Monday and Tuesday - Earth Day

Monday

We have had a full on day predominantly of constant rain.  It will do the earth good, but after all the recent warmer weather being damp comes as a bit of a shock.

Cooked G his breakfast he went for a toasted bacon sarnie this morning

I have spent time working in the kitchen working away at individual projects, not focusing on bigger projects at the moment.  Washing up done, and the emptying of various vegetable bags which has created more space.

Fridge has been finished off and sorted out a little bit more.

I have started off on the preserving front Strawberry top vinegar.  I hate waste of any type and am therefore making a little vinegar for topping off a salad.  There is a link here on how to make it : Strawberry Top Vinegar and a Lime Cheong which I keep in the fridge after fermenting and then use for drinks.  It is very refreshing especially during the Summer months.   

I finished prepping off the vegetables for Piccalilli - in the end I made a double batch (just over 4kg of veggies prepared - sore hands now) more on that in another post which I intend to post at the end of the week.  I am mainly aiming to get at least one item done a day if not more.  One is the minimum though.  

Long keeping Mint sauce made from fresh mint.  Mint vinegar made.  I use this to dilute the vinegar down when making up for using.  I also put some stems of mint popped into water to propagate some plants.  I bought in some ordinary garden mint to try and get going. I lost my original plant a while back.  If successful it will be going into a different garden bed. 

Another day I will get some more mint (until I can harvest my own) and make some mint butter to serve with new potatoes to give that lovely fresh taste even during the middle of winter.

The mint I have in the garden at the moment in the old herb bed is Black Peppermint which I used for making my own Mint tea. I have also started off some Lemon Thyme and Thyme going using the same method and maybe some Rosemary as well. Rosemary will be prepped up on Tuesday.

Tea tonight is a duplicate of yesterday.  Starters, prawn cocktail, followed by roast lamb and veggies and Strawberries and cream for afters.  Cannot be bad.

After tea and courtesy of the lighter evenings where I can see what I am doing, I dragged in the 5 planters that I sorted out the other day and gave them a good scrub down. There were also two extra fence planters as well, done more in readiness for plants to come than need at the moment, but it all helps whittle things down a bit. Hopefully some time on Tuesday I will be able to get all the Chive plants planted up into the three long planters and the two tubs for a Rosemary plant each. Dependent on the weather though.  Hoping it will not be teeming down for most of the day. (Just checked and supposed to be reasonably bright with temperatures up to 16 degrees). Fingers crossed does not change.

Tuesday Earth Day

It is Earth Day whereover the whole world celebrates the beautiful and wonderful diversification that we have in our world and tries to protect it.  I have celebrated by getting my hands into the compost and grounding myself.  Something that I have needed to do for an awful long while.

I got handy with the drill today.  This is not my natural habitat/domain.  I needed to get the drainage holes drilled out on the planters.  Rather than go to the kerfuffle of getting G to drill them out I decided why not have a go myself - it can't be that difficult can it?  He sorted the drill out for me today but next time I want to know how I change them myself.  I then set too and dealt with drilling out the drainage holes myself. Was straight forward. Only a little thing but it did make me feel as though I had achieved something.  I then managed to get the Rosemary plants planted and the Chive plants into the long planters. I intend to get more Chives as well.  

I intend later on to clear another tranche of these long planters as I want some Strawberries to go into them as well. Sadly I did not get to deal with these this evening. I will get them washed out tomorrow and then the bits drilled out.  Have left the drill where I can get at it easily. I did do lots of other stuff though.  Enjoyed myself been a good day. I may have to buy some more planters in due course.  I do no want to plant the Strawberries into the ground as that is growing space for something else.  The Strawberries will happily live in planters and hanging baskets as will cherry tomatoes. Now that I am at home all the time, I want to garden circumstances prevailing.  However there is so much other clutter that needs sorting.  If I can do some a day then things will build up slowly.

I also managed to sort out a small area of the garden when in nicer weather I go and sit at dusk just to chill for a few minutes.  It is nowhere near where it should be, but I have managed to get rid of some of the weeds and clear them.  I have also trained the two Honeysuckles up some of the trellis I have.  

I sat out a little earlier on and got to see the single bat in flight.  There used to be several of them, but it would appear that numbers have diminished.  So sad.

Piccalilli Mix brine period completed already to make into Piccalilli.  Will update on the next post as to how many jars I managed to make.

Need to take some Rosemary cuttings to root on.

Pickled Cabbage is in the salt brine and will be finished off tomorrow. 

G is going fishing again on Thursday and so I will have some space for once whilst he is fishing. I think he is taking part in a match. He did not go fishing last week. I may try and get a load of preserves made whilst he is out of the way this time around.

Tea tonight was a Butter chicken, Pilau rice served with a Naan bread. Cheats version Charlie Bingham. Very tasty it was too. Was on offer and I succumbed. Do not usually buy ready meals. We have Strawberries and cream again for afters. Must say it has gone down very nicely.

Tomorrow is another day as they say.

Have a lovely evening.

Catch you soon.

Pattypan

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