Cornwall Again!

Hello Frugellers
Nice to see you all here.
Welcome Geoff to my follower bar and to Jo on Blog lovin. Do comment whenever the mood takes you.
  Back from Cornwall by 2.00 on Sunday and twelve for tea ( and three dogs) by 5.00. You should see my kitchen floor!! The rain has turned the garden to mud again Grrrr. Yesterday I had a few hours to myself and cleaned and dried the floors. I feel better now and happy to receive visitors again. Mind you the carpets are rubbish as my Dyson seems to have broken. I need to get D.(aka Mr Fix it) to look at it.

The first sea fishing trip of the season was a mixed success. Though they caught nothing to eat, D.caught the first Conga of the season and at least they got out in the fog and wind and reformed their little fishing group for another year. The weather was atrocious with fog and Cornish Mizzle all weekend.
Here they are coming back into Looe Harbour - can you see them yet?

 There they are!!

While D. was fishing and my friend J. was volunteering I worked through my "to do" list. I hit the shops in Callington with a list of things I needed and some I wanted. Whenever I'm in Callington I buy a Ham joint from the Spar shop which also has a butchers. I bought a good sized joint for £6.99, a very large savoy cabbage for £1.00 and some reduced bread for toast this week. I bought this years tide tables for D., which made him a happy bunny.
I then hit the charity shops. My wish list was for some work shirts and a going out one too if possible. I also needed another pudding basin. Bingo ! At first shop they had a kitchen display with a stack of pyrex basins. I bought four of different sizes for four pounds. I then picked out two quality shirts that still had their labels in, for £2.50 each and a nearly new M&S one for £2.00. I then found the bargain rail and found a lovely lined River Island jacket for a pound! I bought this for YGD who now has a new job and needs to be smart casual at all times. I thought that for a pound if she didn't like it, or it didn't fit I had lost little. She loves it and it fits like a dream.
At the next CS I bought a new cardigan for £2.00 and some new shoes for £5.00 Neither of these were on my list, but were such a bargain that I could not resist.
Back to J's to do some prep work on J's laptop for the Civic Society's AGM this week. I also prepped some sauces for Sunday's ham tea, before relaxing with a spot of hand quilting.
 Not a bad day. J. and I went down to the harbour to pick D. up, ate a fish supper in the car and back to J's for spot of reading and a small (ahem) scotch.
Before we travelled down on Friday a friend bought me a book from the CS which he said had my name on it.. it is called "Labour Saving Hints and Ideas for the Home" published in 1924. It's a great read and I will post some quotes from it on my next blog. ooh the days of mangles and liberty bodices!

Off to do some printing for the AGM  this week. As Secretary I have much to do.

Back Soon
Gillx

For Arnie read Arniette!

Hello Everyone !
I haven't posted for over a week as I have been so busy. I'll bring you up to date without giving you a blow by blow account of the last week.
But firstly, A warm Derbyshire welcome Judith in N.Z on my follower bar and Shirley, Penny and Su on Blog Lovin

The lambs are coming on really well. As this blog title suggests we have had a bit of a gender issue here. Arnie is older than the other three and his tail and gonads had already fallen off when we bought him. When we banded the other three's tails last weekend we looked to see if Arnie had a clean site where his balls had been. Oops ! Girly Bits ! Arnie is a girl!. We've only been keeping sheep for 30 years, how were we to know?!
A few posts ago I put up a recipe for Mincemeat cake. This has been really popular with us and with other bloggers. However, I made a batch of three a few days ago and they needed a lot longer in the oven than those I had made previously. As I had used a different oven to the one I usually use I thought that might be the reason. I then had a comment from J>Moose to say her cake was undercooked too. I wonder if the kind of mincemeat used will also make a difference, with everyone's mincemeat recipes being different. If you having a go at the recipe I advise that you do the clean knife test to ensure it is cooked properly.

 The bees are flying well and we are starting to allow ourselves to believe that they really have all made it through the winter. D. is working really hard to build enough spare hive parts so that we can sell a couple of hives in a few weeks time when the colonies have built up. He is also enlarging the chicken house and increasing the number of laying boxes in the orchard chicken house. There has been much hammering and banging in the workshop this week

My friend J. who lives in Cornwall has been staying here all this week and she loves to work on the bee frames - mending, assembling and putting in new wax foundation. this has been really useful and has helped to put us in front a little more. She has also been barrowing horse manure from the paddock. This has been thrown over the fence by our neighbour, who has a horse in stables. You will gather that J. likes to be busy and useful.
She and I have been to Derby to have a trip down memory lane. It really has changed and I realise that I am truly a country hick now!
J. and I met when we crossed the road that divided her house from mine when we were both three years old. Let's be accurate here, I was two and a half and she was three - I continually remind her that she is older than I ! That was sixty five years ago.You could play in the street and cross a road in those days. I remember a few years later we would sit in the gutter with a piece of paper (soap wrapper) and a pencil taking car numbers, we even had time to note the colour down too as there were so few. We would sit there, picking at the melting tar with lolly sticks, listening for the sound of an engine, pencils poised.
   Many years later after qualifying as a nurse, she followed her sailor husband to Cornwall when he was stationed in Plymouth. She now lives in Callington and we stay with her on out frequent sea  fishing trips in Looe.

And speaking of Fishing, J. goes back to Cornwall tonight and we set off tomorrow for the first fishing trip of the year!
So the next 24 hours will be spent getting packed and making sure that the house and animals are ready for YD who will decamp to ours to look after the small holding while we are away. We will be back by Sunday afternoon (in time for the family to arrive for tea) This trip YD will have 4 lambs to bottle four times a day too. What would we do without her?.. she is a star!!

I have just realised that if I write about everything I have to say, this post will be far too long and I will probably get little else done. So I will close for now and get on with my huge list of jobs.
Back Soon
Gillx

Individual Lamb Pictures

Hello Each !
Below are individual pics of the lambs  -
Firstly here is Adam, who as yet hasn't got the hang of drinking from a bottle!

Secondly, Arnie, who is older than the others and therefore much bigger ( and Greedier)

Thirdly, Arkwright, who is sucking my hand because he has run out of bottle.

Last but not least, Archie, Arkwright's brother, who moonlights as a rabbit!

So there you are. Old farmers say not to name them, but they still have to be identified. If we hadn't given them names within a few days these would probably, for the purposes of identification, have been called, Fluffy, Big 'un, Ear up and Floppy !
Three of the lambs are sucking at their bottles like good 'uns but Adam, I'm virtually having to force feed. He'll get the hang of it soon I have no doubt.

This Follower business is driving me mad.
I tried to follow a couple of blogs again today and AGAIN was was told "we are unable to handle your request"
A couple of friends have told me that they have tried to follow mine and have been told the same..What is going on?
On a similar subject, a (different) couple of friends tell me that they have tried to comment on mine and others in my side bar and not been able to. I think this has something to do with having a Google account. I have just asked YD and she tells me that they need to ....1. Go to Google; 2. Go to sign in; 3.Create an account. They should then be able to comment on any blog ........Hope this info is useful to others.

We had eggs, bacon (Sainsburys cooking bacon) and champ, made with left over mash and some yellow sticker scallions, for tea last night. There was a really thick bacon chop left, which I cooked up at the same time (saves heat) Today I shall cut the chop up into pieces and mix it with some cheese sauce left over from  Sunday and the last of the yellow sticker scallions. I then have to decide if I shall make savoury pancakes, cheese and ham pasties or turn them into a pasta dish. Whatever I do I shall also use some spinach from the garden - might do a simple stir fry even.  Oooh I know how to live.

Off to plant some new hops and blackcurrant bushes now. it will soon be too late to do this!

Back Soon
Gillx

Our Cade lambs

Hello Frugal Friends

Frugal World meet -  Arnie, Adam, Archie and Arkwright

 They are from Suffolk mums and a Texal father. The three smallest were born last weekend and the larger one (Arnie) is two weeks old.
Not the best photograph. Hopefully will have better ones tomorrow.
Until tomorrow
Gill

Lamb Alert

Here is a cuteness warning.
Yesterday we were phoned by someone we didn't know, to ask if we wanted some Cade lambs?
I was thinking that maybe we shouldn't bother this year, which would make the willow whip planting we have planned easier (sheep would nibble the plants unless they were netted)
He had been told that we knew what we were doing and were kind folk.
 Over the weekend two of his ewes had had triplets. One of these use had a non-functioning teat as well, so he had to find homes for one from one ewe and two from the other.
I said we would meet up with him and just have look... Yeah right!
Long story short - we are going to have the three - plus one that is a little older and has no mum.
We are collecting them this evening. They are all boys and their names will start with "A". I have phoned the youngest granddaughter to tell her and say that she can name two of them. As I rung off I can hear her saying to her mum "What about Apple?..Arnie?...?  Goodness know what she will decide on!
I will take a photo of them when we have picked them up and post it .... hence the cuteness warning.
Off to get their pen ready.
Back soon.
Gillx

The easiest cake ever

Hi Everybody !
What happened to my resolution to keep up with my blog and blog more often ? Hey Ho!
 The temperature is about to drop here so I am making room inside to bring my early tomatoes in. I do have a heater that I can use, but I might as well use the heat in the house as the plants aren't too big yet and there is room.
Walking around the garden today looking at the bees, digging up jerusalem artichokes and picking spinach I note that most of the trees are in bud at some stage or another. Significantly the peach tree we bought a couple of years ago and planted last year has a couple of flower buds !! Tonight I will wrap the tree in a warm coat to maximise the chances of the buds surviving.

I have been baking over the last couple of days. One recipe that I tried for the first time that has been very successful is Mincemeat cake. I tried this because I had a large pot of mincemeat left over from Christmas. This is probably the easiest cake ever, but one of the scrummiest.
Mincemeat Cake 
 Heat the oven to 160 degrees
 In a bowl mix together-
 8oz mincemeat
4oz softened margarine
3oz sugar
2 eggs
 5oz Self raising Flour
Put the mix into a loaf tin and cook for 35 minutes - It really is that easy. - no creaming or rubbing in.

I also made a marmalade cake thus -
Marmalade Cake 
Heat the oven to 170 degrees
ingredients
8oz SR Flour
4oz Margarine
3oz Sugar
one teaspoon orange rind
2 eggs
3 tbs marmalade
2 tbs milk
2 extra tbs marmalade
 Method  -
 rub the fat into the flour
add the sugar and a pinch of salt - stir
add the remaining ingredients and stir
put into a loaf tin and bake for 50  mins
place cake onto a rack and when it has cooled a little, melt the extra marmalade in a bowl in the microwave (add some more orange rind if you have some) and brush the melted marmalade on top of the cake.

Still having trouble with follower stuff, so if I have stopped following you, I haven't really and will get back on board as soon as it lets me!

Off to finish getting tea ready for the marauding hoards
Back soon
Gillx

The Cat and the Stove

 Thanks to all who commented on my last post. If I send my land girls to help you all they will be going on a world tour! I shan't tell them or they might just set off with their passports!
I'm not so good again today, this blinking vertigo is really getting on my nerves. I'm okay so long as I don't move !! it is really frustrating as there is so much to do and I don't do "sitting"
I guess I shall do a spot of hand sewing and there are a couple of maps I need to draw for the Civic Society Exhibition later in the year. That should keep me out of trouble for an hour or two. These are things I usually do once I have settled down for the night, never during the day!
Fortunately I made a cheese and onion pie for today's tea, so D. can heat that up for us tonight.

Remember  the field kitchen in the workshop? The one I thought would fit nicely into my kitchen? It seems as though I have no chance of getting it into the house as even the cat has voted for it to stay outside.
Here she is, yesterday, within  minutes of a sudden downpour she fled into the workshop and settled into the kindling box in front of the fire.

I'm having some problems with my "Follower" stuff. I find that I am no longer following some people I have followed for months and can't put that right. Similarly, Some people who are following me are not showing on my side bar. Any ideas?
Welcome to Sophie Summerlin on Blog Lovin. Nice to see you here Sophie.
I think that's about it for now.
Back soon.
The weather's on the turn again for those of us in the UK, great! I thought Spring was here.
Gillx