February began with storms confining us to the house where we started to plan in earnest for the year ahead. Choosing kitchen furniture and fittings along with a new greenhouse were high on the priority list closely followed by our fruit and veg seed order, including potatoes, garlic and onions, all placed in the hope of better weather to come.
Once Storm Henry had passed we managed to get outside again, clearing the chicken yard and preparing the area for the coop.
A few days later our first chickens arrived, Morag, Wilma and Maisie. They settled in very quickly and Wilma even laid an egg within a few hours in her new home. Having never kept chickens before it was all very exciting, we spent most of the day watching them, listening to them cluck and feeding them from our hands.
We knew this was going to be a busy month with the installation of the new biomass heating system, new windows and doors being fitted and the start of the kitchen rip out. As seems to be the way with us the 3 day biomass fit took 8 days spread over 3 weeks. Still, at least we had hot water and heating from one system which was great.
Keen to get ready for the growing season we also ordered a new greenhouse which would hopefully be ready in March (long after everything else was finished) and planned for it to be sited in the back garden above.
The above area, next to the woods had a marshy patch at the top and the majority of the central area was laid to grass with a small rough square of land in the middle. Around and beyond that some (possibly) fruit trees were in an orchard arrangement with a large uncultivated wild area at the very bottom. As a break from the workmen (or lack of workmen) we decided to dig over the central rough area and prepare it for vegetables.
We made the most of the occasional dry days by collecting sticks for firewood and stacking it in the byre for next year. The strawberry bed also had a makeover as it was full of weeds and strawberry runners.
In the hope that we would be able to sort out the byre roof we started to clear the brambles, weeds and trees growing alongside and through it.
When the farm was a working farm the byre was used to house the dairy cattle and drained into a midden. It was many years since manure had flowed into it and looked quite clean. In fact M even got the canoe out for a little paddle, thankfully it had survived the move and was still seaworthy.
Rainy weather meant lots of reading and researching was completed alongside lots of Internet surfing. Having only had one apple tree at our last house we were desperately keen to have a variety of fruit trees to plant in our orchard (in the loosest sense of the word) and ordered the smallest (and cheapest) sizes possible of 4 apple, 2 cherry, 2 plum and one damson trees. We also felt the need to provide food for birds and wildlife and so ordered 100 edible hedging plants which consisted of blackthorn, hazel, cherry plum, crab apple, hawthorn, blackberry, sweet brier rose, oleaster and common elders.
Despite the unforeseen delays in the biomass system and the lack of kitchen rip out activity this month at least we were able to say that we had successfully had new windows and doors installed. The garlic and onion sets arrived and were planted out immediately in order for the garlic to catch the final frosts.
March 2016
It was with much excited anticipation that we entered March and we just couldn't wait to get started on the kitchen project and hopefully the greenhouse. The old kitchen was due to be ripped out in the first week of March with the new fit during the 3rd week. The kitchen company had kindly lent us a standalone oven to use while we were without cooking facilities - and so it began.
Just to try to explain a little: the kitchen area was originally the old diary, decorated with pine cupboards and in a yellow and green theme. It was split into a kitchen and office by a strange dividing wall/shelving unit which didn't quite reach to the ceiling. The ceiling was quite low and was made of large polystyrene ceiling tiles supported by metal struts and the lights were bare tubes. The floor in the kitchen was wood and the office was laminate.
Once the divide and the office floor were removed the room looked massive and we were excited to see how it was going to develop. We had hoped that upon removing the lino that the office floor would match the kitchen wooden boards. We took soooo many photos of the evolution of the kitchen that it could fill a blog all on it's own.
However, it's probably best to keep this brief and limit to a couple of before, during and after photos and just mention that the project was not completed in the expected 3 weeks and that yes it was frustrating and ridiculously annoying, but a little more about that in April and May.I had to include a couple of photos from when all the walls were stripped back as a reminder of the time when it was like living in a dark cave.
So to recap, by the end of March we had ripped out the old kitchen, re floored the office, removed and raised the ceiling and re boarded it; stripped back the walls, insulating the exterior walls, boarded all the walls and completely plastered the whole room.
We were able to cook in the shell of the kitchen most of the time but the craft room became the alternative cooking area and believe me this was not by choice. It was a cramped and almost impossible area to use but somehow we did manage to produce some reasonable meals.
March had always been a busy month for gardening and this year proved to be no different. Although we wanted to wait to see what flowers and plants emerged in the garden we had brought quite a few shrubs which needed to be planted out. I was also keen to get my fruit and veg seeds started and despite the lack of space sowed a first lot of tomatoes, peppers, chillies, beans and peas. The baths were put to good use with an early sowing of lettuce, radish, beetroot, sorrel and rocket. We found some old plastic cloches which fitted perfectly and encouraged the seeds to sprout within a week.
Due to some heavy downpours we decided that the chickens needed a little extra protection and M built a shelter which also used one of the old windows on one side, they seemed to like it. As we were worried about storing the chicken food M found some old wood and built a large rodent and weather proof container which houses the dustbins containing the food.
At the start of march we covered the newly dug and manured veg patch with thick black polythene in a bid to both suppress the weeds and warm the soil up before planting our potatoes.
The trees and hedging arrived in the middle of March and we spent a very long 3 days planting 100 hedging plants and 9 fruit trees. The planting info recommended that the elders should be planted at the ends of the hedging and as we had a few left over we planted a row of 6 elders (last photo).
The peas had sprouted really quickly and as we found some old blue tubing and plastic in the byre we decided to get them in the ground early. I had a sensible caption and decided that I didn't want the greenhouse in the back garden as it was a real chore carrying everything through the chicken yard and trying to open and close gates with my hands full. The new plot was behind the byre where it would get the benefit of full sunlight. We had initially planned to put some raised beds here but the ground was so poor and full of rubble it was deemed inappropriate. However, M did build me a seed bed which would have sun but also protection from the greenhouse.
We have always loved being outside and this was a good month for us, our tiny blueberry bush joined 2 which were already surrounded by chicken wire protection. M had longed for a rhododendron and got his wish as we planted one we bought from our local garden centre.
The month ended with more seed sowing, planting out our rose bushes in the garden, planting primroses, bluebells and snowdrops in the woods and most exciting of all, seeing the foundations completed for the greenhouse.
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