What's happened recently?

It took a request from a reader of my blog to remind me that I have not updated recently, and I was surprised to see it was January the last time- I thought it was more recent than that!

I have been working at my old company for odd days per week as a consultant after my retirement last year. I always said I was available for work if they wanted me to, for up to two years after retiring. (This would mean up until the "normal" retirement date)

Some work was done in December after returning from a China holiday, and this was picked up again at the end of January.
I did not want to go back to five days a week and 9 to 5 working, but was happy to do up to three days in any one week. (and no paperwork or politics to deal with!)

So far this has worked OK, some of it has been spent in the building working at a laboratory bench and I was let out for a few days to support some project work in France, near Bordeaux.

As a 16 year old,  I had vacationed nearby with my parents, but was left in charge of my brother and two other boys of friends of the family, whilst both sets of parents went in to Bordeaux for the day (basically to get away from us) and I was personally disappointed not to see the city then- Some 48 years later, I got to see the city!

It is a very pleasant setting on the river Gironde. A lot of old warehouses have been demolished on the river frontage and this has opened up a great vista for the citizens of Bordeaux. They were wine warehouses for storage prior to shipping out to other cities/countries. Now more transport is direct the warehouses are no longer needed.

Today I was able to act as a mentor to a "colleague" from Hong Kong as we worked on the lab bench on a project, so that was a pleasant task.

Our latest granddaughter had her first birthday, so both sets of grandparents and an Aunt/Uncle with cousins, descended on the family, to find that the birthday girl was unwell and she went back to bed for most of the day. She did revive for present opening and cutting the cake, which was made by hand by her mother in the "Hello Kitty"style as shown in the photograph below.

Once this was done the energy level dropped again and she went back to sleep, but has recovered well in the meantime.

We have redecorated a bedroom that used to have a small window in one wall, but this was filled in when the house was extended on that side, and had a neat rectangular plastered area in the middle of the wallpaper! It was about time as we had left it a year before tackling the job.

In an earlier blog I put a photo of a mosaic piece I was doing, but not finished. This is now complete and shown below. I ended up wax polishing the marble part of the mosaic, with stone wax kindly supplied by Lawrence Payne of Roman Mosaic Workshops                                                                http://www.romanmosaicworkshops.com/default.html 
 as I realised that the grouting had taken the shine off the stone.

I also treated myself to a new DSLR camera- we have a camcorder that also takes still shots, but unfortunately a fault has developed which makes it unreliable and co-incidentally E's digital compact also developed a fault so a new one was obtained for her as well.

This new DSLR takes pictures at an amazing 18 mega pixels so the level of detail in the pictures is amazing- I am still getting used to it, so have been out and about taking pictures under different conditions. Luckily as it is a Canon camera and I previously owned, and still have,an old Canon film camera, the lenses I had, fitted the new camera, and do work, but need a bit of fiddling with in between shots, so will supplement the standard lens until I can trade them in for a more up to date one.
The Cake picture above was taken using the new camera.

Our dog, Rosie,  had her second birthday, and in our house we always celebrate this with a cake (according to Blue peter it should be a savoury one) which we can all eat- the dog has a slice cut up on a plate and we have a piece as well. This is our fourth family dog, and each one has had a cake on their birthday. Below piccie of her relaxing after eating!

Sasha lived for 14 years, Matt for 11 years and Homer for at least 10 years with us (and up to two years before we rescued him) and Rosie is the latest. All have been rescue dogs. Homer was the only one without a known history as he was picked up from the side of a motorway in Scotland, and the other three were to much for the owners to cope with, had not been mistreated and turned out to be lovely family pets.
A bit of a gallop through the last few months and I have probably missed some things out which I will remember later!

More of China holiday

More pictures from China

Speed of the Maglev train from Shanghai centre to Pudong airport. Max speed 431km/h (267.5 mph)- this journey took just over 7 mins. Once the maximum speed is reached the train starts to slow down again . The train going the other way and this one pass each other at about 340km/h each, approx 680km/h (423 mph) closing speed and there is a momentary shake of the carriage and a whumping noise. There is a competion to win money for the first person to photograph the front of the approaching train whilst on the other train - a bit mission impossible I think.

Vertigo inducing view down the inside of the tallest tower in Shanghai-the Jin Mao tower,  the top 35 floors (of 88) are a Hilton hotel. and all the rooms are on the outside of the building leaving an atrium in the middle- if you look carefully, you can see the reception at the bottom.

As well as the normal black and white Panda, the Chengdu sanctuary has red pandas- they are much more active, and smaller than the Giant Pandas.

This was a group (probably office) outing spotted in the park near the Little Wild Goose Pagoda in Guillin. They were dancing to music and we stopped and watched them for a while, then they asked us to join in a circular dance, where we all linked hands and danced around and around, much to the hilarity of the Chinese dancers.(we were exhausted and they just carried on after we left!)

Also at the Little Wild Goose pagoda in Guillin- we were given an elementary Tai-Chi lesson.

Cormarant with neck tied to stop it swallowing fish- taken at night on the Li River in Guillin - the traditional cormarant fishing is now mainly for tourists but some does still go on. The fish that were caught when we watched, about four of them, would be given to the cormarants for their evening meal later.

Silk worms eating mulberry leaves. They grow rapidly and are fully grown at about 25 days or so. They basically eat, sleep and grow.

Silk worm cocoons being sorted- some of them are double cocoons and this is the most expensive silk- two silk worms spinning near each other join up to make a bigger cocoon.

A semi automatic silk spinning mill- the coccons are kept in hot water and the strands from 8 cocoons are combined to make one silk thread and wound on to a bobbin.

Christmas potatoes

In the late Autumn, to make use of one of the newly made raised beds, we planted Charlotte seed potatoes, 9 in all, although one was small and did not thrive well.

Due to the warm weather the greenery grew fast and high and outstripped my efforts to earth up the sides. Once the colder weather came along, the potato growth was covered in fleece to help protect the plants.

By the time we had arrived back from China, the growth had all died down, some taken by frost and some died back naturally.

Today I thought I would see if any potatoes actually grew from the seeds- the first plant (the runty one) yielded a few small ones, and as I worked my way along the row more and slightly larger ones came to light.

By the end there were enough to have a meal of new potatoes with the family over Christmas.

                                                       Trug of potatoes fresh from the garden.

So the experiment was worth it!

Scenes from China

A few key pictures from the China trip.

The route we took- 21 days in total

The weather was expected to be cool to cold, instead it was warm and humid in the South, Cooler in the Middle and very cold in the North of China by the time we got to Beijing.

Guillin featured in the HSBC advert with the Cormorant fishing - it was a misty day when we sailed down the Li  river. The river was very shallow as the rainfall in the rainy season was not as much as normal.

Some of the Karst scenery on the Li River

We had a delightful time in Yanshuo the town at the end of our Li river cruise. It is a backpacker mecca and many westerners have settled there.

Chengdu is the home of the Panda sanctuary, where Panda numbers have been increased by artificial insemination as Pandas in the wild breed very rarely being very solitary animals.

Panda without a care in the world.

The highlight of Xi'an is the Terracotta warriors. Part of a mausoleum built for the first Emperor of the United China, Emperor Qin, the warriors are his army in the after life. When first discovered they were vivid in colour with lifelike painting on their body, armour, faces and hands etc. but this faded quickly. Once this was discovered then excavation stopped and it is estimated there are another 6000 or so to still be found. All of them are damaged by a destructive peasant revolt, a fire and the ravages of time, so none are complete and have to be re-built from fragments. Every face is different and so far about 1600 have been uncovered.

Just one of the many warriors found.

In Beijing came Tienanmen square, the forbidden city and outside the city, The Great Wall- first started by Emperor Qin.

Tienanmen square and Forbidden City gate picture

Great Wall and the final tower on a long climb- took 1.5 hours to get this far- only 40 minutes to get back- would have been quicker back but very slippery.

There were many other amazing sights- took 1700 photo's and some video, so plenty still to work through.

Back from China

No posts since November 11th as we set off to China for 3 weeks and no Internet access. What a great place to see- Travelled 5000 km from Shanghai to Beijing passing through Chengdu and the Panda sanctuary and Xi'an , home of the Terracotta warriors and ending on the Great Wall neear Beijing. Just started to download the pictures , so a selection will appear soon.

Memories - make sure you write them down.

Today is a day of remembrances. Both E's and my fathers served in the 2nd World War, mine at sea on an air-craft carrier as a meteorologist, E's was land based in the medical corps. Both of them ended up in similar places, one from the sea and one across continents, Asia, Africa and Southern Europe.

Both came through uninjured, but not unscathed.

E's dad had constant nightmares, so routine that it took a stint away from home for E to realise when she got back that her dad did have nightmares nightly, as he would call out in his sleep.

Mine refused to talk about his experiences- he would answer direct questions like "did you have Kamikaze dive bombers attack your aircraft carrier?" "Yes" was his reply and that was all he would say - he did not collect his campaign medals after they were issued, and eventually my mother made him write in the 1950's and ask for them to be sent to him. I have them now- but I never saw them until he died in his 70's, and my mother passed them on to me.

A curious heirloom we do have was from my paternal grandfather, who fought in the First World War and did a stint in Africa, building roads and bridges. He had a photo of him sitting in what must have been a tribal chieftains grand chair, with two native Africans, in costume, standing either side of him that was taken during this period.

He died when I was twelve so I really did not hear anything much about his experiences, but again when my mother was in hospital before she to passed away, she gave us a silver pocket watch which my grandfather gave to her for safe keeping, reckoning that she would look after it better then the rest of the family. It actually was not given to him directly and we don't know the story behind it, how did it come to him, although through genealogy channels and a regimental archive, I have tried to find out.
The watch is very identifiable as it is inscribed "To the best shot in the Regiment" dated 1899 and presented by the Colonel in Chief of the regiment, and had the name of a private engraved upon it. It turns out this was during the Boer War era and finding the privates service record in The National Archives, it was whilst in South Africa that he was awarded it. The trouble is , we don't know how, or if , this private was related to us. It remains a mystery even now.

My maternal Grandfather had what is known as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder now, but was called shell shock after the First World War. Mother would tell of how, if there was a loud noise outside, say a car backfiring, he would shout "down, under the table" to them, and they would all have to dive for shelter under the table- it so affected him that he eventually took his own life in 1933.

What I would dearly have loved to do was know something about all these men's experiences, and my mothers and grandmothers experiences- it is only when you realise how little you know, or not remember if you were told in the first place, that you realise it is important to record the memories, on paper or tape/film, so that future generations have access to them.

I have in the last few years been researching my family history as best as possible, and found links to relatives all over the world, who are willing to share information and pictures etc in return for what you also know that they did not, so I have more idea of what they did and where they went, but not the stories that go with those recorded facts.

I was fortunate to not be called to do service for the country- National Service was phased out when  I was still at school, so I don't have any idea what it involved myself.

The upshot is that I will be recording my life in some way to pass on as well for others to have (if they are interested to know that is!)

Don't delay- preserve your Blogs and other online stuff as it disappears from the web if you stop contributing, also get you life story down on whatever media works best for you.

Been busy..

Busy time since last posting. Working on developing my mosaic project- on the fiddly stage now, background fill in.

We need an area in the garden for a cold frame and storage that is out of the way, but easy to get at. Decided to put together a honeycomb layout using some six sided paving stones that were the old path stepping stones- will be making a new path in a different place at some time.

Began the preparation of the area ear-marked, it is where four leylandii were before getting the chop, and partially dug over- so many fine and not so fine roots to dig up, and four stumps to deal with. Decided to leave the stumps but grind them down a bit using the chainsaw, which worked, but was quite an effort to do.

Then came the final dig over prior to levelling and I came across a hard object a few inches down- another rock/stone I thought as there were plenty in this area. However it turned out to be a sewer drain cover right beneath the area I was going to cover over.

Over the years this had disappeared under the Leylandii as they grew, and subsequently got buried with debris from needle fall and soil movement and was now 4 or 5 inches below the current soil level.
So next task was to reveal the drain cover, prize it off and inspect the inside for possible root intrusion.

It was a bit corroded but luckily once opened up , no internal damage was done by the trees, but one of the stumps was hard up against the drain.

Decided to raise the sides of the inspection chamber, duly sourced some ready to use mortar, some bricks recycled from the garage wall when we removed an in situ oil tank many years ago. ( I knew they would come in useful one day!) and added another layer of bricks- two layers would have been to much, one was not enough.
After a day to set, installed the frame of the cover - sat on a generous layer of mortar and left to set. (Also covered over with a board to keep the dog out- she is very nosy!).

So after several days of unexpected industry, got to lay the slabs, but not in the pattern originally envisage, had to work around the drain.

Looking out the window just now I can still clearly see the old path outline as there are a series of half metre wide areas of bright green where new grass seed was used to re-grass the leveled holes left by the slabs- it looks quite cheerful. The rest of the lawn is mostly moss and native ground hugging plants- due to the hedges blocking out sunlight, parts of the lawn died back and the ground huggers crept in.

A bonus to that is less grass cutting, the downside is it dies back quickly in summer. But that's a job for next year.

Broad and dwarf beans are now popping through in the raised beds, need protection from the munchies brigade, so fleeced over, but had to resort to slug pellets in the end, as a few mysteriously disappeared overnight.

Potatoes are snug in a tent fleece- looks like a huge moth cocoon on top of the raised bed- shades of the body snatchers! Hoping they will last till Christmas.

Just finished the Village Newsletter- it is a joint production between E and I with a committee setting out the content- got delayed waiting for some info- it should have been out prior to 1st November, but is being handed out to distributors toady so not to late thankfully.

Pea sticks and other animals

A few weeks back we planted winter pea plants, variety Twinkle, and with this warm weather recently, they have started growing well- so well in fact that they are twining themselves together. According to the label that came with the mini pea plants, they are self supporting if planted in a block together.
This certainly seems to be their habit from observation, but they are also pulling each other over, so we decided to put in pea sticks, which are tall twigs, to allow the peas to climb- they should reach 50cm in height when fully grown.

We were going to go to a local hedgerow and see what we could scavenge, but remembered that the hedge at the edge of the green, which was cut in such a way that the stems were bent over in an interwoven style, by being  partially cut through, and this allows side shoots to form and grow upwards.
Normally these shoots are trimmed back by the local authority to maintain a neat height, but not been done yet, so these became the source of our pea twigs.

Now we have a little forest of twigs sticking up from the raised bed, looking like they are ready to repel any invader. Hopefully the peas will begin to climb these instead of each other.

Whilst walking to the hedge, we had to stop and pick up more walnuts. The last few weeks or so has seen many of the walnuts falling off the trees (four of them) at different stages. Each tree has a different walnut size or shape. Currently we are finding mostly large walnuts, but another tree is dropping very small smooth shelled nuts, and another has medium sized nuts with an orangy tint to the shell.

We collect them  to use for cooking - to make cakes to raise money for the local church, but we especially collect them to prevent the squirrels burying them in our lawn and flower beds. We have had a squirrel invasion twice in our roof before now- but I have worked on plugging the gaps over the years to stop them getting in- seems to have worked in the last few years. They hang around our area precisely because of the plentiful supply of food.

The squirrels have poor memories, so often don't dig the buried walnuts up- some are found by rooks and crows, but many start to sprout and grow and if they get a toe-hold, can be very difficult to dig up as they throw out a long tap root which makes pulling them or digging them up a chore.

Rosie had a pleasant surprise this morning on her walk- a cat ran across her path, that always get her excited, followed closely by a monkjac deer- not sure if the two were connected, or just both spooked by an approaching dog. Luckily she was on her lead, as she pulled me along in an attempt to get to one or both. The deer must have jumped the gate to the cemetery as it was long gone, and the cat did what cats do and disappeared.

Also in the garden today, was covering the potato plants with fleece in an attempt to stop them getting frosted- they were supposed to grow and be ready for Christmas harvesting, but the warmer weather has made them grow rapidly and despite constant earthing up, the growth has exceeded the capacity to protect them with soil anymore.

And to round it out daffodil bulbs have gone in to the front garden beds ready to give a show of colour next year.

Cave Canem

Means roughly, "Beware of the Dog".

This is the subject for my mosaic project- all the lessons are learnt, now to make something of my own choice.
First saw Cave Canem in Pompeii, in an early spring holiday to Piano Sorrento, in the south of the bay of Naples. Using the Circumvesuviana train, Pompeii can be reached quite easily.

Whereas we would put up a sign on our gate to say beware of the dog, the Pompeians and other Romans, had a mosaic depiction of a dog and the Cave Canem warning, in the entrance to the property.
I chose to use as an inspiration, a similar, but easier to construct mosaic from the Isle of Capri.

here is a picture of the dog - made of pre-cut marble tiles, ready for the background tiles to be laid and the words to be created and grouted to finish it off.

As you can see - it is a stylised dog. I did not know until using marble for the first time , that although you can cut the tiles using the nippers we use for other tiles, it takes more effort and the resulting cut tile shape is unpredictable as they shatter easily. This meant that I did not cut many of the tiles (also had just about enough to make the shape so scared to waste them) just laid them in as flowing a way as possible, so in some places there are some weird gaps. Still it should look OK when grouted.
The dog is wearing a reddish brown collar and will have a lead attached as well.

We have next week's session and a follow up session after half- term if needed  to finalise the mosaic.

Today finished the mowing strip around the lawn, so that was good- the lawn looks neater in having the edge, and also a more defined shape as when it was seeded in the spring, we made it a little wider than the original lawn that this replaced, to allow for trimming later.

Lawn edging update

As we are struggling to find a fence colour we like to re coat the now much longer fence and then find enough of the one we chose (it is end of season for this type of thing so shelves are de-stocked) the Lawn Edging has begun.

The blocks I brought home a few weeks back were accusing me of neglect, and as the days looked to stay mainly dry where I am, the job commenced.

Following the advice of the interweb, I bought sharp sand and am using up the rest of the weed suppressant cloth (used on the raised beds earlier in the year) to line the mini trench that needs digging for the sand and then the blocks to go on top. The trench was dug 10cm or so deep and filled to about 8 cm or so with the sand. Blocks placed on top were truly embedded, level with the grass surface, using a wooden mallet - using a nylon cord and pegs to get a straight edge.

However, the OH indoors came out and told me the line looked a bit off straight and asked if I had measured from the edge of the drive when I set out the nylon cord. "Of course" I replied, but on re-checking I was a centimetre out at one end- it is interesting how we can notice such a small deviation from the straight line!
So a quick lever with the spade was enough to line the blocks up to both our satisfaction.

Doing it in stages as there is a lot of kneeling down to do - however as with all things it is getting quicker to do each stretch as a routine begins to develop. The lawn is roughly square, but has a rectangular protrusion in to the soil area in it to allow access to a fruit bed and also at another  point there is a gentle curve where the lawn runs around some existing trees and shrubs. The straight bits are fairly OK, (once they are set out correctly!) and just on to the curved bit now and so far so good.

As I mentioned the fairly dry weather above, it started to rain, the sort of mizzly rain which soaks you through as you work, so eventually come indoors to write this -it may not stop until tomorrow if the forecasters have it correctly predicted.

Spherical Balls!

No not that sort - but three dimensional objects to use for a mosaic exercise.

This weeks mosaic lesson was on how to create a design on a three dimensional object - we had a clay flower pot and a polystyrene ball to cover.

As part of covering the flowerpot we had to provide a plate of some sort to break and use as some of the covering tile work. If there was a small design on the plate, it could be cut out and used on the flower pot. Not too easy as it was a crude hammer job to start off with and then the finishing cutting could begin.

Of course being mostly flat the pieces from the plate could not be to big as they would stand proud of the curved surface, shame I did not realise that before nearly finishing!

Grouting this next week will be very interesting, lots of sticky out edges to make neat (hopefully) Still I departed from my usual line everything up properly approach that I have been doing and left big gaps between the pieces and a random layout.

Our other challenge was to cover a spherical surface with tiles or beads- this time it needs to look neat or it will truly be a mess.

We started the lesson by looking at the mosaics from last week, sorting our pieces of now fired glazed ceramic  and learning the new techniques.

We had all been to enthusiastic with the clear silicone adhesive to stick our last weeks glass pieces, so all the gaps were filled with the adhesive and no room for the grout.  The solution, pick out the excess rubbery adhesive with a dentists tooth pick. Luckily we could take this away and work on it at home( and very tedious it was to)

Then it was back to the concrete slab we made and a chance to remove the sand from what is now the top surface of the piece and grout the article. Then they were wrapped again to continue curing for another week.

As usual I was a bit behind some of the others and only just started the first row of the ball - you have to start at the circumference , which on these balls is easy as there is a mould join line all the way around.

As soon as the lesson was finished it was off to Birchanger to meet up with some of my ex colleagues as one of them was leaving the company. As they had been there since about 12-15ish  and I couldn't get there before 1pm, it was a short greeting and meeting time, as they, unlike me, had the pressures of work to drive them back to the office and calls or other tasks to get back to.

I definitely don't miss that aspect. However there may be a little, or not so little task for me to help with , so I should see them again soon one way or the other.

Over the weekend, worked on the ball again to make it ready for grouting as below

Blast from the Past!

It is funny what a simple reminder from the past can do to conjure up memories.

Yesterday I received an e-mail from an ex work colleague from the 1980's/1990's telling me his daughter had found in an old box in storage a video tape labelled, caution X-rated film- with my name on the label. Naturally she was curious about it's content.
The e- mail was copied to the POKS group which was an acronym for Pride of Kent Society - a loose association of colleagues and ex colleagues derived from the days we all worked in West London and a local pub was called The Kent, and they served Fullers London Pride beer, which we imbibed sometimes.

The video in question was from an outward bound team building week in Betwys Y Coed in Wales  in the late 1980's and as part of the team building we carried out certain tasks one of which was to make a video. We were given two expensive video tape cameras, of the over the shoulder size, and no instructions, so we had to figure out how they worked as well as make a film.
The problem was that if you stopped the recording and then started again, the camera re- wound the tape a fraction and the last part of the previous shot was lost. One of our scenes involved a dramatic rescue from the river but the pesky camera kept cutting off part of the shot. One of the team had to plunge in to the river 6 times before we got a good shot of the rescue.

As it was March the river was very cold, so once on the dry land he stripped off all his clothes ( he was a bit of an exhibitionist) and this was caught on film- so it was kept on the video.

This video when complete was circulated around the team for them to take home to show the family/partners etc when we returned, and I was the guardian of the tape- as it turned out is stayed in one place since then and as we all went different ways it was forgotten about.

Of course these days the video presents a problem, many of us will have gone to DVD or Blue Ray players and probably got rid of the video tape equipment - so one of the team will get it transferred hopefully- it will be strange to see what we were like about 20+ years ago.

We did all sorts of things that were given as challenges, some by the course leaders and some as individuals challenges within the team set by the teams themselves. Such as  bursting in on the local village school and taking over a class ( the teacher was very flexible and let us do it -  would we get arrested these days?) and a story reading session ensued.

One night we had to sleep on the top of Moel Shabod, a small mountain, in just survival bags, no tents, and were woken up by a herd of sheep that were a bit annoyed that we were on their grazing patch- this was before dawn, so we had the lovely view as we came down off the mountain of the sun rising and driving off the mist in the valley, as we walked down for a great and welcome cooked breakfast.

It was a very memorable week in many ways.

Mowing strip

We created a new lawn which earlier in the year to rejuvenate the front garden after house extension work last year.
A neighbour suggested putting a mowing strip around the garden edge to define the lawn edge and make it easy to mow the lawn to the edge as well.
Good idea we thought.

Just returned from Wickes with 130 driveway style blocks and some sharp sand to bed them in.

Using the ancient trailer (that has been on various camping holidays in the past when our children were children and not adults,  has had three paint makeovers to match various car colours, and has had all the wooden sides replaced and extended upwards once, and had "new" rubber indespension units fitted about 20 years ago) I managed to get them back home without mishap.

Looking up lawn edging / mowing strip on the InterWeb I came across a helpful guide at www.pavingexpert.com/edging4.htm which shows how easy it is to do.

I will do this bit by bit as other projects allow- such as the lean to shed.

Once started on the roof replacement, I decided to replace the cladding. I had used some thin cladding about 8 tears ago as thicker was more costly, but it was a false economy really. The cladding shrank and warped, so let water in at times, and it looked poor. So off to my local hardware store to buy new cladding. They had slightly fewer lengths of T&G wood than I needed, but I bought all they had. So assuming they would have more, went back after a few days to find the stock had not been replenished.
As I had used up all I bought, I tried searching other sources, a local timber merchants was closed on Saturday afternoon so can't ask them until Monday.

The Wickes I went to has something similar, but not in long enough lengths, so went back to original hardware store and asked if they were getting more in- "try later next week" came the not very reassuring reply.

Oh well. will keep looking and hope one of the possibilities comes off.

Apprentice piece and garden update

Having been very busy over the last two years before retirement the mosaic hobby I started took second or even third place to other tasks, especially last year when the house extension was built.

Last week attended the first of a one morning a week mosaic/craft course lasting 6/7 weeks (depending on the speed of the person in producing the finished articles)

Last week involved cutting up shapes from a clay sheet to be used in a future project, and making a small mosaic piece. The subject was compulsory, it had to be a heart on a wall tile base.

We all had different skills and knowledge, so some completed the preliminary design and some, like me, had to finish off at home.
The picture below shows the mosaic at the point of taking it home.

A week later allowing for an interruption to re-roof the lean to shed at the rear of the garage due to UV induced plastic fatigue, you can see the finished article.

I could tell I was a bit short on practice as I had difficulty cutting tiles in to even squares to fill in the background area.

This week it was glazing the pieces of bisque fired clay so that they could be fired again to produce a transparent glaze seal so the pieces could be used later.
Also a chance to use marble tiles al la roman mosaics using the reverse method, tiles are laid face down and using a frame to act as a mould, concrete is poured over the back of the tiles so that when released and turned over, the image can be seen.

Also a quick and cheerful small reverse mosaic using colourful small glass tiles and clear silicon adhesive to be stuck on to a glass pane, again when turned over the final image is revealed.

We have moved forward on planting up the raised beds.
The potatoes planted for a hopeful Christmas crop have shoots just peeping above the soil level. once grown a bit and before any frost, they will be earthed up progressivly so they occupy a bed of their own. We found at the local nursery, overwintering peas- initially it looked like a dozen or so, but once tipped out of the plastic tray they turned out to be nearer three dozen little pea plants. These have gone in staggard rows about six inches apart and are sharing with the rhubard plants.

Meanwhile the slugs or snails managed to eat all but a few brassica plants, so new ones were acquired and are firmly under a mesh covered cloche with slug pellets around them ( no birds or other animals should be able to get to them as the ends of the cloches are firmly sealed and the mesh pegged down.)
They are sharing the bed with the leeks and chives.

This leaves one last bed that will have dwarf french beans and also broad beans sown from seed to overwinter for next years crop - the planting is imminent..

Hotter update

Well, discovered yesterday that draining the central heating system also turns the boiler off- DoH!

I should have figured that out beforehand- it was only when E said that she had to re-adjust the manual shower to get more warmth that the penny dropped - The low water level detector had shut it down.

So hastily turning off the power to boiler and pump I switched the "Water Otter"  (immersion heater) on to give us hot water. Luckily both washing machine and dishwasher are cold fill only.

Today started to fill the system again, spanners, hose for emergency system drainage etc. to hand in case of leaks. I was pleasantly surprised that neither radiator sprung leaks- considering there were nine new joints per radiator that could have leaked, I was lucky.

Will restart the boiler today and hope no damage was done.
Addendum 14th Sept. Phew- boiler had a secondary overheat trip switch which needed re-setting and off it went, heating side Pump tested as well to check for air blockage, needed bleeding then nice hot radiators emerged!

Next job, replace a leaking fitting in the caravan water syetem, new piece arrived yesterday.

Thursday sees me off to a new mosaics/ceramics course which I booked back in May- time flies!

Hotter still.

Over the weekend I  purchased two replacement radiators and new valves for two cold areas in the house, one in the bathroom and one in a now larger hall since the house extension was built.

The bathroom on cold wintery nights can get cold quickly as it is partly in the roof space, i.e. in a dormer window situation, and there is only a layer of plasterboard to prevent heat loss. I did put loft insulation at the back of the plasterboard and that helped, plus loft insulation under the bath as well which helped again. However, you could be sitting in the bath and below the waterline was nice and toasty, but above that the air could get distinctly chilly with goose bumps on the arms.

The new entrance had a radiator in it, but was not giving out enough heat to keep a reasonable temperature.

Having drained the water from the system, I proceeded to remove the radiators, take off the old wall hangers and replace with the new ones and hang the radaitors in position.

I thought I would be clever and buy double radiators to replace the single ones. However this gave two problems, one, the fittings did not line up with the old pipework on either radiator as they were wider , and two, the entrance hall door bangs on the new radiator which is thicker than the old one so the door does not open absolutly wide as it should.

"We" decided we could live with the door not quite opening, but I had to go back to the DIY store and buy extra fittings to try and line the old pipe up with the new radiator by making an "S" shaped  joint assembly. This meant I had to dig out my old gas brazing kit and try and remember how to solder to get a waterproof joint. The first one I forgot to coat with flux so that two of the three solder areas were fine, but the third leaked when I pressure tested it (hose pipe and a removable cap over the assembley to fill with water under pressure.)

The next four fittings ( a pair per radiator) went OK once I remembered the flux!

I am joining the pipework today and waiting until tomorrow to start re-filling the system with water again. Hopefully by fitting new valves etc. I should have a leak proof system, but just in case I want to make sure that it is daytime in case an emergency dash is needed back to the DIY store.

More news anon!

"Slogin"

On our recent caravan holiday break we came across a really bounteous discovery of a blackthorn tree, absolutely loaded with sloe berries- more than we have ever seen in one place.

In a lane only used by golfers and caravan owners there were blackberries and sloe berries , the former were eaten with local cooking apples and the latter picked to turn in to sloe gin (or "slogin" as it is known in our household.) or maybe sloe vodka.
I fancy also fermenting some of the sloes as I understand that also makes a grand drink when mixed with higher strength alcohol.

The picking of sloes, which would normally take me some time to do locally to my own house, took mere minutes in this case. I only had to brave a guard of stinging nettles and avoid being tangled in bindweed as well, and I had probably a kilo of berries.

As I finished picking I thanked the tree for its bounty and left plenty for other pickers, feathered, furred or not, to enjoy.

Back home now, so Plan A) sloe gin is about to commence, Plan B) the fermenting of some sloes will follow, and if enough sloes are left, Plan C) sloe vodka!

This break was near the sea and Rosie's first experience of the seaside.

On her lead she was a bit wary of the water lapping at her feet, but once we were on a permitted dog beach and let her off, she charged in and attacked the sea at high speed, before running out and bounding round to go back and bite it again.

She liked running after stones thrown for her, but did not like the sand in her mouth and kept dipping her head in to rock pools to rinse it out!

As Rosie is a Springer Spaniel and Staffordshire cross, she can accelerate rapidly and dash off at high speed, so we made sure she was in a safe area, free from other dogs and people,  so that she could run freely and not interfere with others.

Back at home, we carried on planting up the raised beds, the green manure that was dug in, has completely disappeared in to the soil apart from a few harder mustard stalks, so it was easy to work with.
Two rhubarb crowns went in, one a rescued crown from a nearly dead plant- this is the granddaughter of one we bought and grew about 25 years ago, and has been moved from Buckinghamshire to Perth and Kinross and now to here- it was down to a spindly root, the rest had rotted away due to competition from shrubs and weeds.

 It was a prolific plant in the past with giant sticks of sweet and tender "fruit" but the original name has long been forgotten by us, we also bought a new plant just in case the rescued one did not survive, luckily both are OK so we have two varieties to choose from next season.

Also planted are some potatoes hopefully to be eaten at Christmas- they will need some TLC as it gets colder.

Some leaks and a divided clump of chives have gone in - unfortunately the brassica plants have succumbed to slugs/caterpillars when we were away, so we will have to obtain some more plants and make sure they are better protected in future.

I am determined to sow some autumn hardy vegetables, so will be doing that very soon- I think carrots can be successfully grown and their are others that grow quickly as well- so here's hoping!

Hedgerow Bounty

I feel the touches of Autumn in the air today. This could be because it is damp and overcast, or it could be that nature is in advance of itself this year.

As part of the walk pattern for Rosie, one route takes us down Church lane which peters out in farmland and a bridleway which leads over to the next community.

Along the first part of the pathway is a mixed hedgerow that contains all sorts of fruits, flowers and trees.
Elder, which yields two bounties, the elderflower in late spring and just now, the elderberries.

There are stone fruits such as wild plum and most years a few hop vines have worked their way in amongst the trees and bushes but I have not seen any this year.

Blackberries/bramble berries are just ripening now and sloe berries are turning a purplish blush colour. These last two and maybe the elderberries will be used to make bramble jelly, sloe gin or sloe vodka and the elderberries may end up as juice, a flavouring for gin or vodka or fermented in to wine.

If we proceed a bit further up the path, there is an opening in the hedgerow that leads along a short path to the edge of the river Lark. (Rosie likes to splash in the shallows, but does not like to swim!)
Here, on a bend in the river, schoolchildren used to bathe in times past as part of the school day, and grain was transported upriver to be offloaded here to take to the Malting along the same dog walk path, which although over grown now, still shows traces of its former track width.

There are all sorts of wild creatures about this area, swans, ducks, moorhens on the river, lapwings, skylarks, swifts swallows and house martins and the usual more common birds flying about. A Red Kite was spotted a few months back, and Rosie and I bumped in to a Monkjac deer one day- they are small deer , usually timid, and have an unfortunate habit of dashing across the road without looking, which causes a few near accidents with cars- this one ran off at a rate of knots.

A few weeks ago I was visiting Cambridge and used the Newmarket road Park and Ride site to catch a bus in to the centre. Around the perimeter of the car park is what looks like an ancient hedgerow as it  contains a mixture of trees, shrubs and bushes, but this was planted when the car park was constructed not that long ago, and here there are sloes aplenty (blackthorn bushes) so I might foray there at some time for sloes as well.

A hedge to far?

It was time to tackle the second hedge in the garden- if anything more overgrown than the first one, and bounding the neighbours garden.
Duly bought a large board as per earlier post to mimic the professional technique of working forward on top of the hedge using the board as a support. It worked for about three feet, then came the gap with just a few spindly branches, before the next thick trunk.  Not a safe system- so the board the professionals used must have been very big indeed to span the gaps.
Went back to old system, ladders braced against one side, a bit of praying to ensure no slips, and the occasional lean over the void with chainsaw in hand to get at branches beyond normal reach. In the end managed to get everything cut down to the old height and only dropped two pieces of cutting over my neighbours boundary.

Well I said all of it, except for the bit that had what looked like an old abandoned pigeons nest in it (hard to tell when they are haphazardly built in the first place). Having done a visual check for absence of any baby pigeon I proceeded to hack the branches away to be surprised by a pigeon flying in and landing on the nest and settling down.

I proceeded to cut further along, she flew off and I checked from a higher perch (pun intended) and spotted a single egg. At this point there was little remaining of the top growth so I thought it might be abandoned, but not a bit of it, once I had done with the last of the hedge, the pigeon was back, settled down and has been there since, so the hedge top is flat except for two long upright branches with a contented mother sitting in it. Hopefully in about three weeks I can finish the job on both hedges ( 10 day old baby in the other hedge awaiting its fledging also)

Then came the fun bit- transporting the debris to the recycling center. As most of the cuttings were 6 to 10ft long, they had to be reduced in size to fit the trailer- a case of tendonitus later and I was ready to take it to the center, however the weather had other ideas- after the second load it rained very heavily so I decided as I was already wet I might as well carry on, so after the 4th load I was wet to my skin and needed a good warming bath to recover.
I am mightily relieved it is done and aim to keep it well trimmed in the future- looking to get an extendable hedge trimmer to do the job in future.

Fan club of Rosie

As a break from hedge cutting  E and I decided this morning to go to the Heavy Horse and Country Show on Rede Farm near Bury St Edmunds raising money on behalf of the Millennium Farm Trust.

This was after waiting for a Bosch engineer to call (we were told anytime between 7am and 3pm) to look again at our dishwasher- it was part of a recall notice a few weeks ago, when it had a new control board fitted. Since then it got progressively worse at cleaning.
It turns out that some of the internal pipework was clogging up and the fault was probably unrelated to the original recall. However as a goodwill gesture Bosch did not charge us for the call ( and we got the blockages cleared as well).

The Millennium Farm trust was founded in the Autumn 1996. With the aim of providing adults with learning disabilities work and training opportunities in farming, conservation and rural skills within Suffolk. Initially the work was on farms in Suffolk, but since 2004 has been based on a section of Rede farm and also at Old Hall near East Bergholt from 2003 to 2008.

Wherever we go we come across members of the Fan Club of Rosie, and this was no exception. As she is a staffy/springer spaniel cross she has an attractive chestnut coloured coat which is short haired and gleams in the sun. She has a friendly face and attracts everybody's attention. Of course with the cross of staffy and springer, she is full of bounce and likes to jump up and lick everyone if allowed.

At the show were heavy horses (as per the title) who were mostly in their fields or in stables. One was pulling a cart to offer rides, and one was waiting patiently to have new shoes put on. He had one new shoe on, and when I asked the farrier, he said he would do the others as well, but a job that takes under an hour to do, had to last all through the show so that everybody had a chance to see it.

There were craft stalls and food stalls and guess the weight of the horse (several tonnes I would imaging) .
We spotted a candy floss and popcorn stall , and E cannot resist freshly made floss. Sadly it was pre-made in tubs, but they had a machine to make it - Hurrah. However both the teenage stall holders were unsure how to operate the machine, so a quick call to mother and an online tuition course materialised.

After some experimentation with the sugar amount, and then finding out the machine was not plugged in, some floss was duly made.

The teenage girl said it was her brothers stall really, but he wanted to go to the "V" festival near Chelmsford, so had pre-made the candy floss in the morning.

We had a good walk around the surrounding fields and met an ancient tractor also pulling a cart, wending its way around the boundaries.

Rosie found a snakes skin which had been shed at sometime, so a good time was had by all.