A Few of my Favourite Things

Almost February. The days are gradually lengthening and the garden is slowly stirring. Time for a bit of trimming of dark, dead stems and soggy leaves, to make room for emerging green shoots. Whenever there’s a dry day I shall be out there tidying and making ready for the Spring show.

One day last week I had an opportunity and ventured out to do a little work. It’s surprising what you find in a garden. I discovered a lovely leaf, just like a piece of lace and some beautiful empty snail shells.

Birds are busy already. The woodpigeons are nesting again in the beech tree. It has a lot of ivy which helps to hide the nest and provides berries throughout the Winter. Sadly though, it’s not a perfect hiding place because the jackdaws and magpies often find it and take the eggs. Perfectly natural, but hard on the pigeons!

The crow’s nest in the birch trees just behind our garden has been there for three or four years. It’s stayed intact through some heavy storms and I think it has been reused. Crows certainly return in Spring and we hear their loud cawing and flapping about.

I love to see the jackdaws flying overhead to their night roosts in the late afternoon, and the sparrows gathering in the hawthorn trees.

We seem to have a lot of rain. The snowdrops and hellebores are sometimes a bit mud-splashed. Raindrops do look so nice on things though.

In the polytunnels, the Spring cabbages are a bit slug-nibbled but they’re holding their own and in a couple of weeks they’ll start to shoot up. I fed the garlic with some comfrey pellets because some of the leaves looked a bit pale and floppy.

Almost time to start sowing seeds but I’m usually cautious. It’s easy to start seeds off in the warmth of the house but it’s a waste of time and effort to plant them out while frosts threaten. Later sowings soon take off when the ground has had time to heat up and the nights are no longer freezing. I might risk a few kohl rabi and mizuna in the polytunnel where they’re protected from extremes, but most of my sowing will happen in March and April.

Indoors, a warm kitchen keeps me happy. I made more mince pies. I know Christmas is long gone but I have lots of home-made mincemeat. We love a warm mince pie dusted with icing sugar. Mmm. Delicious. I baked two dozen and froze some. Twenty-five seconds in the microwave heats two frozen ones to perfection.

Often, when I bake, there is a bit of pastry left over so I make jam tarts with these scraps. So easy and such a treat. Because the pastry has been rolled a couple of times the tarts are often mis-shapen but it really doesn’t matter. They don’t need to look posh. Still taste so good.

It’s important to dilute the jam with a few drops of hot water and stir it to dissolve it slightly before filling the tarts. The jam boils in the oven and becomes too thick and chewy if it isn’t diluted before baking. Result is toothache, if it’s too concentrated!

Time when I’m not busy means time to appreciate small things. I always ask my son to give me an amaryllis bulb at Christmas. It’s growing now but not yet flowering. The stem is very tall. I noticed a fascinating pattern of sunlight on the wall around it one afternoon. The light was shining through glass with a rippled effect, around the door. It made a lovely pattern and striking shadow. I took a shot.

The same light was playing on one of my paintings.

So many little things around the home can give pleasure. The way the light falls and makes shadows, the shapes of simple kitchen tools, lovely pottery, are just a few examples. Here is a small selection of things which caught my eye..