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| Very tasty radishes from the field |
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| Potato plants popping up through the grass cuttings |
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| Broad beans blooming with buzzy bees (try saying that quickly...) |
During the January sales, we decided to treat ourselves to a new bathroom suite, as our bathroom was pretty outdated and had things like a cracked sink, an unfinished cupboard which had bare concrete with jagged metal poking out and vinyl which only covered part of the floor. Now, (as you may have gathered if you've read previous posts) we've been pretty busy since we moved in so, the suite has been sat in the shed boxed up.
Having finished the minor task of planting hundreds of trees we decided another big project was in order so, this last month, we looked for someone to fit our suite for us. We felt we could manage some bits ourselves, but other bits we wanted professionals as we thought we might make a mess of it... can you guess what's coming?
That's right... The bits the professionals did were an absolute mess... Sigh...
The job was meant to take 3 days, it ended up taking about a month. To be fair to the workers, they did stay and finish until we were happy with the job (well, not horribly upset and instead reached a point of 'That'll do, I can't face any more bathroom disruption') when they could have easily run away half way through, and they were paid a flat fee, not per hour, so they probably made a loss overall. Maybe they'll have learnt something from the experience.
I have to reassure those of you who loved the special feature shower from our original bathroom... that part remains the same! We loved it too much to change it, so we still have a quirky watering can to wash underneath. :)
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| New bathroom, old shower :) |
We've now also built ourselves a cupboard with shelving in the bathroom, which we're quite pleased with. Now we just have touch-ups to do and we'll have a lovely new bathroom!
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| Bathroom cupboard |
This month we also welcome a couple of arrivals to our small holding. A lovely couple, Ruth and Craig, are renting part of our land to grow flowers and possibly some vegetables for themselves. Ruth runs a fantastic flower business where she uses locally sourced, in-season flowers to make the most beautiful arrangements. She's now starting to grow some of her own flowers to reduce their transport miles further, and she's using natural and organic methods to grow them. We love this as a business idea, it fits in perfectly with our morals and aims for ourselves so we're very happy to have them with us! Have a look at her work;
http://www.etheldredafloral.co.uk/
We're very lucky to experience a lot of kindness from both friends and strangers recently. We've been given plants including beans, leeks, raspberries, rhubarb, oregano, damson trees and some flowers for prettification. (Thank you Pop, Dave, Hilary, Shelagh and Dave).
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| One of our new rhubarb plants |
We were given broccoli and eggs by a neighbour and also found a tree-surgeon who will happily deliver us a continual supply of woodchip which we'll share with Ruth for making paths between beds. We're feeling very lucky at the moment!
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| First use for wood-chip, tidying up our front garden! |
It's pretty lovely living here in our new home, but to make you city dwellers feel better about where you live I've composed a list of disadvantages of living in the middle of no-where;
- Terrible internet speeds
- Harder work to stay in touch with people
- No local cinema or anything
- Frequently no mobile phone signal
- Takes a lot longer to pop to the shops for a pint of milk
- Did I mention the frustratingly slow internet?
