Week 11 - MACRO shot

My favourite type of shot, the macro shot this week.  My biggest problem is being spoilt for choice.

I have wandered around the garden taking shot after shot of buds and seeds and newly growing seedlings but in the end I have plumped for this shot.

This is the aftermath of leaving pumpkins in the garage over winter, and the mice deciding that the air filter of the quad bike is the perfect place to set up home with a plentiful supply of pumpkin seeds to feed their babies with.

Hey ho - sorry mice - time to move on!

52 images for 2011 - Week 10 - Dreams

While gardening this week I was also musing about this week's theme of dreams, waiting (im)patiently for inspiration to strike.

When it occurred to me that the gardening I was doing was my dream, the soil at my feet contains all my dreams for the harvest to come, on my dream small holding, living the dreams of a self sufficient green life in a rural backwater.

Hence:

dreams - week 10 entry

Kindle garden

Well the weather has been fine all week, and so I have been cracking on with getting the garden ready for planting. But first of all I got my little Kindle garden sorted.

New posts and wire netting, the table and chairs Brendan got me last year, and my Christmas pressie - the Kindle.

It may seem a little wasteful to partition off a bit of the veggie plot just for my Kindle, but it seems highly appropriate to use the bit of shade under the apple tree to shelter under in the summer - it is not as though anything can grow there.

And the netting is for growing my peas and beans up, a living hedge in order to create a private space away from everyone to sit and read - aperos and drinks to be served at 6pm. Not so much Cider with Rosie, but G&Ts with Kindle. (And yes those are carrots - and no they are not for the chickens - I am trying to develop a taste for crudites but without the mayo).

home made poly tunnels from water pipe and plastic

Lots has been done this week, the whole plot has been rotovated, poly tunnels and cold frames are up, and first seeds have been started in the greenhouse. 

Come on Spring - we are ready for you.

The chickens have really been entering into the spirit too and feeding us well, from left to right - normal chicken egg, double yolker Orpington egg, Goose egg - omlette anyone?

Reluctant model

With the rain finally easing off, and after a manic hour of weeding in the garden as well as getting my beetroot seedlings planted out, I finally got my reluctant model to don her coat and head outside for a few photos.

I finished this lastest round of hats the other week, but had not managed to get them listed yet as both the weather and my model were conspiring against me.

With this dry spell possibly continuing into tomorrow I may be able to get the rest of my items photographed and listed. This afternoon I am making a start with these.

Late Spring may seem to be the wrong time to list wooly hats, but as the inclement May has shown us, it is not summer yet.

Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep (and a fat free cake recipe)

A bunch of new arrivals, 10 lovely little yellow chicks.

Yum yum for my tum - new arrivals means a cull of the older birds - the current count is 6 rabbits, 4 ducks, 4 chickens due to go in the freezer - just waiting for the rain to ease off.

With an early start this morning, I though I would get ahead of the game and have another go at making a cake for us to munch for elevenses.

This time I managed to remember not to try to turn it out before it had cooled and so managed to successfully keep the centre in the cake.

Citrus Fat Free Cake

150g of natural yoghurt
2 beaten eggs
225g caster sugar
orange zest and freshly squeezed juice from one half - or lemon or satsuma or grapefruit or whatever you have - a squeeze of prepared lemon juice in one of those plastic things will do at a push
225g self raising flour - if baking in France I use the Farine Fluide with a sachet of baking powder (leveur chimique - I don't use the Gateaux flour as I find this makes a heavier cake albeit that it is more crumbly)

As I make mine in the bread machine and mine has a cake setting it is very easy, throw in the wet ingredients, then the dry with the raising agent if using it last of all, then let it bake for the preset time.

If making in a conventional oven preheat the oven to 180 degrees C, butter then flour a bread tin, combine the wet ingredients with sifted flour until you have a wet runny lump free mix, pour into the tin and bake for 30 minutes or until golden.

Just what we needed with a cup of coffee when we got back in this morning.