Making Stuff for Jo's Birthday

Look what I made!

It's my lovely mate Jo's birthday this weekend so its of to London for some lowlife hijinks. As ever I am on an economy drive so I thought I would tern my hand to making her a prezzy. There's a lot of lavender in the front garden at the moment so I have mixed it up with some green tea, which handily came in a lovely tin, to make tea bag style soaks for her bath. Easy peazy!

I did think that was a bit tight though so I have made some green tea and lavender soap t go with it. I have always been put of making soap before as all the instructions make it sound a bit scary and sciency. Happily I was wrong, its actually dead easy. I followed the instructions in the fab book 'Making Stuff, An Alternative Craft Book' and simply added my b its at the end.

Result, I hope Jo likes it!

Bee's

I am lucky enough t live by two parks. One is just at the end of my street and is perfect for walking the hound before work, the other is quite a bit grander and larger but is still only a five minute walk away. The larger also has, hidden away, an apiary (that's a load of bee hive to you and me!)

Last year when walking the dog in the bigun I noticed that ne of the hives had fallen over. There is a sign with the Apiary Managers number on, so I called him to let him know. This led to him doing a bit of a sales job on me, trying to persuade me to join in. I have to say I was not immediately up for it but the thought of keeping my own bees has niggled away at me over the year.

So that is basically how I found myself all kitted up like a member of the klu klux klan in the park last Saturday.

Plenty Produce

The allotments really keeping us well fed at the moment. We have had loads of marrows, courgettes, chard and beans. There are some very very tasty pumpkins coming up too. We had our first one roasted with a drizzle of olive oil and some rosemary from the garden.

We are all pretty sick of marrow though. I have been making picalli with them as I usually do with runner gluts. My picalli recipe is in Septembers Kitchen Garden magazine along with some snaps of the garden at home. I always wanted to be on the cover of a magazine when I was a kid but I have to admit K.G was probably not my first choice! (I'm still very chuffed though)

Now I have a fixed lap top and found the camera thingy I shall get a few of my glut recipes on as I have been very busy in the kitchen pickling, brewing, jamming and generally finding 1001 things to do with chard!

Chickens!!!!

Introducing the girls!

Three light Sussex bantam hens. They are fab and very easy to look after. I can't wait till they start laying.

Save Sipson

This is a snap of the lovely Tracey from Sipson village. Although she probably won't thank me for uploading it, as it was taken on Monday as she was packing up from Glastonbury, and believe me there was absolutely no one looking at their best!

Sipson is the village that will be demolished if BA gets away with its stupid Heathrow expansion plans. Tracey was down at Glastonbury on the Green Peace Air Plot garden to tell people about the vibrant community in Sipson. I think she really touched people and was very inspiring.

If you haven't already (tut tut) sign up to help Tracey and all the other people in Sipson keep her community http://www.airplot.org.uk/

Bumper Fun Blag of the Year!

Woop woop I have just spent the last week at the Glastonbury festival all courtesy of work.

Before I get carried away, it wasn't all about having a mad one, we went down to build an orchard and an air miles garden. We were based in the Green Peace spot where the focus was against the stupid Heathrow expansion. We took the apples trees down to highlight that the Cox apple comes from Sipson, the village that will be demolished if the expansion happens.

The idea behind the Air Miles Garden was to show people how much stuff is flown in and how many diverse things you could actually grow yourself, even out of typical season.

It all went down well but more importantly we all had a wicked time. Dizzy Rascal was fab but the best music was definitely Peaches, it was a right waste that she was on in the Dance Village on Sunday night. The main soundtrack to this years festival though will be 'pshiisstt'. That's the sound of balloons being filled with nitrous oxide. They were bloody everywhere!!

Ta Da

This is what the labels Ro printed for the parsnip wine look like.