A lovely busy day in the garden.

My first job of the day was to move about 40 bags of horse manure. 

One of my neighbours kindly delivered this for me. 

In payment for this I will make them some lemon curd.

This was a disaster area.

It used to be a rhubarb patch, but over the last couple of years it has become neglected and over grown.

 My youngest offered to go down to retrieve the bruck that had mustered in the most inaccessible areas, well she's shorter and could fit in no bother, I went in and removed the bigger, heavier and half buried items. 

Next I removed a lot of dead looking stems.

They turned out to be nettle stems which have a particularly vicious sting on cold unsuspecting fingers.

I was delighted to discover signs of life and counted about eight rhubarb crowns readily springing forth with new growth.

Finally I fed the area with about 10 bags of horse manure.

I canna wait for the rhubarb to grow.

One of the first things I will need to make is rhubarb jam for  my manure delivery boy.

 I must find out if he likes his jam with or without ginger.

Help from the bairns, was brief but welcome.

          

This was my second disaster area to be tackled today.

This used to be my onion patch but has been quite unproductive for a few years now.

I had managed to dig it over for the last two years but any veg I tried to grow were weedy looking.

So, I moved the bags of grass I have rotting down , weeded, dug it over and gave the whole area a good covering with more manure.

I think I will plant some raspberry canes in here that are in another part of the garden, but seem to have gotten a bit lost. They can grow by the wall and at the front, I'll grow something little like strawberries or herbs. However I am open to suggestions if anyone has any ideas. 

 

 

Sewing News

 Mittens and Gingy woke me up at stupid o'clock this morning.

As the house was nice and quiet, I had a rumble through one of my boxes of UFO's.

I found two "Our House" wall hangings at the same stage. 

They were left over from classes I did, and were looking a bit sad in the box.

So I decided to have a play.

I was amazed, I managed to do this embroidery in just under an hour.

Makes me wonder why I had left it for so long.

There's still quite a bit to do but I am happy with the mornings progress.

Last night I was with a couple of pals and we had a bit of a sewing session.

I got loads done.

There was also a hefty amount of cake consumed and the most delicious pancakes which one of the ladies made and we served with butter and some of my homemade bilberry and apple jam. 

I am really pleased with the way this is progressing, but I am very aware there is still an awful lot to do.

I now intend to put my feet up with a large glass of sherry.