Do we need to build an ark?

The ground is sodden and we make only brief forays into the garden to dig up some muddy, earth-caked vegetables for lunch. Ever since I invested in three huge water butts it seems to have done little other than rain!

Things are flowering well in the greenhouse but it is now too chill and damp to be in there.

Light levels are low.

I'm pleased with the cuttings that I took from my Meyer lemon bush, they are growing well and starting to fruit.

The last picking of pears has ripened and they are in the cool of the greenhouse in an effort to keep them in good condition for a little longer.

But I'm feeling rather like the scarecrow, not at all impressed with how this autumn has turned out!

Mixed weather

This week the weather has altered daily, wind and rain was followed by a still day of heavy mist that hung in the trees reducing visibility to no further than the orchard. Then, yesterday, some sunshine, transforming everything. What a pleasure.

Most of the summer crops are over now, just a few courgettes and mangetout to gather.

The climbing French beans have set seed and I've left them hanging on the canes to dry. 

(Ever the optimist, but if the weather continues to be erratic I'll harvest them and spread them out in the house to dry.)

Himself got out the ladder to pick the last of the pears.

This orchid has been flowering for MONTHS!

Rain and strong winds again today.

Autumn

Woke to a very promising sky this morning, a change from the recent battering wind and rain. The garden is now looking rather weary.

All the water butts are full to overflowing.

This year's crop of figs have now been eaten, but, hurrah, a new crop has set. (Gardeners are always looking forward!)

The greenhouse is crammed with plants to overwinter.

There's no room left to sit down.

Flowers from the garden are very bedraggled.

As am I!

In the Dales

We've just returned from a week back 'home' in Yorkshire. The weather wasn't remotely conducive to walking on the moor tops, but it felt very mild and each promising patch of sunshine would tempt us out of doors. Then a sudden downpour had us scurrying back inside. Wellington boots were always at the ready!

 

The village on the opposite side of the dale was often hidden in mist and rain. When the rain lifted would we have enough time in the dry for our daily stroll to the end of the no through road?

We looked to the west to see what sort of weather was rolling in. Yes, we should be able to get there and back before the next downpour.

At the end of the lane we always ritualistically touch the farmer's gate before turning back the way we have come. I've been doing this for very many years.

Bad timing - by the time we got home we were soaked!

Although we missed our moorland walks we did have a good catch-up with friends. When they came round for supper I  made a tart from the figs that hung over my garden from the neighbours' tree. (It was planted many years ago by my father.) 

Bought puff pastry with a scattering of fig slices, pecan nuts, flaked almonds and a good drizzle of honey. It's good with cream, but we ate it with toffee apple ice-cream.

I've made some fig jam with a recipe from a Yorkshire farmhouse cookery book. I don't  always follow recipes very diligently and on this occasion didn't leave the fig slices to soak and, presumably soften, instead I cut them into smaller slices and they remain intact in the finished product. Neither did I use as much sugar and water as stated. It set well and didn't need skimming.

'ere tis.

The path is finished and I'm very pleased with the result. 

Now I can hop, skip and jump up to the kitchen door.

Tomorrow we are promised a change in the weather with rain coming in. Today was warm with an unusually strong warm wind, feeling rather like the mistral. It knocked quite a bit of fruit from the trees, the large Bramley apples falling with a thud. I picked some of the pears before they fell. They are still green but will ripen quickly indoors. I baked with some that I had picked earlier in the week.

Pear and chocolate tart. Its a favourite recipe that I've posted some time ago.

 

Its a lovely time of year.

Crazy

paving, that is. After weeding and cementing all the cracks outside the greenhouse Himself is on a roll.

Everyone comes into our house via the kitchen door and the path to it has always been an uneven, messy area of crazy paving. Not any more! On Monday we went to the reclamation yard and bought a few slabs. A bit of positioning with a length of string and it is all coming along nicely.

The man's a marvel!

Sorting and saving

It's not just the bushy tailed who are squirrelling things away, I'm busy collecting seed and making cuttings from various plants in the garden. I always take some rose cuttings, just bunging a length of stalk into a pot or a spare bit of ground and hoping that it will strike. The red rose is from a bouquet that I had for Valentine's Day and the pale pink rose in the foreground from a small bunch of roses bought at Aldi last winter.

I collect any ripe flower seed so that I'll have plenty for the local annual seed swap. Nature is generous, a vast amount of seed is produced. I've put the hollyhock stems in the greenhouse ready to be stripped and bagged up. I'll sow some seed straight away to overwinter in the greenhouse and provide fresh plants in the spring. 

Himself has been busy edging the paths

and clearing out weeds (and flowers!) from the cracks.

It's cold at night and I've put the citrus trees back undercover. They will stay inside now until the weather warms up again next year. (Like me, they always get a bit peaky after a long winter!)

The new water butts are all full

and I'm still picking flowers from the garden.

It's amazing what one small packet of seeds will create.

These are spider asters from a seed swap packet

They are rather odd, but I like the pastel colours mixed with some 'Chatsworth' sweet peas.