Tag Archives: marigold

Raindrops on Petals

It rained yesterday while we visited the farm, which put an end to thoughts of blue skies and panoramic nature photography. This grey end to the visit was a suitable background to a slightly depressing visit (though Men in Sheds were all cheerful) and an excellent example of the pathetic fallacy. That, in turn, is an excellent opportunity to apply the word pathetic to the way the farm is run. However, I really should rise above that sort of thing. So I will rise, and I won’t make further comment.

As one door closes another door opens, and so I took some pictures of water drops on flowers. Same goes for projects – Julia will be starting work with MENCAP next week and is already making plans, while her permaculture course is in its final third and she is planning our garden redesign.

Here are a few flowers from the front garden, including a potato that has grown from one of the pots. It’s depressing to have to start again, but such is life. We shouldn’t have put so much effort into a garden where we didn’t have a proper tenancy agreement, and we shouldn’t have neglected our own garden. I’m sure there’s a moral in that, if not an entire homily.

Off to Sheffield now, bringing back Number Two son and his luggage. Will the fun never stop?

 

 

The Ultimate Irony

Got up.

Changed bags.

Finished Richard Mabey book. Yes, 3.5 stars seems about right.

Had high fibre breakfast with fruit.

Watched the Peregrines on Notts TV. Can’t find a good link to post. You aren’t missing much.

Opened parcel. It’s a new book. Could be hard work.

Explained to Julia why I needed a new book.

Picked up prescriptions.

Photographed flowers.

Asked surgery receptionist very nicely if she could get details of one of my two hospital appointments next week. I lost the letter. Yes, two next week. With luck like that I should buy a lottery ticket.

Set off for Peterborough.

Stopped for Burger King lunch. Yes, it was bad planning.

Visited Father and Sister.

Sister told me she now has three books on decluttering. Yes, three. Hence the title of the post.

Had tea. It was veggie burgers. Menu planning has slipped a little in recent days.

Went home the country way.

Saw two Kites.

Watched TV.

Blogged.

It has not been my most interesting day.

Chives and Calendula

It isn’t a combination you hear of often, though they do both feature n my edible flower and weed salads, and may do so again as I try to feed garden weeds to the visitors on Sunday.

Today they are together by coincidence. I’ve been meaning to have a go at a hand cream for a while as my eczema is coming back and my hands are starting to crack. I’ve looked up a recipe and I knew I was dead-heading this week ready for Open Farm Sunday (sorry to mention it again) so while I was taking the seed heads off I also picked a good selection of flowers (trying to get as many orange ones as possible) . It worked out at 26 flower heads to two thirds of a jar. They are now steeping, and I will see how it goes. I have also traced last year’s beeswax so may be able to source both flowers and wax from the farm. Theoretically I could source the oil too as we are growing oilseed rape this year and also planting sunflowers as game cover. However, hand pressing my own oil isn’t my idea of fun as i don’t imagine it coming easily.

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The other project is chive blossom vinegar. Unlike the hand cream, which has been at the back of  my mind for some years, I didn’t even know this existed until two days ago. It took a couple of jugs of flower heads, a brief struggle with some bumble bees (don’t worry, I left them plenty) and some warmed vinegar of two different sorts. One lot is in white malt vinegar and the other in cider vinegar. It’s not actually an experiment, it’s just what I had in the cupboard.

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The recipe, if you can call it that as it’s so simple, is now on the Recipe Page under the Resources tab. After two days the vinegar has already taken on a fierce pink colour – not really sure how to describe it.. It also tastes quite good, though I do know that I’m supposed to leave it a lot longer yet.