure which road they are on ) , stopped by and wanted to tack some of their sheep to our land. We thought this was a better idea than cows as sheep are not so heavy on the land, and thinking ahead, if we do  get some sheep in the future this would be good practise for us. So we decided to foster the sheep. Derek arrived with a double decker trailer full of 25 sheep one Sunday afternoon.These ladies are last Febuary's lambs, so just over a year old. They are here to rest and put on a bit of weight before they have lambs themselves early next year. There are two sorts, a few with pale mottled faces and the rest have black faces. Derek did tell us what flavour of sheep they were, but neither David or myself caught the name. These sheep are used for fleeces and will be shorn towards the end of June.That should be fun to watch, and Heather has promised to show me how to fold the fleeces before they are sent off to the Wool Board... something else to put on my CV.. fleece folder, GCSE. As Brian still hasnt come to do the fences or gates, Derek brought a couple of tempory gates, which are held in place with baler twine ( the stuff they use in the machines that harvest the hay and bale it ) It seems like all you have to do is keep the sheep in, keep a distant eye on them and make sure they have some water. Easy peasy, dont know what all these farmers moan about.(though I am sure we are going to find out ).
Well David cannot just look at the animals in the distance. They were not particularly friendly, but give David a bag of sheep food and plenty of time, and he soon has some new friends. The most bold sheep who comes at every opportunity we have called Maud, and she gets cheekier by the day. After two weeks , she is even coming to the top gate in the field to look for David and calls him as well. I am sure she says Daaaaa vid Daaaa vid . She now eats out of his hand and is quite bossy, not really letting the othere get a look in side ways. I just wonder what Derek and Heather will say when they have 25 sheep waiting to be hand fed and entertained. LOL( laugh out loud ). 

Photos from Dads birthday, and the street party

And off I go again !

After 2 nights at home, the freezer stocked and the fridge packed to capacity, I left Llaingof again, this time for ma week in the sunnier and more noisy climbs of gidea Park and Basildon. So leaving the home team ( David, Michelle, Mark, and Deslyn) with a list of jobs as long as my arm ( which is very long as any one who has had to knit me a jersey will know), and off I went again. This was a bit of a test for myself, as I am not fond of driving long distances, and I had a journey of almost 300miles ahead of me. I managed the journey n about 5 hours with plenty of stops at services along the way for a bit of a breather. The roads and the services always seem so busy, and then I get to wondering if any one is actually ever at home, or wether we all live in our cars most of the time. Hotel Gunn was open for me as usual, almost my second home, thanks lorraine and Graham. Dad has not been well, so I was hoping to offer both Mum and dad a bit of support and see what I could do to help them. Actually it was a real break for me, as their garden is postage stamp size, and once I had potted up a few plants and a few baskets, it felt like I had actaully managed to do something. I was also able to celebrate Dads 82nd birthday with them. I suspect that Dad has had better birthdays than this years one, and am sure he will have better ones in the future.
Friday 30th April dawned, the day of the Royal Wedding. I spent the day watching telly with Mum and Dad, not wanting to miss out on any detail. I thought that Kate looked wonderful, and hope that the Royal Family appreciated the fact that I had my lucky wedding knickers on. Instead of buying a hat for various functions, I buy knickers, so I have white lacy ones for weddings, pale blue or pink ones for christenings, sparkly ones for going to discos and black ones for funerals, much cheaper than a new hat each time and at least I will not look as silly as Beatrice at the wedding, I thought her hat made her look like Tinky Winky form the Telly Tubbies. Anyway, it was a lovely day, and I had a great time watching with Mum and Dad.
The day following the wedding, I attended my first ever street party, in honour of the royal celebrations. Fairholme Ave sure knows how to rock, and there are some very talented local kids about as well. Lorraine deserves a medal for all the work she did and over 100 people attended and had a great afternoon.
In the meanwhile back at the ranch....
The Chicken Arc finally arrived, and was given a coat of paint by Deslyn .. thank you
One tonne of sand arrived and was put into place lining the wild life pond, the underfelt and liner were placed and the pond was filled up, thank you Michelle and Mark.
Loads of plants were either transplanted or potted on, thanks Michelle, Mark and Deslyn
4 more raised beds were completed and filled with compost and potting soil, thanks David .
David also managed to place 300 meters of sheep fencing , attaching it onto exsisting posts. We are still waiting for Brian the grave digger to come and put in the new fence posts and new fencing..... hope hes a bit speedier with his other job than he is with the fencing, or there are a whole lot of people waiting to have a long lie down... well I suppose they have all the time in the world .
And David became the proud foster father of 25 sheep, who will be staying on our fields for a few months. Thanks Heather and Derek for the loan of the sheep.
And me, I managed to do a few little jobs, all indoors, did a bit of shopping with Mum and did lots of sitting, do I feel guilty... no not really.
After a week in Basildon it was time for the great trek home, didnt seem so long going home, maybe i was not quite so nervous of the journey. Again, it was wonderful to get home, and sleep in my own bed.Heaven.

Going Home

Its actually hard to know you belong somewhere, when you havent left, so our trip to Poole served 2 good purposes, one to join in a great family get together, and the second one, , we actually felt like we were going home on our return to Wales. It was lovely to start recognising all the familiar places on the way home, to realise we are only 100 miles from the bridge, and that we enjoyed returning to the peace and tranquility that is Llaingof. As they say the green green grass of home.

The Big 80 !

Our very special Uncle dave was 80 on the 23rd April, and we decided to travel to Poole to join him for dinner as a surprise ! Michella and Mark were left in charge of Llaingof, and after making an early morning telephone call to the birthday boy, we left for Poole. What a wonderful day we had, visiting our special place of rememberance at Upton Park, remembering all the happy birthdays we were able to share with Peter ( David's late Dad) and good old Uncle Dave. Then off round to Lynn for a quick cuppa, and to get washed and polished, and speed off to the hotel in Frendown, so we could hide away before Dave and Doris arrived. I think its fair to say Uncle Dave was suprised to see us all, and we had a wonderful evening together, laughing , talking and maybe even a few tears. A great day and we were so lucky to be there.

Nearly caught in my jammies

Good Friday dawns, Im busy pottering around the kitchen, making breakfast and wondering what we should have for dinner, when out of the corner of my eye, I see a flash of blue car ! Its 9.00 am, and Michelle and Mark have arrived, thank goodness I changed out of my jammies about 5 minutes before hand. What a wonderful way to start the day, so its on with the kettle, out with the rusks and the weekend has begun. After 1/2 hour R and R, Mark and Michelle descend on the veggie beds to help out . Me, Ill get on with the lunch, dinner, grub etc.

Change over day

The Gunns and Satterthwaites have returned to their homes, so we have one day to change the beds, do the washing, stock up the pantry and fridge, and line up the next lotn of jobs for the lucky visitors... next up Michelle and Mark, due good friday

The pond takes shape

James Pond has had many hands to help shape it. It is a huge nature pond,in Field One, near the poly tunnel and the 4711 orchard.
First David dug a rough outline with the miniture digger ( more playing than planning I think !), then James, Mar3k and Anna dis a bit more shaping, shelf building,forming Tuffey Mound,( a raised shaped area seperating the deeper end from the shallower end, and so named because Anna made the mound and her surname is Tufffey ) and turf removal to make the edges level. Then Michelle and her friend Mark, lined the pond floor with one tonne of soft sand, placed the underfelt ( did you know pond liners need an underfelt ?? I didnt ) and the liner in position, and started filling it with water ( from the mains, still havent got a pump working on the well). Then I managed to buy some water plants, aquatic soil ( ordinary top soil has too many nutrients and will soon turn the pond too soup )and planting baskets on a visit to a garden centre in Basildon, while I was visiting Mum and Dad). David and I managed to plant up the baskets, covering the soil with pea gravel, and then had a challenge to place the water lily in the deepest part of the pond, which just happened to be in the middle. Neither of us was too keen on wading in, though we were not going to own up to this too each other. We decided that it would be tempting fate if we walked on the liner, so had to devise a crafty method, involving threading the plant basket on to a very long piece of twine, walking to opposite ends of the pond, with the basket suspended over the water,then gently lowering the basket to the floor of the pond,and pulling the string back to land. Great fun to work out, and neither of ud got wet or fell in. We have done a bit of tweaking with the levels, by raising some of the edges with more sand under thevegde of the liner, so we have made an area when the water will over flow, making a bog garden. I have put a plant called a Gunera here, it has two leaves each about 6 -8 inches across, but has been known to grow leaves as large as 10 feet broad. Unbelievable, we will be watching and measuring the leaves with interest.
Jackie and Alan ( Not farmer Alan ), who live across the road from us, have some land that runs down to the banks of a river in a village called Saron. When they heard we were busy building a pond, the collected a whole load of water irises and a bucket of water, containing tadpoles and other water beasties, and left them on our doorstep for us. I cant believe how kind people are to us. Any way the tadpoles have been added to the pond, along with a frog that David found swimming in an ols animal trough near the piggery. Jackie needed her bucket back, and David was just busy cleaning the bucket before returning it. Jackie said "the bucket did not need a wash and set", and rushed off with the bucket before he had finished cleaning it. Laugh out loud !!. Anyway, I managed to leave them a bottle of Plum Jam on their doorstep, as a little thank you.We have found loads of plants that are very over crowded on the garden, so have been moving some of them down to the pond, to help it look a little less like a hole in the ground. I guess in a year or two it will look more comfortable in the land.

James and the Giant Plait and Lorraine posts a letter.,

While visiting, James mentioned that he had made a very nice bread plait at school. Well that was an opportunity not to be missed, so before you could say Jack robinson, I had the bread maker busy making a batch of dough, and James was soon enrolled on Penboyrs version of master chef, and was helping to plait a giant bread plait, which he decked with poppy seeds. Once it had proved and was almost climbed out of the tin while it was baked, the tribe set to sampling, and within a few minutes the whole loaf had dissapeared !It was really tasty. Come again soon James.

Lorraine was desperate to post a letter in the post box on our gate post, so first we had to have an expedition to Newcastle Emlyn to find a post card, and a stamp, and then we had to record the moment of posting digitally. Michelle and the Gunns senior were the lucky recipients. After all that excitement and hard wotk, the Gunns were happy to return to civilisation AKA Gidea Park. Funnily enough, they have not yet made another date for visiting. Chickens !!

Dinner at The Blue Bell Inn, darlings.

We decided to have dinner out on Tuesday night with the Gunns. Problem was, being new in the area and not great diners out, we didnt have a clue where to go. In a near by village, Cwnwyl Efford ( pronounces Quin Ell Ef Ord), I had seem a pub called the Blue Bell Inn, and we decided this was going to be the lucky establishment that would be providing dinner for eight. Unfortunately when I called by in the afternoon, the pub was shut, but a sign on the door promised it would be open from 5pm. Yippee. It was about 8pm by the time the rabble were all washed and dressed to go out, so we decended on the Blue Bell. The fact that there was only one dim light burning, and only one bloke sitting on the floor assembling a chair should have warned us that on Tuesday nights, the Blue Bell does not rock.The nice chair assembling man turned out to be the landlord,Mark, and he and his friend Karl, were quite happy to provide us with dinner, and free entertainment. We were presented with the menu, told that there was no gammon, there was only one portion of pasta dish left, and found that the sirloin steak had to be rump steak as there was no sirloin left either.Groceries were due to be purchased the following day. Apparently Mark had told his local supplier of potatoes and carrots that they "stink,really stink", so he might be interested if we can produce saleable produce , sometime soon. Anyway we all managed to find something to eat and drink, and Mark the landlord managed to keep us entertained by telling us all about a gig he was doing at a local hotel the next Sunday. I never really worked out if he did his act dressed as a woman, or as a man pretending to be a woman, or maybe even something else. He was rather proud that his frock for the occasion was covered with sequins.which he assured me he had sewn on himself ( ??) I was too nervous to ask what colour in case he wanted to show me. As always, when you are having a great evening, the ladies needed the loo, so migration en masse was planned, and directions were sort. Mark told us to" wait a minute , darlings " while he minced off to put the lights on in the loo, so we could enjoy the ambiance. Well, what atmosphere! When we arrived at said facilities, it was to find the loo had its very own screen of fairy lights on the wall, and the top of the cistern ( which was sort of beige/brown originally ) had been given a lovely shiny coat of glossy lilac paint . Such style !!Unfortunately the stratigically placed tea towel to dry your hands on spoiled the effect. Not to be out done, the boys shot off to view their facilities, and reported back that their place was covered with saucy postcards.Boys will be boys.
Well it was a great night out, the food was OK and I would definately go again, but not on Tuesday night.

The Big Chop

Well, I can never cease to be surprised. I was wrong about the Tree Man, he was back within a week, to sort the poor old tree out. With a lot of noise of chain saws, a great big shredder, and two good looking blokes in braces and helmets, and the bloke who owned the company, our poor old tree was sorted out. It was amazing to see what a knot the tree had wound itself into over the years. Species still unidentified, age ?? probably at least 50 years by the number of ringd in the trunks. If anyone would like to confirm this for themselves, there are plenty of logs that can be moved to the wood store, where you could count rings in relative comfort.In the end about 2/3 of the tree was removed and shredded, then dumped into field number 2, to make lovely compost. The remaining 1/3 of the tree is still large, and not too bad looking considering the drastic surgery it has undergone. We also have a huge area( about 10m x 3m that hasn't seem day light form a long long time, and might well turn into a shady seating area. Theres also an area of bank that needs covering with plants. I have an idea for this that involves burying planting baskets half way into the bank and planting up with 'self caring', low maintainance plants. I believe the local pound shop does a great range of plastic flowers and foilage. ( Just joking )

The Gunns descend from London

Graham, Lorraine James and Catherine are visiting for a few days... What can we get them to do. Well, Graham was able to help loosen the soil at the bottom of a couple of raised beds for us... no easy task as the ground seems to have baked hard in the sun. Seun was on hand to supervise, and make sure the job was well done. (see photo below).
Lorraine and I were able to fill the raised beds as they were dug, with the turf I removed from the same piece of ground.. feels like that was a waste of time and effort, though no doubt good experience. I could put that on my C V now, quailfied Turf Roller ( read that correctly please) and Mud Crawler.. guess that doesnt have the same ring about it as a mud fighter, but think I am better suited to being a Mud Crawler .After a layer of turf came 6 bags of well rotted compost,then about ten wheelbarrow loads of topsoil. ( did I mention that these are BIG beds, 5m x 1.2m , or 5yards x 1,5yards ( Sort of rough conversion, for the oldies ).Then it was time for tea and cake. Praise the Lord.
James meanwhile was seconded to pond shaping duty. This involved the making of several shelves to rest the water plant baskets on, and a lot of throwing of the ball for Ruby, who dose not seem to recognise the inportance of the task. The pond has been named James Pond (not 007) in recognition of James effort . Catherine was relaxing after several heavy nights out ( in London , before she came to visit) and was making sure the conservatory looked attractive.
After lunch ( 3 pm in Wales ), the comittee of David and Graham ( with a lot of nagging from me ... as I was worried that David would leave the cover for the poly tunnel until we were on our own again) decided that we would " go for it " ie: put the cover on the tunnel frame. A Huge piece of plastic (21m x 39m )was moved into the field and allowed to warm up in the sunshine. Another stalling tactic by the men I feel.Luckily Mar3k and Anna then arrived from Fareham, just in time to have a glass of cool drink, and get a move on with helping us. ragging the cover over the frame was the easy bit, then came the stabilising, the starghtening, the repositioning, the cursing, redoing the stabilising, fiddling, measuring etc etc. Did you just hear a fog horn booming ? I think it said "Boring ,tedious necessary."
Finally, the boys declared the job was done for the day, and we could get back to it tomorrow, Joy.