Tag: plants

Children, Fruit and vegetables, Garden, Sustainability, Working the land

Smallholding Sunday

Ellie

A little update on the holding! a little of what we have gotten up to this summer!

We have…. Giant courgettes, hoof trimming the sheep, honey harvesting, plum picking, a grape harvest, some beans and a new little chap hanging about more and more!

A Sunday dinner completely made and grown and raised by us, bottled rhubarb gin, the starts of a Holly run, an onion harvest and LOTS of berries.

All sorts of lovely stuff growing in the veg garden and Polytunnel!

We have baled, both big bales and hand baled small bales, we dropped the fleeces at the wool mill, made fire bricks from sawdust and paper…

And all this, as well as having summer adventures with the boys, dyeing yarn, forest school and so much more!!

Such a fab summer!!

animals, Building work, Food and drink, Sustainability, Working the land

What’s doing??

Ellie

We have been busy as bees round the holding still, but since the start of lockdown in March we have not had any significant rainfall!!! 10 weeks!!

Things are tinder dry outside…. we are having to regularly water everywhere and currently just the other side of our nearest village there is a forestry and field fire that the forestry services and a helicopter have been battling since Sunday evening…

Thankfully there is some rain forecast tonight and for at least the morning tomorrow! The earth here will give a sigh of relief I expect when it starts to fall!!

In the meantime here a few snapshots of the past few weeks here! New fencing, shearing, turning out the horses, new chicks, new play stuff for the boys, elderflowers and a lot more!!

Fruit and vegetables, Garden, Uncategorized, Working the land

All go round here!!

Ellie

So over the past few days we have been working hard to get things sorted, built, planted, weeded and moved!!

We have weeded both large raised beds, and I have started to plant seeds for veg in there, using my scaffolding plank as a bridge across to stop me from stomping all over the bed!

Yesterday I potted on a load of seedlings in the Polytunnel and blimey it was warm in there!!!

We have happy ducks moved into their new digs…. and the chickens now have wood chip flooring in their runs!!

The muck heap has been shovelled back and some of the compost from the back excavated to fill the raised beds, the small tractor is a godsend for jobs like this!!

And someone has discovered the rubble pile….. apparently it’s his castle!!

Tomorrow we move onto the fruit cage of doom and clearing the veg garden paths!!!

Fruit and vegetables, Garden, journal, News, The tin hut, Working the land, yarn

So plans for Tyddynbryn!!

Ellie

Social distancing smallholding style!! We have an absolute load of work to get on with here on the smallholding and with the nice dry weather that has started we have made a start!!

Moving the chickens and ducks to new turf. Wood chipping paths and flower beds and around new raised beds!

Having cleared the Polytunnel a while back, we have started some seeds in there and in the house. Today we have started in the veg garden, turning the beds from an absolute weed ridden state into something we can actually plant into!! So we have seeds ready for starting in successional sowings there!!

We have started a few projects for the boys for play, including a bean teepee…

These times are going to be difficult, but I am certain, no determined that we will come through it and be more organised, sorted, prepared and ready to face the new world head on. We are using this as an opportunity to finish projects started, start new projects, action plans we’ve had on the back burner for an age it seems.

So as for plans….

  • Weeding (there is always weeding)
  • Growing veg and fruit
  • Dyeing all the yarn
  • Clearing and sorting first the house, then the barns (I’ve started this as a wet day job and am part way through upstairs…. slow work with two small helpers though)
  • Finishing the new cottage
  • Building a tree house (if W gets his way it will be two storeys!!)
  • Making a garden or lots more garden areas
  • Gates, trying desperately to keep the errant hound in and the free range children!!
  • Processing the giant log pile into useable stacked logs ready for next winter

And there is likely to be more but I’ll add them to the lists as I go along!!

Building work, Firewood, Fruit and vegetables, Garden, Podcast, The tin hut, Working the land

Weekend waffle

Ellie

So summation Saturday and Sunday wasn’t working for me as a title for the weekend chat/catch up vlogs…. it didn’t sit right….

So I was up feeding the smallest boy a few nights ago and a Title came to me for these vlogs!! Weekend waffle!!! Hurrah!!!

Any way the next instalment is up on the channel!! Here!!

Food and drink, Fruit and vegetables, Garden, Life with a toddler, Livestock, News, Plans, Podcast, Wanderings, Wildlife, Woodland, Working the land

A few little videos

Ellie

I’ve added a few new videos to the YouTube Channel!!!

Some tours of the animals and I’m planning a weekly ish….. vlog about the happenings on the smallholding!!

Here is Episode one!!

Day tripping, Garden, Wanderings, Wildlife

Day tripping!!

Ellie

We originally made a pledge to go out and learn something new about our local area or visit somewhere each month…. well we missed a few, time got away from us, jobs came up, regular chores took over…. and oh yes we had a beautiful new baby!!

So we have made up for it recently with a few trips!! All disguised as plant or poultry sales!!!

A day trip to Aberaeron for the plant and craft show!!! Maybe I’ll be a stall holder next year!!

We came away with some lovely plants!! An acer, some heathers, and a few more bee friendly plants!!

An afternoon out to the smallholders boot sale and poultry sale just past Llandysul!! Where I tried to persuade James we need bunnies and ducks as pets for the boys!!! Starting him small!!! Maybe then I’ll move onto pestering for horses of our own!!!

Finally I took the boys to the Welsh Wildlife centre in Cilgerran to explore a little, have a picnic and Oo yes another plant sale!! So as I had gone solo…. no we have another fab collection of wildlife and bee friendly plants to add to the beds and banks!!

Three marvellous outings, lots of new plants meaning lots more work for us prior to getting them in!! And a few more ideas for what I want to get done around the place….

Willow maze anyone?!

Fruit and vegetables, Garden, Livestock, Working the land

A few updates!!

Ellie

Things are starting to grow in the Polytunnel and the fruit cage has a heap of green strawberries!!

James has built the majority of the first long raised beds!! Just awaiting delivery of the blocks for the rest of this bed and the second now!! But we could wait and started to plant!!! Beans this end…. ran out of canes but had a heap of branches!!! So for now we use those!!! Broccoli, cauliflower (any suggestions for deterring cabbage whites gratefully received!!) celeriac, some pumpkins and courgette so far!!!

The hay meadows are looking glorious following the spell of hot weather we have had!

The hedgerows are growing amazingly now!! Fingers crossed that they’ll now be a bit more Wanda proof!!! But I’ll still check on her each day to make sure!!!

We have had some seeds sent from the seed share project from @croydongardener on Instagram!! Some really unusual squashes etc all heirlooms too!! Can’t wait to get those planted!!

Last week was half term so my sister and the children came to visit. They enjoyed meeting the tenants in the field currently!! Such beautiful little foals and their gorgeous mamas!!

They had fun building some of their own toys for bits from the barn and building dens!!

My niece turned ten also so I made a cake and she helped me ice it!!! Mmmmm chocolate orange cake!!! Yum!!!

I cant remember whether I included the bee hive in the last update or not but James has built a bee hive and we are now awaiting our first bees once he has it sited!! So exciting!!! We shall have our own honey next year!!!’

Lots of things happen here each week it seems…. time flies and it won’t be long before we will be looking to get our hay cut and baled up!!