Birthday blog

Double birthday celebrations here today - our son is five and I am fifty two. Some days I feel as if the 52 is reversed, other days, doubled with VAT added.

We held a party on Saturday and twenty small, excited children attended. There were balloons and bouncing, ball pits, castles and cake.
I loved how the children shared with one another; one little boy went round ensuring that 'they all ate up their sausage rolls' and another child handed me a fairy cake 'as I did not have one'.

Today will be spent outside in the (woefully neglected) garden. The strange weather made the grass grow so much, it would make good hay.
We have several of Rosie's trees to plant and now that the moon is favourable, we will choose their place to grow.

We have been looking at the areas of illegal resumption (which we still pay full rent for) and will take down the discarded fences then assess what to do with the land.

Here is a photo of two acres which has been illegally resumed. It is known as a game 'strip'.



It did not have a 'crop' last year so was left to waste.

What a waste.

I reckon this 'strip' or let's not beat about the bush (no sardonic pun intended), field. Let's call it a field because that is what it is.
This two acre field could provide quite a few homes with fresh food.

What an excellent birthday present to be able to share what we have with others, perhaps from town or on low incomes who would benefit from working in fresh air and growing their own produce.
No expensive import taxes on out of season food which may have flown half way around the world and it is good ground. Our best ground, in fact.

Two acres to share or two acres for one man to neglect and perhaps hold a shoot for a small party of wealthy guns one or two days of the year.
We both pay rent for these two acres, shooter and farmer although the estate appears to have forgotten that our family still live and work here.

What better legacy for the field, the community and local economy than a permaculture area where people are welcome to grow their own food? The ground has been well manured by a gazillion pheasants so nitrogen rich and excellent for proper edible crops suitable for for humans.

We are up for it if anyone is interested.

I would love to see a difference on my 53rd birthday. A lot can change in a year.

For the better.

June

When did June sneak past so quickly? Two minutes ago it was February and now we are almost at Midsummer.

We have had a couple of difficulties namely that the oat crop never grew, it failed to germinate completely so we are left with the dilemma whether to attempt a second seeding of kale or try something else.
It is late for sowing something else and there is such a short growing season here, time is against us.

The Farmer is his usual philosophical self; "These things happen", he said, quietly. No mention of the hours spent ploughing, preparing the land, seeding and waiting. It is just one of those things that occur and he thinks that the extreme dry spell may have affected the germination or there was something up with the seed.
Who knows?

I have every faith that he will chalk this down to experience, a few more furrows on his well ploughed brow, add a bit more salt than pepper in his hair colour then set to the field and try to sort things out.

Still no word either about a roof for the farmhouse. Man, are the estate slow in making a decision given that the first request went in in 1976 by the previous Farmer, my husband's father.

Crops have grown or failed, we have produced a new generation in the form of our children, hell, even the Planet has warmed up and sea levels risen in the time it is taking for the estate to make a decision.
I think they should just go wild and stick the roof on, as a gesture that they give a fig about the farm which the family have worked for 125years.

We can cope with crop failure, somehow.

Coping with abject failure of an uncaring estate is a little harder....