Time To Bring On A Few Hyacinth.

Today I've bought the first lot of Hyacinth that I'm forcing in to the light to start growing on. As you can see I have nine in all so I just took the three on the right and potted them up in to a proper bowl. They don't want to go anywhere too warm just yet. Its best to just grow them on steady until you can see a flower bud forming and then you can bring them in to more heat. If you take them straight indoors when they are at this stage they will go all leggy and weak.




Well I have to go and have my dinner now so take care.
Bob.

Bubble Wrapped For Winter.

Hello everyone, how are you all today? I’ve had a busy day finishing off insulating the rest of the greenhouse, I also got some of the plants moved. The far end of the greenhouse is the hot or fairly warm part, the first half is cool but frost free as there is an electric heater that comes on to keep it above freezing and the conservatory is a cold house, there is no heating in there at all. It will keep about 3 degrees of frost off thought, I did over winter Geraniums in there last year. If it was particularly cold I covered them with a bit of fleece. I just need to finish off sort what plants I want to go where. I want to get everything sorted out for when I go away on the 10th November.

Today we had the new carpet fitted in the bedroom, so that’s looking smart now. We are just waiting for the new bed to arrive which I think will be Thursday.

Our new carpet.

Well I’d better get going now as Bob is ready for a sit down. I’ve not had one yet as I’ve been going through some things in the store room, looking for a book. There are still some things that we haven’t unpacked since we moved. Anyway as you can imagine I had to go through every box in there before I found what I was looking for. I also had my little helper with me so every box I lifted off the shelf and went place on the floor there was Tommy standing right where I wanted to put it. Everything turned out okay though. Take care and I’ll see you tomorrow all being well.

Bob.

Week 44.

A few jobs for this week.

click to enlarge.

Getting The Greenhouse Ready For Winter.

Here is a picture of some Chrysanths I have in pots.

Today I've picked the last of the apples, I have 525 apples in store. I also went to the farm to pick up a couple of gas cylinders for the greenhouse heater. I then set too and cleared the soil out of the tomato beds in the greenhouse, I replace it with fresh every year to avoid a build up of disease. I won't put the fresh soil back in the bed until after the new year as the extra height that removing the soil gives means I can over winter some of the taller plants in the greenhouse rather than heating the conservatory which is quite a large space although it would be nice if that were possible. I don't really have any plants that would justify the cost of heating that though so I cram as much as I can in to the greenhouses.

A Lazy Sunday.

Good evening everyone, well its evening here so I'm sticking with good evening even if its still the middle of the afternoon where you are.

Today Bob's been very lazy. You see the thing with me is that I was brought up in a time when sunday was sunday and a special day for it. If you go to the North of Scotland today you will still find sunday is how sunday should be - well how it should be in my opinion. Anyway the upshot of it is that for me sunday has to be different, its a day when I please myself or say to hell with the jobs and sit for hours watching a movie with Vicki or just messing around generally wasting time and definately avoiding B&Q and any other place like it - really I don't need that sort of thing invading my Sunday.

I did rip up a carpet from the bedroom this afternoon as Vicki is wanting to do some painting on her day off tomorrow, the new one is supposed to be getting fitted on Tuesday. So thats it, the dogs will be send to hell and dalmation if they dare to drop one hair on the new carpet. Talking of which I did give Tippy a good old going over with the comb this afternoon as she is malting like crazy, I hardly needed a comb I could have pulled it out with my hands. Now she is laid up in front of the radiator so maybe I over did it with the comb.

Also today I cleared the draws out in my desk, they were full of papers gathered over our time here, most of which were no longer needed so they went on the fire, I never throw papers in the bin.

Thats about it for today, so I hope you're all okay and I will see you again soon.
Bob.

Brodsworth Light Show.

Hello everyone. Last night David and Jo came over and we all went out to see the light show they are putting on at Brodsworth Hall. As you will see from the pictures I took for you various parts of the gardens are lit up by coloured lights. It was very busy with a queue of at least 40 yards long and 2 people wide when we arrived but it was all good fun and I don’t think anyone minded too much even though there was some grumbling about the wait. Once inside the gardens the crowds weren’t bad enough to spoil the event. As you walked up the drive to the hall there was music playing from the bushes, the big Cedar tree was lit up which showed off it’s beauty and behind this could be seen the hall which was lit by ever changing colours. I think my favourite part was the sunken garden area which was lit mainly in blue with palms and other things in different colours. There were lots more to see than what I’ve shown you in the pics, I didn’t photograph everything and I only had my phone with me so some of then turned out a bit shaky but I think you will get the idea.

This morning I had to take Vicki down to the doctors as she was having a bad time of it with her foot, she’d been awake all night because of the pain. Anyway it turns out that its all to do with her arthritis also the doctor says she must lose weight which as you probably know is easier said then done.

News from the village is that someone is proposing a wind farm in the area, there was a meeting about it the other day apparently, the first I heard about it was when someone who is planning on buying property here has had second thoughts and from what they were telling me is going to be looking to buy elsewhere. They are very nice people and wealthy so I hope they find somewhere to their liking without too much trouble. I think they will. With the money they have I’m surprised they wanted to buy here in the first place. The village is middling to good but the surrounding area is at best very average. I know if I hade a million to spend I wouldn’t be looking to spend it here.

Just in case you’ve been reading my other blog and wondering why I haven’t added anything to my journey this past few days don’t worry I intend to carry on with it, I’ve just been a bit busy going out and stuff that’s all.

Best wishes,
Bob.

Bulb Planting & Leaf Raking.

This morning I planted some Dwarf Iris and Alliums in the main garden, I was surprised how cold it was, my hands got quite cold by the time I’d done – it must be something to do with global warming!

I’ve spent most of this afternoon raking up leaves in the walled garden. People often talk to me about raking up leaves as if its some kind of a chore, I have to say that it doesn’t bother me at all as I have a good leaf blower. The tedious job is carting them away afterwards. I take them in to the wood and make a leaf pile which I leave alone for 18 months by which time its made a really good leaf mould for mulching any beds or what have you.

I took these two pics for you this morning when out with the dogs. It was a really beautiful sky in one direction and then when you turned the sun shinning on the village showed the stone houses and church up very nicely.

Today Vicki and Fallon went shopping for bedroom stuff, Vicki is decorating our bedroom so she bought all the wallpaper and some material to make curtains, and she even bought a new bed too. Oh yes I nearly forgot, and she bought a carpet, we have to wait for the bed and carpet to be delivered though.

Before I go I will just remind you to pop on over to see the hiking gardener http://peakdistrictwalker.blogspot.com/ and take a look at the latest instalment of his journey along the West Highland Way. If you don’t fancy reading there are quite a few pics of Scotland for you to view.

Best wishes,
Bob.

Over But Not Out.

It would seem that after saying yesterday that the formula one season had ended that may not be the fact after all as the Team that Lewis Hamilton drives for 'McLaren Mercedes' has decided to appeal a decision by the stewards who decided not to exclude the BMW and Williams teams for running with fuel that was thought to be below the 10 degree limit allowed in the regulations. Had they been excluded from the results then Lewis Hamilton would then gain extra points so making him the world champion. I really can't see the point in any of this, even if the court of appeal find in favour of McLaren Mercedes what pleasure can be had from winning in this sort of way. I'm never really in favour of celebrating second place but really, in this instance it's more commendable. For those who don't follow the sport I will just point out that Kimi Raikkonen drives for Ferrari and was not driving one of the cars that McLaren Mercedes seek to get excluded. As far as I'm concerned the best man won and I hope it stays that way.

Which One For The Champ?

Today is the last race of the formula one season. Apart from it being the last race of the season its also the race that will decide this years drivers title, there are 7 points seperating 3rd place driver Kimi Raikkonen from current leader Lewis Hamilton, Fernando Alonso who is the current world champion is second. Lewis Hamilton is British so I think I would like him to win although I think Kimi Raikkonen would also be a worthy champion too but either way I think it will be very intense, the build up being very exciting, probably even more so than the race itself.

POINTS AFTER 16 RACES.
01 L.HAMILTON 107
02 F.ALONSO 103
03 K.RAIKKONEN 100

Kimi Raikkonen 2007 F1 Champion.

The race is now over and we Kimi Raikkonen jumped from 3rd in the championship to 1st and is the new world champion and it also serves to show that you must never give up hope. As I said in this mornings post I'm not disappointed that he won because I think of the three he deserves it the most. Its all about perfection and Lewis as made quite a lot of mistakes whereas I can't really think of much to fault Kimi on. Being British it would obviously nice for Lewis to have won but thankfully formula one and motorsport in general is not about nationalities so I think people who follow the sport will just be happy to know the right person won.

If you want to read more about Kimi Raikkonen you can do so by clicking on this link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_One

Picture courtesy of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Kimi_Raikkonen_2007_2b.jpg

I'm Choking On Drambuie.

Tommy is looking at me very strangely at the moment. Thats because I was sipping a Drambuie when one sip went down the wrong way. If any of you ever had a sip of Drambuie you will know that its pretty powerful stuff when it goes down the right hole, it sure takes some dealing with down the wrong one so I think Tom was getting a bit worried for me. I think his concerns stemmed from the sight of my bright red face streaming with tears.

This picture was taken yesterday on my way back from looking over the flock of sheep the estate run. They are a rare breed run for tradition more than anything as they are not farmed commercially. My first job of work every morning is to walk over and check to make sure they're all okay, during the winter months I also take them some feed.

Today it was the qualifying for the final Formula One race of the season which is held tomorrow in Brazil. Its going to be particularly exciting as it will be the day when this years champion will be known, as yet it's open to three drivers to win.

Carmel Blue.

Here is a picture of a flower on Carmel Blue Fuchsia, as you can see it really is blue although does fade as the flower gets older.

I'm not able to post on the hiking gardener tonight as Jo and David are on their way over for the evening. I like it when they come, apart from it being good to see them and we have a good laugh Jo is a vegetarian so we usually have baked potatoes or something else thats yummy.