Weekend Away!

Arrived back after my long weekend away at Mum's. Had an exciting journey back driving through, sleet, hail and rain. The temp has definately dropped. It is that time of year again...



Rayburn lighting!!

Last year we lit on the 19th October, so we have done well lasting so long. But to be honest it hasn't been too bad as we have had the front fire lit!



whilst we have been away hubby survived with just the front fire, he was at work most days so it wasn't too bad but look at the mess he left



can you see all the dust? This is the problem with coal fires and there is an art to cleaning, riddling and stoking and I don't think he has it! Yuk!!!

Let me re-introduce you to my Great Neice Madison,



she will be 2 in December



yep she is going to be a big girl, well her mum is 6ft 2ins!!!

Here she is in K's boots!!!




it was great spending time with Mum, Zoe and Madison, the next time we go up will be Christmas!!!

Warming Up!!!

Well it has warmed up so much that we will let the Rayburn out today. We lit it in October so will have to organise the chimney sweep for this week if possible! I expect 'T' will complain she hates it when it gets cold. I miss it too, but it gets just too hot to keep it in!!!

I went down to let the chickens out, walked back up the garden, put my hand out to open the door and my back went!!! Its a muscle thing I believe, so I lie abit, sit abit, move around a very little bit and take an awful lot of pain killers!!

This has happened at a crucial time of year as alot of my tropicals need to be pulled in and out of the greenhouse to harden off. I need to pot on my tomatoes etc. etc. Plus all the watering!!

I thought I had been good yesterday, as I had to dig out all the old bedding from the chicken run, lime it and put in fresh new bark chippings. I only part filled the bucket and took plenty of rests cos its a long time since I did work as heavy as this and doing it this way took me 3 hours.

Anyway the chickens are happy, with there fresh bedding


the old bedding I use as a mulch on the flower beds


the veg patch is pretty organised, although a bit behind and now will be even more so!!!!


now a view looking back up the garden


All the while my friend, had made himself comfortable in my chair

Now he does this I make a concerted effort to make sure water is available, in large quantities in the greenhouse, just in case he gets shut in, as its not always me that closes the doors!!

I am Lighting the Rayburn!!!

Well complaints are rolling in, about how cold it is,so it must be that time of year again!!
Last year we lit (according to my blog) on the 31st October.
In all honesty I would probably have hung on a bit longer this year, but poor 'ol' T really feels the cold and sits infront of the fire wrapped up in a duvet, in fact when she is in her room she is wrapped in a duvet too!!!!
So the 1st lighting has taken place, it usually takes me 2 goes, the 1st one seems to warm things up then goes out, then the 2nd one catches and takes off. I use anthracite which is a very hard coal and can't be lit with just firelighters or paper rolls like housecoal can. I have to use lighters and wood!!!



do you like my new kettle?




For this weekend it will be unbelievably warm in the house, so windows will be opened and tanks of hot water will be run off, well the tanks of water will be run off all through the winter season. I know its not very green, so if anyone has any idea on how we can 'green up' please feel free to contact me, bearing in mind, we only have access for coal at the rear and no space for a tank or storage at the front!!!???

I've just been to check and the things lit?????? I can't believe it???????? On the 1st lighting, I must be getting good at it????????????????? It probably means it will go out sometime this weekend and we will have to do it all over again!!! lol!!!Theres something very friendly about its warmth!!!

I can't remember if I told you

The bubblewrap insulation came, opened up the box, no rubber??? Stupid company forgot, so checked invoice, not on there, checked order???? Oh dear not there either!! 'Twit head' here forgot to order the rubber glazing strips????? Yep! Thats right! So phoned them up 5-7 days delivery, not on your nelly!!! Looked on Ebay- to expensive! Went surfing, found another company, phoned them up and was told if I ordered by 11am I would get it next day!!!! Yesterday was the next day and guess what? Yep your right, no rubber!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The situation is getting desperate, look this was taken at 7.45ish this morning



Just look at my big 'Brug' these plants are supposed to be very tender, this one has amazing survival watchimicallits? It stands in front of a large baytree, I have not covered it and still it blooms? The scent is magnificent as you walk past. Amazing!



all my 'brugs' are under the fleece!

and this is the wheelbarrow this morning too



Yesterday, even with my headache, I cleaned out and wrapped up with bubblewrap the small greenhouse and put in alot of important plants, so the heater was on in there last night. I have brought just one plant inside, so far as I have been informed that it will not even survive in the heated greenhouse, its currently in the kitchen!


Colocasia Black Magic!

Right off to get some heart warming porridge, before I go out and see why the red car wouldn't start this morning and whether I need to phone the garage. Hubby has nicked mine!!!!!!!

I took some amazing sky photos last night, they are over on my sky blog, if you would like a peek!

Likes & Dislikes!!!

There are days when you really dislike lots of things you normally like!!!

For example I love my Rayburn (normally)but today having let it out last night, I had another battle to get the firebricks back in!!! For all future owners of Rayburns, I can assure you it is not normally like this! After it has cooled they should just slot in!!! But for some unknown reason mine don't! I had a battle to get them out at the end of last year as well, so something is not right somewhere!! I think I will have to get 'the man' in during the summer!!! But because I had to scrub the sides with a wirebrush etc just look at the mess and the dust





Now this layer of dust has covered everything, and I mean everything in the kitchen so I have had to wash down all the surfaces, cupboards, shelves, toaster, kettle and other items normally left out plus washed the floor, hoovered and dusted the dining room (as its part of my kitchen). The only thing I haven't done, because I can't bring myself to do it, is along the tops of the cupboards, I will have to do those in the summer!

How can something as lovely,cuddly and adorable as this (I'm talking about the cat!!)



cause me so much grief!!!!! Well its done with these.....



he always comes in with the most dirty feet! Even Sassy's aren't as bad as this! The thing is he likes to dry them off on 'you'! So there you are minding your own business, drinking coffee and reading/knitting or what ever and plonk! he arrives on your lap walks all over you (if you haven't thrown him off first) wipes off all the mud and only once he's practically dry will he go and lie in his favourite spot!!!!!!!!!!

I used to have a Draylon suite and I must admit towards the end of its years it had an odd aroma! When you look at the state of my leather suite you can understand why!!





Now I don't want you all to think that I don't do housework, I do (sometimes)just not as often as I probably should do, theres loads more interesting stuff to do, but these chairs had been cleaned on Friday so thats 2 days worth of cat prints, no longer, honest!!!! But at least now I can wipe the mud off!!!
Actually this reminds me of a story Kathryn told me, she was busily working on her computer in her room, when she was hit on the back of the head by something, as she turned round another 'something' came flying past her and either stuck to the wall or her computer screen, it turned out to be the mud off Sassys feet that she was loosening with her teeth and as she pulled it her leg sort of boing off and the mud flew across the room in a catapult (no pun intended) sort of motion!! So they are both as bad as one another!!!

But how can you not love this



or this



Went back to the specialist today, as things aren't right yet he wants to give things abit longer to heal and see me in 2 months (for free!!!)then we will decide where to go from there!! I am releaved as I thought he might have said,'sorry I can do no more for you!!'

Kathryn has gone back to Uni and Tori is back from Amsterdam tonight!

Oh and this is just for Vallen, I would take up the challenge to show you where we live, but theres not alot around! Our house is in the group of houses in the middle of this picture!!!!

B****y Rayburn!!*$#

16 years we have had the Rayburn and we have never had so much trouble with it as we are this year! I wouldn't mind if it was never serviced, but it is swept and serviced every year as I am fanatical about having a fire in the centre of the house.
Normally we go through one coal bucket of anthracite a day, but since we lit, we are shoving on 2 buckets, I can't seem to get a steady temperature, its either raging or its out?!?!

This morning I found this

the back fire brick has dropped down? The top of it should be in line with the bricks on the left. But how does a firebrick that is sat on a substantial ledge and held in place at the top with a lip, drop down?????? The only thing that ever touches it are the flames????? How long has it been like this? Am I that daft that I didn't notice? So yet again we have had to let it out long enough for the brick to cool down so I can get it out and see whats happened to the ledge, then put it back in and re-lit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After cleaning the eglu out this morning, I was sat on the bench and I got some beautiful pics of 'Bree' our Barnvelder

hasn't she got the most beautiful markings and colourings, its a shame she is so frightened of us!

Oh! and I'm sorry if some of you don't like the idea of a countdown to Christmas. I LOVE CHRISTMAS! I have been out and bought a twinkly outdoor christmas tree, I decorate the outside of my house and I have been after an outdoor Christmas tree for years and at long last I bought one! Apparently my sister has bought all her Christmas presents, which rather concerns me because it is usually the other way round and I have them all and she has none! So I had better get organised! Oh! I have just remembered this will be the first Christmas for years that I won't be spending with my sister, we have always taken it in turns one Christmas everyone goes to her next everyone to me! We just can't do it this year so it will be very strange.... watch the phone bill go up!!!!!!!!

Right off to do some knitting, catch you all later!!!!!

We have lit the Rayburn!

My friend Mrs Nesbitt has done what I had planned to do. Now I don't want people to think I am copying her.

The girls where conplaining bitterly about how cold it was! ark and I wnere fine, but we gave in this morning when we found them both shut in the bathroom with an electric heater on, getting changed!!!!!!!!!

Just being lit this morning! Now the main problem we have with our Rayburn is, we had to have a complete flue put in as the previous owners of the cottage had the chimney taken out, what this does is create a 'perfect' chimney which is not really what a Rayburn wants!

and here is the flue!!!! The Rayburn heats 5 radiators and we use it for cooking and we get lashings of hot water, the big disadvantage is we have to run off at least one tank of boiling water a day!!!! When I say boiling, I mean boiling it splutters out of the tap, to be honest it is rather dangerous, but no one appears to be able to come up with a solution to help us!
All the firebricks are in, this should help stop the hot water getting too hot (but it doesn't). The spin wheel is shut tight, the flue chamber damper is also shut, the flue chamber door is open wide (to reduce the draw from the flue) and the boiler thermostat is set to its lowest setting! We have been told we can't shut it down any tighter, most Rayburns would not run set like this, they would just go out!!!! The dial on the right is the top oven temperature, when I took this pic it read 80C and it had only been lit about 2 hours! As it is so windy today, by tonight it will probably be off the scale the highest reading is 350C.
I do love it when its lit, and will often stand in front of it resting my bum against the silver rail and providing its not too hot, will stand and drink my coffee here! Very soothing for back problems too.
I still have quite a few windfall apples so for the first time I am going to try and dry them in the bottom oven. I may have to wait a few days until the Rayburn has calmed down and ashed up, abit!
Ha, ha, ha, I was just having a read through the instructions and No13 states
'Typical Water Temperatures against Thermostat Knob Settings@
a) using the cooker boiler to provide heat for domestic hot water and radiators in the winter, a boiler thermostate setting at No 8 is recommened
B0 Using cooker boiler for the provision of domestic hot water only, in the summer, a boiler setting of No 5 is recommended!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is the biggest laugh going I always always always run on No 1 and it still boils!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now Mrs Nesbitt, if your reading this have a word with your husband and ask him if there is anything he thinks we may be able to do to stop us wasting all this water, please.

The banana is now wrapped up for winter, just as Monty Don did on Gardeners World on Friday! I'm not convinced it will work as well as last year but to be honest I don't have an option because the one planted outside is now way too big for the greenhouse....

Here we have cleared the ground around the base and trimmed some of the leaves, before we put the net frame up I covered the ground around the base with gravel, this keeps the straw of the wet ground and stops it rotting.............................. we hope!!!

heres Mark stuffing more straw in the top, what I have done and Monty didn't is protected the crown from water... if any water sits in the crown it will rot and that will be the end of that!

Here it is all wrapped up, the little one on the left is a Sago Palm. I must admit when I did this last year I was really confident it would survive, mainly because I used bubble wrap. But all the info says don't do it that way because it can't breath. It was a bit soggy in places but did survive! this is my pride and joy, when I got it, it was about 3ft tall now it is between 6 and 7ft tall. It has had a number of babies which I have cultivated and donated to the local Plant Sale which raises funds for the church. I might get some wind break stuff, its green plastic and has lots of small holes in it, if I wrapped that around the outside it might give it a bit more protection??????