the daydream fund challenge thread

Davesnave

Glad to hear you are making a few bob again CTC.:j

I'm still working outside, but it's slow going at the moment. Most of what I'm on is house, not garden.

Too tired to write much tonight, but I will try to update soon.:o

choille

Good for you CTC with the car-booting. If you know anyone who goes to Tenerife get them to get you seeds there. A neighbour brings us some back & they are marvellous & huge amounts in the packets - too much really.
I'll be sowing that Romaine lettuce again - it did us until just a few weeks back & that was outside. Really good. Also the yellow courgettes as they've been brilliant too. I've got so much seed that I don't really need to buy any.

The weather hasn't been too bad I suppose, but a couple of really cold spells & it's supposed to all get bad snow-wise on Thursday, so off tomorrow to get some supplies in. I've ground down into Winter sloth mode & not really firing on all cylinders. Got another two panels up on the house - upstairs ones, but until we get some money in then we're stuffed from buying some more wood/materials. We also have a tax bill that we're slowly trying to pay off, but until someone pays us we're just treading water & living really cheaply - as you do.

Davesnave

I've been mainly painting/varnishing stuff, like external doors, as these were getting hard to close with all the rain. Also, while it was dry for a couple of days I got a coat of preservative on the shed. That isn't the whole job, but at least it won't rot now until I can get to it properly. The shed was one of the best things the previous owners left.

Out on the land, I've been trying to get more timber cut for next year, but reached the point where I need to burn off the twiggy stuff, and lighting that is a devil. I have a big corrugated iron container 6' tall, which is great once stuff is well alight, but it's getting it to that stage!

Yesterday we had three power cuts, including one of an hour, but I think it was just caused by some work they're doing in the village. Stopped me writing anything long on MSE though!

ETA: Choille, I use quite a lot of Italian seed from a company called Franchi, and their packets are pretty generous by British standards.

choille

Hi Dave - good for you getting on with painting & varnishing.

I collect brash - the twiggy stuff & use it to light the stove, but that's stuff that's really dried out & dead. I pick up a box of it most days & lay it beside the stove, it sort of clears the wood up. Great that you're getting wood in for next year - we seem to burn ours as we saw it up, but just been offered some seasoned beech from an estate as a favour - so will have to borrow long suffering friends van to get that. We really must get a van - get rid of the car - that's on the to do list, once we get some money in.
I'm still slowly tackling the brambles - a little each day & am getting there - cleared all of one bottom field apart from a string of them along a deep burn, so am pleased with myself. The jobs where you actually make break throughs are heartening. In a little while I'll be able to let the sheep down ther & that'll rest the top fields a bit - stop them getting even more churned to mud.
So much to do - so little energy at the moment!
British seed companies are getting incredibly miserly with the amount of seeds they put in a packet, so good for you getting the Italian ones

ukmaggie45

Hello there, been following this thread for a while, but I think this may be my first post on it. Hope you don't mind me joining in.

choille wrote: »

I'm still slowly tackling the brambles - a little each day & am getting there - cleared all of one bottom field apart from a string of them along a deep burn, so am pleased with myself.

We just completed on a semi with a pretty large garden (well, for a Liverpool semi anyway) and we've just started tackling the brambles, so have a lot of sympathy for you! MiL came over on Saturday and helped clear the path that runs across the garden about half way down, and I tackled a few more on Sunday after raking up the leaves from the magnolia tree. I'm fairly disabled, so can only do it in 5-10 minutes chunks of time, and then have to rest for up to half an hour. If I go at it more intensively it means I'll likely be unable to do anything the next day.

OH works Monday to Wednesday, so although we're visiting the house daily to empty the dehumidifier we're not able to work on the garden. Central heating not working currently, and till we can get that going it's not feasible for me to spend the days there with my need for regular rests (it's getting a bit chilly at the mo! ). Am so looking forward to getting back there tomorrow, and hacking some more brambles! :j And must remember to get some loppers so I can start tackling the multiple buddleia bushes too - there seem to be hundreds! :eek:

Vendor was selling her Dad's house as his Executor. She has left us some garden tools, and a biscuit tin full of seeds that I haven't had time to explore fully yet, but there's definitely some runner beans.

The thing that charms me most about the front garden is the quince bush. :j We don't know all of the things in the back garden yet - will have to wait for the spring to identify. But there's a James Grieves apple tree, and an ornamental crab apple which is covered in beautiful yellow fruit at the moment, smaller than cherries.

Vendor was born and brought up in the house, and helped her Dad with the gardening. When she was growing up they grew lots of vegetables and fruit bushes - she said they were almost self sufficient in fruit and veg. As her parents got older and less able to do as much in the garden they replaced the fruit bushes with mainly evergreen bushes, as easier to maintain. It's all around that area and where the veg garden was that is completely overgrown with brambles.

There are lots of squirrels in the trees beyond our garden (back onto tennis courts of uni halls of residence), are squirrels likely to dig up garlic and shallots if I plant them? Plan B is to put them in pots in the front garden, as I don't think the squirrels venture into the front gardens.

While I envy you your fields, I know that OH and I couldn't cope with a large amount of land like that. Would love to keep chickens, but we are forbidden from keeping any kind of fowl by a condition (can't think of the right legal word) in the original deeds of the house.

We love our new garden already, and it has an interesting history as the house is one in an estate built on what used to be Liverpool Zoo. Vendor's brother told us when they were originally digging out the stones from the soil they found a lot of monkey skeletons!

Maggie

choille

The garden sounds like it's been wonderful. Great about the quince - they are beautiful. James Grieve apple trees are good - would grow here - thanks to RAS for the apple tree info.

OH got an adze in a charity shop for a couple of quid. It's so much easier to use than the mattock to prise out the knuckle roots - it's brilliant.
Maggie can we be sure those skeletons were monkeys & not just strange looking neighbours?:eek: How amazing.

All the best - it sounds like a journey of discovery.

stitching_witch

Whilst having a quiet moment, I've been contemplating this self-sufficiency lark. Yes, I'm growing much of our veg, the fruit will be better next year and we'll have the chickens in the spring. Sewing work is coming in little by little although not enough to call a wage yet!

But I do have one BIG problem with all this - I can't grow Twinings English Breakfast Tea. If we go down the self-sufficient route I'll be asking for some very odd birthday and Christmas presents from the family in future.:D

choille

You can grow tea in Britain, but to be totally self sufficient is'nt really possible - I don't think.

Davesnave

I find Sainsbury's Breakfast Tea a bit more to my taste than Twinings, but there's often not much of a price difference. Sad person that I am, I notice things like the price of tea, so I know that Sainsbury's BT has been between £2.31 and £2.99 in the past 6 months. I stockpiled a bit at the low price, but it is going down fast now.

DD2 works for a large food company that shall be nameless, but it makes chocolate, among other things. We can get a kg of drinking chocolate for £1, and it is very nice, but tea would be nicer, and far less fattening. I never thought I'd say it, but it's possible to have too much chocolate.:o

COOLTRIKERCHICK

Davesnave wrote: »

I find Sainsbury's Breakfast Tea a bit more to my taste than Twinings, but there's often not much of a price difference. Sad person that I am, I notice things like the price of tea, so I know that Sainsbury's BT has been between £2.31 and £2.99 in the past 6 months. I stockpiled a bit at the low price, but it is going down fast now.

DD2 works for a large food company that shall be nameless, but it makes chocolate, among other things. We can get a kg of drinking chocolate for £1, and it is very nice, but tea would be nicer, and far less fattening. I never thought I'd say it, but it's possible to have too much chocolate.:o

i am a jellylishous now:D ahhhhh all that drinking chocolate.... heaven..

i could swop you chocolate for a load of new socks if we lived closer... and some brand new clothes with tags too, at a push....lol...