It's pickling season

 This morning I pickled a few jars of tomatoes and one of cucumbers. The tomatoes will only keep a couple of months but the cucumbers stay crisp for a very long time. Don't they look pretty. My freezer is stuffed to bursting with garden produce and I am planning on reducing the amount of tomatoes and courgettes that I grow next year. There's only so much space in the freezer. 

I gave a neighbour a tub of vegetables this morning. She popped back a little later with a bar of chocolate for me. I was so touched as that's the first time anyone's given me anything in return. I'll make a tray of rocky road with it as I've got all the ingredients. We're off out to friends for a meal this evening and it'll be a nice change not having to cook. 

In crafter mode

 I've been getting the urge to craft again lately. Yesterday I used some of my dies to cut the components for a couple of fuchsia flowers. I rubbed baby oil onto the flower parts after I'd cut them out. Needless to say I didn't use new paper but chose to use the envelopes that my birthday cards came in. I had to wait for the baby oil to dry and the flowers are now all put together and drying. I'll take a photo later today and show how they look. The baby oil is great for darkening the coloured paper. It turns the white inside the envelopes to a pale version of the facing colour. Very useful as I don't have any dark green paper

While I'm sitting here a road sweeping machine has just gone past. It's clearing all the gutters. I can't remember the last time I saw one of these. Everywhere we go these days the gutters are filled with grass and weeds. People don't take pride in their neighbourhood any more. Tony and I clean the gutter in front of our house and the chap down the road does the same.  We each take turns to do the gutter in between our house and his. About four houses in total.  If everyone that was able to did a little bit to keep their area tidy it would look so much nicer. And if people with drives actually put their cars on them the road would look so much more inviting.

 

Fresh from my garden

 It won't be long before summer is a distant memory and we're complaining about the cold will it? I'm making the most of my harvests while they're abundant.  I took a lovely selection of veggies to one of the (older*) men at my carving club last night. It's lovely having plenty to share and Jim does so much for his sisters. He's been quite poorly and not felt inclined to grow much this year so I'm trying to take a little something for him each week. I hesitate to say old these days because I'm not getting any younger.* 

I've just been out and picked this lovely little selection of flowers and vegetables. The posy of sweet peas and roses are filling my kitchen with a beautiful scent.

There's two types of cucumber, a Rondo de Nice courgette,  a medley of tomatoes and a little handful of French beans.

A great day for laundry

 I've been  a right old domestic goddess today. Beef curry simmering  by 08.30, bedding stripped,washed, dried outdoors and replaced by lunch time.  Veggies harvested and ironing  finished.  My halo is positively blinding. The little jar is a pear, raspberry and strawberry compote.  I'd spotted two small windfall pears this morning and managed to find a few strawberries and a raspberry. It'll need using up quite quickly so I'll stir it into some porridge on Thursday morning 

Do you remember this?

 Many years ago when I was very much into crafting, I crafted using junk. Even now I can't look at anything without seeing several ways to craft with it. I'm getting the urge to craft again and thought perhaps if you didn't see this the first time around you'd be interested in seeing it.

Well worth growing

 If you've only got an average sized garden you'd be staggered at how much food you can grow. I'm in the North East of England not too far from the coast and here's what I picked over the past two days. The first tray is literally minutes old and the second tray shows my harvest for the past two days. Top tray has Patty pan squash and Rondo de Nice courgette.  Two mini cucumbers and a mix of different tomatoes

 

I added today's harvest to yesterday's.  That doesn't include the 680g of tomatoes that I picked and froze yesterday. The cup and saucer is just to give you an idea of the size of the different veggies.

Oh no. Not again

 Poor Tony has just had someone run into the side of his car.  The lady admitted responsibility straight away but that doesn't make it any better. Our car now has a nasty dent and huge scrape all along the passenger side and Tony is understandably most definitely not feeling very happy. He's smoking like a chimney and he very rarely smokes these days. Hopefully the damage is just cosmetic and easily repaired.  Our car is bright red so very visible. 

Harvesting and another freebie

 This mornings harvest fresh from the garden 

And Tony  came home with this yesterday. His former colleague bought it to use at work. He's changing jobs and has no further need of it.

He can't resist a freebie bless him.

The solar eclipse

 Yesterday Tony and I sat in the garden and watched the solar eclipse unfold.  It was the most incredible spectacle as the moon slowly nibbled away at the sun. I had expected it all to turn dark which unfortunately didn't happen.  Nonetheless it was a lovely experience. Afterwards I snapped some photos of the amazing colour in my garden 

Sitting watching the eclipse with the scent from this tuberose filling the evening air was absolutely magical 

Freebies and tomatoes

 It's tomato season at long last and I have many different varieties to enjoy over the coming weeks 

And look what we were given yesterday 

It's the perfect size for two people and will be really useful during the colder weather for cooking quick meals and snacks.