New spot for the chickens

Today has been a glorious day! Mr.M. and I spent all day in the garden cutting back bushes and moving the chicken coop and run. We're having a garden room built where the chickens live so we had to move them. They didn't seem to mind while we were chopping and moving, but they have seemed a bit unsure about their new place this evening. Ah well, considering the size of their brains, they'll soon forget ever having lived in a different spot.

In between chopping and lifting we had to have quite a few tea breaks. We tend not to use loose tea but I was given some by my sister last week along with a little diver to put the leaves in.

 

Once the little diver had had enough he was off to his little rubber dinghy and the tea was ready.

Cute little fellow. And the tea was lovely as well. 

Mrs. M. 

And then there were two

Oh dear. Mr. Fox has paid a visit. Dear Marjorie is no longer with us after a run in with the sly animal. At least that's what we think happened. What else could it be? She was found with her neck broken behind a tree at the top of the garden and there were feathers all around. Gwen and Peggy were at the bottom of the garden making a racket and seemed quite disturbed.  

Marjorie, Peggy and Gwen.

I suppose we've been quite lucky not having lost any of them earlier since they've been wandering around freely for hours every day. At the age of two they are considered "older" chickens and I guess Marjorie had a good life while it lasted. Now that Mr. Fox knows that there are chickens to catch, he might be coming back. We'd better put a padlock on the coop!

Mrs.M.

Potatoes are in

Easter break. How lovely is that? Fabulously lovely actually. Time to relax and do what you want to do for most of the time. I do have some work in my school bag but I've put the bag out of sight for now. 

Commitments have not allowed me to go up to the allotment until today. It was pouring down all day yesterday so we weren't sure whether we'd be able to plant our potatoes today. Was it going to be too wet? Well, if you don't try you won't know. Mrs. G. and I met up at 10 o'clock in the windy but sunny morning. Boy was it nippy! We had already dug over two beds but soon realised that we needed another bed as we had three types of potatoes. Hey ho, let's dig. The soil was wet but workable so it didn't take us very long to weed and dig. Soon enough we had three beds with potatoes buried in three rows per bed. 

Romano late potatoes ready to be covered up.

Early Foremost to the right and late King Edwards to the left.

It didn't take very long at all but instead of heading home (Mrs. G. is off to the airport this afternoon and I'm having visitors arriving tomorrow) we started weeding the onion/garlic bed. It's amazing how addictive weeding can be. It helps that it looks so much nicer afterwards. 

  

 

Onions are great to grow as we both use that a lot in cooking. These are early ones and should be ready to harvest in the early part of the summer. We'll also plant some that will be ready by the autumn. You can't have too many onions!

After only a couple of hours the allotment wasn't looking too bad. I doubt whether the plot police will have a go at us. 

Neither of us will be able to do any more work this week but roll on next week - time to sort the rest out!

Mrs. M.

Back on track

Gorgeous day yesterday but no time to visit the allotment. I kept my fingers crossed for continued good weather today and I wasn't disappointed. Mrs. G. and I met up at the unusually early hour of 10 o'clock, ready to tackle some digging. I will easily confess that the thought of spending hours digging had filled me with dread but I really enjoyed today's efforts.

It was an unusual day in more ways than one. We actually spent most of the time working, not drinking coffee whilst chatting. As neither of us had brought any coffee and all the allotments around us are looking very nice and tidy, we probably felt that we had no time to lose. I'm saying probably as we didn't talk about it at all. We just got on with it.

We never overdo things and today was no exception. We dug over and weeded two beds, ready for potato planting next week. 

We put some of the chicken manure into the soil, hoping that it'll make the spuds grow nice and big.  There's still a fair bit of manure left in the corner of the plot. 

The smell is still very strong!

It was time to harvest the remaining parsnips and some of the leek, which is always a pleasure. I always plan my meals for the week ahead and haven't planned anything where I could use any of it. However, it will no doubt last until next weekend. Our nice neighbour Bob mentioned while passing by that the rhubarb is ready to start picking so there will be a rhubarb crumble in both Mrs. G's and Mrs. M's household this afternoon!

Going up to the allotment early in the day has meant that I've now got the rest of the afternoon to potter about. If by pottering I mean washing and cleaning the house.... Oh and of course, making and eating a rhubarb crumble!

Mrs. M.

Menopause

Well what do you know? Our three little chickens have reached the menopause! They've been laying soft eggs for a couple of months now, mixed in with the odd normal egg, and Mr. M. has tried everything, and I mean everything, to get to the bottom of this. They've had calcium supplement in their food, their coop has been blow torched to get rid of mites, you name it and Mr. M. has done it. In the end he contacted the farm we bought our little dears from and they said that this was normal. They've come to the end of their egg laying and have consequently reached the menopause. 

So that's it? We've only had them for 2 years. Apparently, chickens lay a predestined number of eggs in their life time and when they've laid them that's the end of eggs. Hm. I suppose we've been very spoiled getting 3 eggs a day, 7 days a week for almost 18 months. If a chicken lays for example 4 eggs a week, their egg laying period will obviously last longer than if they lay day in day out. Mr. M. was told that they will still lay proper eggs for a while yet but nowhere near as frequently as before. Who knows? We might have to buy eggs one day soon.

On top of this, Gwen has been on an adventure again. This time she decided to visit our next door neighbour on the other side. Luckily, he wasn't afraid to pick her up and put her back in our garden.

Mrs. M.

Time away

Ahh, half term and some time for me! Last year, my friend Mrs. H. and I met up in London to see Les Mis. We had such a good time so we instantly decided that in 2014 we would do the same but also stay the night. Half term is here and I've just spent 2 days with my dear friend in the capital. 

We had decided to meet up outside The National Gallery in the morning. I decided to walk there from Victoria and  managed to arrive at Buckingham Palace just in time for the changing of the guards. It was packed with people! I didn't stay to watch as I was already a bit late but I saw these handsome horses while I was walking down The Mall. 

 

There's something about the sound of hooves that make you stop and watch.

We went straight for one of the cafes in the gallery before seeing the Van Gogh exhibition of 2(!) paintings. We wandered around the impressionist galleries and enjoyed all the paintings before heading out, only to realise that it had been raining while we were inside. As Mrs. H. lives at the other end of the country we don't see each other very often. This means that a lot of coffee stops and chatting is a frequent occurrence when we do meet up. 

We had found a nice hotel near Victoria and headed back there to drop off our bags before heading out again.

A very decent hotel though as it was on a main road it was very noisy throughout the night and neither of us slept much.

The musical this year was  Billy Elliot and we were not disappointed.

The show was better than I had expected, having seen the film several times. The acting was very good and I was impressed by the accents, especially after reading in the programme that the boy who played Billy was American. His singing might not have been brilliant but overall I think he was fab. The boy who played Michael was excellent! The feeling of the whole mining situation came across as extremely angry - very powerful!

After a bad night's sleep we got ready to wander through London. It was a glorious morning so we decided to walk up to Marble Arch and then stroll down Oxford Street. It took us an hour to walk there, fairly briskly. Time for another coffee... This time in Selfridge's. After some more window shopping and drooling we ended up in the cafe at Liberty's and had some cream tea. 

The haberdashery at Liberty's made me itch to get my hands on practically everything. I bought some wrapping paper for £4.95 instead, hoping to find a frame for it. 

Hours later and strolls down Carnaby Street, around Covent Garden and Leicester Square, we said goodbye and headed to our respective train stations. My legs and feet were aching and it was heaven to sit down on the train once it arrived (late). Having had a lovely two days away it was nice to come home to a happy family. I should go away on my own more often...

From one day in 2013 to two days in 2014. What should we do next year? A week? In New York? Well, one can always dream.

Mrs. M.

It's too wet!

Will this rain ever stop? Well it did for most of today actually so Mr. M and I went to the allotment with a bucket full of chicken you know what. It was muddy and soaking wet up there. We cut off the remaining brussels sprouts and also took some tiny red cabbage for the chickens. They're not fussy with what they eat. They love picking away at the brussels sprouts stalks. There were some sprouts of decent size so they ended up on the dinner table later on. 

I'm glad the parsnip is growing leaves as it would be difficult to find where they are otherwise. We really ought to harvest them soon but it's been so wet and horrible that I don't fancy digging much. 

 

Some of the leek is looking nice and thick whereas others look rather thin.

 

I'm so glad that my favourite is showing signs of re-emerging. I can't wait to make more rhubarb and vanilla jam. 

On the way home it started to rain. It was a bit weird as the sun was shining and they sky was fairly blue. All of a sudden we saw this:

 

 The rainbow was really clear and bright, which is not very obvious from this photo. It was stunning. 

Apart from this little trip out, I've spent most of the day making a music bag for Little Miss M. Her flute teacher has asked her to keep all her score sheets and books in one bag so I offered to make her one. I used some fabric I bought in IKEA a while ago. It was really fun to make and the owner is very proud and can't wait for her next lesson. 

A pocket for pencils, keys or similar.

From the back.

It's now time to meet Mr. and Mrs. G. for a pub quiz gathering. We've yet to get anywhere near the winning team!

Mrs. M.