After rather pathetically realising my ‘stay at home’ status had become a little bit too literal in my last post, we’ve been out every day this week. Which has been some achievement actually. We’ve been various children down at various points of the week this week so the dimensions of life have been quite different.
First up was on Monday was an afternoon at the allotment. Due to illness, being away and a two week stint without a car, it had been neglected and we’d lost some stuff, including our peas and spinach and a few cabbages, to lack of watering. It had also gone feral 😯 Some serious weeding was therefore in order which they did with a good grace, particularly as we had left over sweets from Fran and I going to see HP8 the night before. (Fran sobbed, I dribbled a small amount, mostly when George called Fred Freddy, to be honest. Good film though.)
The corn is doing well, although I thought we were growing corn on the cob and now I’m not sure. And I knew potatoes and tomatoes were related, but seeing these on the potatoes surprised me. Is that normal? Hasn’t happened on our home tub ones.
We did get a haul from the ones at home, despite the plants shrivelling away to nothing when we went away and they got a bit overwatered.
Not enough to feed us for the winter but my word they tasted nice.
Tuesday we met up with Jax to lend her a daughter. I do hope she’s behaved.
It was lovely to go back to Anglesey Abbey and probably the first time a day out with a toddler hadn’t consumed me with “if” moments. Even getting tangled up with a gang of little boys was only passingly sad, Smallest was fine and aside from Max taking an extra ticket and then rather daftly saying “I’ve got too many, we’re missing a child” (he meant the missing daughter, I find those remarks hard because to me, we are ALWAYS missing a child) I did fine. At one point Jax and I looked at the retreating backs, remarked they ranged from 13 to 1 and I realised that should be the range in my family. It doesn’t seem possible to me now. I can’t imagine having a small person again.
Wednesday, reduced to 2 children, we went off to Houghton Mill.
We walked around the meadow walk (children got hysterical at this, extremely nippy, caterpillar).
Max too the picture. it wasn’t that fuzzy in real life, though it was very fuzzy!
It was a nice walk, though very hot and with some moaning. The shot of the river has a heron in it, if you squint hard. Trouble with a half decent phone camera is you stop taking the real camera out. So can’t really do close ups.
These are my favourite two photos but I REALLY like this.
It’s an iphone app called BeadItHD which lets you turn a picture on your phone into a Hama Bead pattern. You can even choose between Hama Bead or Perler bead colours for your palette. I LOVE it!
The mill was once a Youth Hostel (what’s a youth hostel, they asked? 🙄 )
There were loads of hands on bits and a kids trail.
It had lots of hands on things, so they did some milling and stuff. I cried at the family trees though, littered with “died at birth and died at a few hours old”. Somehow these things, written so baldly, seem to write off all the grief. I think that one day, my grand daughters will say “apparently she had a little boy who died when he was a few days old” and that will be it – all those tears just reduced to a moment in a sentence, a curiosity. The mill tree didn’t even have those babies in their rightful places, just lumped together in a “these ones all died.” All that grief negated, all those big sisters and big brothers shoved out of place.
I suppose it is stupid to mind 🙁
When we got home, the skies got very dark indeed. In the centre of town, though, a huge flood of water fell out of the sky, creating rivers in roads, shutting shops and bringing canoeists out into the street. 3 miles away, just here, it didn’t even rain! (I’d link, but the local news site is down!)
Thursday I had a business lunch with my absolute favourite supplier, because they gave me my first ever account. Hama, Corolle, Wonderworld – they are all still my favourite toys to sell and even BETTER, they are going to be helping me with this blog with some slightly fantastic things to review and give away. Watch this space – it is possibly the coolest new product EVER!
The girls, in full summer holiday mode, played a game with Scaletrix all day. Daddy even let them use his special cars 🙄
I did smile though; so careful were they not to spoil the special cars, they built cushions up all round after this.
I finished the first side of my cushion cover.
And tried something new too.
And read another two books. Must do reviews.
I was wondering about your allotment the other day, so it’s good to get an update. Yes, potatoes do this sometimes, although I dont know why. Btw, you dont have to wait for the tops to go over before you dig them up, you only need to wait for the flowers (sorry if you knew that already ;-))… We’ve been eating our new potatoes for a few weeks now. They are just so delicious when they are freshly dug, and the skins are like paper…! In fact that reminds me, I must cancel the veggie box while I think of it – we don’t need it so much with our garden in full flow… lovely crochet too, i’m gravitating towards it again, and think I might have to do some soon…
Mmm… lack of being there has mostly contributed to lack of digging so far. Max is going to have to come and help though. And I have to remember if I planted the the ones that will be ready first at the front or back.
I am still chortling about Josie:
“Amelie, will you please just STOP singing”
She is such an old soul in a young body that girl.
I’m still chuckling at that too. I have MUCH sympathy. At least they all sing well.
I think the fruits on potatoes thing depends on the variety. some seem to do it some don’t
Love these pictures…
Glad the sunshine has dragged you outdoors. I loved this post and the pictures.
xo
potato fruits aren’t at all uncommon but, according to Duke, are poisonous. No idea on corn heads, I think they do the long whispy flower-head type thing first then grown the seed head (the corn cob or whatever) after it. Long time since I watched it grow at the side of the road to work so my memory is a bit foggy!
Crochet is looking good! (cue contented sigh, another yarn harlot is born….)
Our potatoes failed to flower at all but are delicious all the same.
The cob grows lower down the plant, nestled in the leaves for ages – we got caught out by the ears of corn on the top of our when we grew them a couple of years ago and then realised we were looking at the wrong bit!