Jelly Day, Tuesay 7th July, 2009

Jelly Day

Oh yes, today Jim stirred and weighed and added sugar to the dripped juice, rolling boiled and poured and I capped and topped our lovely blackcurrant jelly.
It's not labelled yet but I'll do that soon. If the weather is fine tomorrow, we'll be able to pick some more. It's given 2 days of fine weather. Hooray.

We had to sample some for our afternoon tea:
Yummy....

No builders today.

Garden Progress

I carried on with the border I was doing yesterday and finished the stone edging as far as I could. Jim's car is in the way now and as it no longer goes, that's it I suppose!! I could put the stones round it and make it part of the border! I know you saw a photo yesterday, but now it has more stones and I filled the front section with fresh soil ready for some rockery plants:
and here is one a bit closer of the new stones:

You can see the new dark soil. I cannot dig out the weeds as this is the bed that has the cowslips and crocus in the spring and I don't want to lose those. I may have to attack it in the spring, when I can see where they are and avoid them.

On our trip to Galway and B and Q on Saturday, we bought this lovely black leaved plant:
Isn't it pretty? It can be split into several small plants, so some of them will go in the above border. Read about the card below under ATCs.

Vegetable Patch

The veg patch is going crazy. Jim picked some carrots today, ok, it was a small bunch but they were delicious, together with some fresh chard, potatoes and pork fillets with our own redcurrant jelly. Lovely.

Jim has also grown some 'asparagus peas' this year for the first time. I don't know what they'll be like but the little scarlet flowers are fabulous:
The big peas are swelling by the day and soon we'll be able to eat some. They are my very favourite, preferably straight from the pod! (when Jim isn't looking).
And look, we have sweet corn cobs appearing! I just love the leaves of sweetcorn:

Animals and birds

Buster went out this evening and didn't come back until midnight. What a bad dog. Sandy has been round our feet a lot today which is unusual. Here he is sitting on our bench:
We often get curlews flying overhead, usually in 2s and 3s but today a whole flock flew over. They make an amazing noise, we often hear them before we see them and I tried to photograph them. The camera had trouble focusing on them but I did manage a couple of decent shots:
Can you see their long curled beaks?
They always seem to fly over in the early evening. I wonder where they're going? There must have been 40 or more today. Their flight is rather languid and their wings are wide. If you click on any of the photos it will enlarge them.

ATCs

This morning I received an ACT from Lisa, who is one of the 10 members of our Artist Trading Card Group, doing the alphabet. My letter from her is 'G' for Goat. How beautiful is this:
It's a pygmy goat and I want to cuddle him!! It came with the card above. Here's a better photo of it:I have had one of this series before and I love them.

I have just made my letter J for Jumping for Joy:
This one will go to Linda (Stampmaiden), but not until 20th July. I like to make them ahead in case I have trouble with one.

Fruit

I picked some more strawberries and raspberries today. I don't think there'll be many more. Quite a few have botritis and have rotted with the wet. Still we did get to make a little strawberry jam and have had lots with cream. I might make some scones tomorrow to have with strawberries and cream. Mmmmm.

Lina

It's my Grand daughter Lina's 12th birthday tomorrow (well, today actually, 8th July). I made her a card, posted it and forgot to photograph it. Perhaps K will do it for me. She will have to have pennies for a present and I have no idea what she's 'into' these days. I hope she has a wonderful day. I know she is going to have a party and that her brother Tony's group is going to be playing. How exciting, I wish I was going. K's promised to take lots of photos and some video. Watch this space!!This is a photo of Lina at Cleethorpes on a day out earlier this year.
This is big brother Tony who will be playing with his group for Lina's party. Tony's just got a distinction, merit, merit at college studying performing arts and now goes onto Derby University for his degree. Clever boy.

Blackcurrants Blackcurrants and Rain, 5th July 2009

Blackcurrants

We knew we had to pick blackcurrants today as a lot of them are very ripe and have pulled the branches of the bushes to the ground. So we picked a whole jam pan full then it started to rain. And rain. And rain.

Tennis

Luckily it was the mens' final at Wimbledon between Andy Roddick and Roger Federer. I wanted Roger to win and beat Sampras's record of 14 Grand Slam titles and Jim wanted Andy to win. I won. Pity we didn't bet on it. It was a 5 setter, not the best final in the world and in the end it became a bit of a 'last man standing' as they were both so tired. Sampras had flown in from the USA to watch the match and saw his record tumble. Roddick looked shell shocked. Just as it was hotting up in the last game, we had a storm and lost the satellite signal. Can you believe it? Luckily it didn't stay off for long, so we only missed a couple of points.

Buster

I took this photo of Buster 'in' his bed (sort of). How can he sleep like that?

Look at all that dust. That's from the builders and I haven't washed the floor this weekend as it'll only be just as bad on Monday. I might give it a quick go tomorrow.

Jelly Making

Jim washed and cooked the blackcurrants then strained them through our muslin home made jelly bag ready to make the blackcurrant jelly tomorrow. We always let it drip overnight.


Lovely jelly, fantastic blackcurranty smells.

BlackJack and Towels

I dyed my towels navy blue and they were on the table. BlackJack came in absolutely soaking, looking like a punk cat and sat next to them:

The towels are actually navy blue now but the flash wiped out the colour and I couldn't correct it on photoshop. Poor soggy BlackJack.

Dinner

We had lasagna with home grown lettuce and rocket and other salad for dinner. Lovely. Followed by a muller yogurt. I've just eaten half a bar of chocolate. Bad girl.

If the weather's good tomorrow we'll be picking more blackcurrants as we've promised Joe the builder some on Monday and might make some to sell at the next car boot. We've both been computing tonight and it's been really quiet. I must make some more ATCs for the ABC group.

Paying it Forward

Oh, Bea received the parcel I sent her as the 'pay it forward' game she played with me. This is what I sent her:
This is the front. Can you see it says 'BEA' on the red bow at the bottom?
And this is the back. They never really photograph well, this is a 'purse' (in American) or a Clutch Bag in English!! It is all woven using re-cycled materials such as vegetable netting, leather from a belt, wool, found items, bubble wrap. Old t-shirts, all sorts really. Do click on them to enlarge. Bea likes it and I'm so pleased.

Enough for tonight, I'm tired and off to bed.