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..