Fish
We’ve lived without fish in our pond for about three years and I yearned for them. Ours were fish that had been born and bred here for over 25 years. But one bleak winter a hungry heron discovered the joy of our pop up restaurant. There are ‘heron losses’ in most country ponds. In a big pond like ours they tend to take the weakest ones and solve the problem of overcrowding so we didn’t take much notice. It was only in spring that we realised that the heron had picked them all off one by one. There must have been at least a...
read moreTwink
When I was six I met an amazing child. She was in the year below me at school. Of course fraternising with the year below was frowned on. “They’re babies.” But she was no baby. Intelligent, exquisite and fun, she became my best friend. I’ve been searching for her for years, hoping to rekindle the joy. The daughter of a famous father she shunned the blazing light of the Internet and vanished. This morning I discovered that she had died in February of this year. She was only 55 years old. A very special friend that died too young....
read moreThe First Cottage Smallholder Party 2011. Official unexpurged report
A party is a bit like a garden. You plan and dream but can never know exactly how it will turn out. Both will develop a life of their own. Organising a party where most of the guests had never met before was a first for Danny and me. Most of these party goers had chatted on the CSH forum and/or had read the blog. So contact had been made in the virtual world, friendships forged and developed. But what would happen when everyone met in the real world? And what would they think of us? The cottage and garden – a bit scruffy although we like...
read moreUpdate on the first Cottage Smallholder party – Saturday, July 23rd 2011
It’s just three weeks to go until our first Cottage Smallholder annual get together. We’re very excited by the prospect of meeting you and putting faces to the names. Years ago we used to throw a lot of parties. Big affairs that started with lunch and went through the night til dawn. We had a larger lawn and much more energy back then. Someone always fell in the pond. Sometimes there was live music but generally old favourites warbled from the open Velux window in The Rat Room. Fearing that not many people would actually show up to our...
read moreThe Withersfield Village Fête. Old England at its best.
“You know the stand where people break crockery. How does that work? Are there prizes?” I had watched fascinated as people threw wooden balls at shelves of crockery. Listening to the encouraging roars when someone managed to break something or at best create an avalanche that slid satisfactorily down the shelves, smashing the odd piece on its way. “Ah!” Declared C conspiratorially, “no prizes. It’s done for the pure hell of it. In fact there’s lots of crockery in the Flea Market next door. You could buy it and smash it at home....
read moreI make a brief appearance on ITV’s Love Your Garden tonight
Do you remember that Danny and I were beavering away in April and May tarting up the cottage and garden? It had needed sorting out for quite some time. I am naturally untidy, prone to leaving things lying around. Danny is King of Weeding the Gravel and I’m Queen of everything else in the garden so I couldn’t blame him for the mess. This major shake up was prompted by the imminent arrival of Valentine Warner and a TV crew. They would film a snippet in my garden for the food slot in tonight’s Love Your Garden on ITV. We had about three...
read moreResults of Grand Draw for 5 x £50 Homebase vouchers
Danny here. Fiona opened the Homebase Grand Draw on May 11th and it ran until the end of the month. As she said, “the five lucky winners will each receive a £50 voucher. The vouchers can be used throughout the store. As you know, they have a huge range of other products too.” You can read her article here. This morning I ran the drawing of the prize vouchers. There were 136 entries (including my invalid one), which were comments on her article. One entrant Tweeted and also posted a comment (1 entry). The method of selecting the...
read moreBlogging can be good for your health
When I started blogging, five years ago this August, I had no idea what I was doing or what to expect. Danny had installed the WordPress software on my laptop. The sample words for the first article were. “Hello world.” Just two words that had me scuttling for cover immediately. “Well what are you going to write about?” Danny’s eyes were bright and expectant as he peered under the duvet. He had taken so much trouble. I felt I couldn’t just say. “IknowthatIwantedtoblogbutI’vechangedmymind.” Basically I couldn’t think...
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