In My Kitchen

Being completely unprepared for this months "In My Kitchen" I've taken the prompt rather literally this time - and no "pre-blog tidying" has gone on! I'm not sure we've ever shown you our kitchen as a whole. Its rather chaotic in different ways; the complete mish-mash of cupboards, empty spaces, broken drawers and different colours of worktop come to mind before we even start on the added everyday clutter.

Looking around, this month of particular note is the broken down freezer which we've decided has given itself up for lent! We were going to hurry out and sort a replacement, but having dealt with the food that wouldn't fit in the fridges little ice box the urgency has gone. It'll have to be done soon though.

The chop saw sitting in the middle of the kitchen is certainly not a normal feature, nor the large stack of cardboard packaging to its right. A birthday present for Joe which should hopefully make the upcoming cabinetry a little easier.

Talking of cabinetry, without the cabinets in the bathroom there is no sink, and so toothbrushes are sitting on the kitchen side still.

Finally, some rather pink lilies that Joe found in the reduced section at 10% of their original price. Bargain.

What's in your kitchen? Celia at Fig Jam and Lime Cordial is collating her monthly roundup of kitchens all around the world.

Read More

A Postcard from Bangkok

What a week! Bangkok was so different from everywhere we've been so far that for it took a little getting used to. The heat, at night in particular, was almost more than we could cope with. However, cope we did and as a city it was an interesting one to explore. Worth a mention certainly is the range of transport available, from the lovely air conditioned skytrain to the buses that are barely more than a pickup truck, from taxis that weave in and out of the traffic to express boats that run up and down the river and are often completely cramed with people; moving around the city is an adventure all on its own.

Amongst the hustle and bustle of the city are a plethora of temples and we took time to visit Wat Pho with its collection of courtyards and plentitude of golden Buddha statues. Everything is intricately and elaborately decorated, with gold leaf applied everywhere it can be. The highlight of Wat Pho is the giant Reclining Buddha which, at 15m high and 43m long, is definitely an eye opener! 

We also enjoyed a visit to Ancient Siam. This is a museum, for want of a better word - a large collection of Thai buildings with everything from palaces to traditional village homes. Some of these are the originals which have been transplanted from their locations, while others are recreations. The site is large and green and relatively quiet compared to the city centre. Your entry ticket includes bike hire and we had a great few hours pedalling around, exploring some of the buildings closely and admiring others from a distance. 

Our highlight from exploring the city though had to be the cut flower market.  Stall after stall covered in flowers all of which were incredibly cheap. For less than £1 you could get 50 roses or a large bunch of orchids. Orchids by the bunch was a new one for us and we just couldn't resist them! For an added bonus as we came out of the far side we discovered a wholesale vegetable market with huge bowls of chillis and ginger by the bag. Before we reached Thailand we were a little worried about the spiciness of the food, but it turned out to be absolutely fine. There were plenty of non spicy options all of which were incredibly tasty, they really knew how to get good flavour out of the fresh herbs and ingredients.

Finally to round off long hot days of exploring we went for a massage on a couple of occasions. While described as a foot massage we'd actually sit for an hour as they slowly work on our feet, up our legs, onto our arms and hands before finally working on our head, neck and shoulders. While we discovered a few tendons we weren't sure existed and questioned if we were flexible enough for some of the moves in general it was a very relaxing way to finish of the day.

And that was it. On Wednesday we spent 20 hours travelling to return once more to the UK; three months of travelling all done with, finished. Home at last.

Read More

Photo Friday - Dahlia Mr Optimist

Bought last year for 50p in a sale and now flowering. Bargain!

Read More

Photo Friday

Read More

Round and round the garden....

It's been such a pleasant weekend hasn't it? So nice to see the sun shining. While we were out in the garden yesterday we realised it's been a while since we've shown you what's going on, so here's a round the garden trip of what we've been up to and what's looking good at the moment...

We've been planting out lots of our seedlings. Taking inspiration from the kitchen garden at Chatsworth house where they plant their veggies all mixed together in a radial format we've mixed up our purple sprouting, salad leaves and some flower seeds in a grid. We're hoping that it's all going to look very pretty in a few weeks time.

Our broad beans are doing very well. Unfortunately the peas we planted at the same time have been well and truely munched by the juvenile sparrows we've had around. Just not to be this year.

Being indecisive about where to plant out our sunflowers we eventually went for placing them all in a block in the middle of our veg patch. 

We've recently hung out a new bird feeder to cope with the influx of the aforementioned sparrows. They certainly come in flocks and still choose to squabble over one or two holes despite there being plenty of open ones. The chickens of course continue to feast from the rejects!

Well trained sparrows throw the bits they don't like to the chickens...

As part of all the clearing we did earlier in the year we revealed an acer that had previously been well hidden. It's thriving for the extra space.

Our alliums are looking as good as last year (sorry, not sure on the variety). I do love these flowers. 

We've been donated quite a few broken fence panels for our wood burner recently. While we're very grateful for the free fuel our patio does currently look like this:

The small bed in the front of the house is looking relatively tidy at the moment, with the climbing rose (Claire Austen) covered in flowers and the penstamen just coming into bloom too. 

We're very hopefully for a first cherry harvest this year. We planted this tree 18 months ago and it didn't try and fruit last summer. This time it's looking great.

The black peppermint is thriving this year. Joe has high hopes of a plentiful supply for peppermint tea.

And finally a few more plants in flower at the moment...

Last summers lavender plugs trying to flower already!

Read More

Photo Friday - Pear Blossom

Read More

A Tangle of Ivy

When we moved in we loved the way that our new garden contained all sorts of mature plants. It meant we could start enjoying the seasons of the garden while debating what changes we wanted to make. In this picture taken just under a year ago you can see that we have a long border running the length of the garden along the fence line, full of shrubs.

What you can't see is that the whole border is a tangle of ivy, and that a lot of the shrubs have been neglected over the last few years leaving them straggly, out of shape and overgrown. In the end we decided we'd need to be harsh with this area, leaving only the bare minimum and starting from scratch. 

Last summer Joe made a start at the right hand end, removing two hebe that were very woody stemmed and overflowing the lawn, waging war on the ivy and discovering that there was a beautiful peony hiding behind them - an excellent find. He did manage to take a runner from one hebe which is now flourishing in a pot and can go back into that border.

Recently in order to sort out our fence issue we made some progress clearing out the left hand end (so much easier while the fence panels were down) and last weekend we continued with that further meaning that this:

May 2013

has become this:

April 2014

and this:

May 2013

has become this:

April 2014

There's a little bit more to be done, but what we've cleared so far has left us with a blank slate. We've started to use the space to plant up things that needed it, but we're now at the point where we need a plan. This is our first garden and so far all our major changes have involved vegetables and chickens, and so we're really excited to have a large area of flower bed to work with and to start to truly make this our garden. 

Read More

Garden Blogger Blooms Day - November

Everything in the garden is starting to look a little sorry for itself at the moment. Anything left from the flowers that have flourished in previous months are looking dog-eared and windswept, the grass is overly long and the weeds are taking over.

There is one exception, the star of this time of year. The beautiful cyclamen:

Linking in with May Dreams Gardens for GBBD again this month.

Read More

Garden Blogger Blooms Day - October

Ill just leave these here...

Why hello mr buzzy bee!

Our beans did awfully this year - those ones behind are as big as they have got. New seed for next year I think!

The last of the sweet peas, guaranteed. The plants are in the compost heap now!

The cyclamen are starting  to bloom. It must be getting cold...

And another month where I shall say the last clematis flower of the year!

Although it was windy when I took these photos this rudbeckiia really does just look windswept.

This penstemon is rapidly becoming one of my favourite plants for abandoning in an awkward corner. This one is under a dry overhang at the front of the house and is still flowering many months on!

Linking up with May Dreams Gardens for Garden Bloggers' Blooms Day again.

Read More

Garden Blogger Blooms Day

So we are a few days early but we are joining in anyway! Here are some pictures of what is blooming in our garden:

Love in a mist

Geranium

Sweet Peas - still going!

Another sunflower

Sweetcorn - a bit late but definitely in bloom!

Nasturtium

And another nasturtium - twin coloured this time

Rudbeckia gloriosa, sewn from seed this spring

Penstemon keeping up the pink blooms outside the front door. This has been going for months!

The last of this years clematis flowers. They have done well for their first summer. 

Sedum just starting to come into bloom.

We also have some rather pecked at camomile (apparently the petals are tasty for chickens), lavender attempting a second flush and a hebe that is just about still flowering. Not much more to come this year for flowers. I will try and force some paperwhites in a few weeks but aside from berries and pretty leaves this is it.

Read More