"Isn't it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it."

greenbee

Only a couple of meetings today, so shifting work to this evening and have been pottering. Kitchen is now tidy enough for the cleaner to actually clean (still lots of stuff that needs homes, but I'm pretty sure that requires a full redesign!), and I've FINALLY unpacked and put away (mostly) the stuff from my trip. So just the ironing to shift really.

Dog and cat bedding has been defluffed and I have a queue of stuff to go through the WM. 

But first... there are two out of three animals hanging around hopefully, so I think it might be lunchtime. If I feed them and swap some laundry and do some ironing I might actually start feeling like I'm catching up.

greenbee

Lunch for animals, laundry swap, and ironing done before my cleaner arrived. I need to put the ironing board etc away in a minute, and then make some lunch for myself. I've then got a meeting - after which I'll take the dog for a walk, and then maybe fill the garden waste bins or do a bit of greenhouse clearance. 

Windows are open, and frames are being cleaned - after which I'll spray them with the stuff that kills the spiders. We've made good progress in reducing the number of spiders in the house, so I want to keep it up. Both my cleaner and I are phobic, so this is non-negotiable. It's the only nasty chemical I use - I'd rather not, but the alternative is moving house!

greenbee

More compost and manure acquired, food shopping done, WM filter cleaned and drum clean cycle done. Cleaning cloths now in on a 'hygiene' cycle. Making the most of cheap electricity on Agile to supplement the solar. 

The house felt lovely and fresh and clean yesterday after the cleaner had been and all the windows had been open. I did spray the spider stuff on most windows, but have a few left to do. 

Gardener is here and has planted the last (for now!) new tree (a rowan with yellow berries) and given the old apple tree a serious prune (it has a lot of canker, so will need ongoing remedial work), and is working on a huge bay in the back corner of the garden.

There are lots of things I want to do, but I'm trying hard to prioritise properly. So I'm about to shift a couple of IBCs round to the back of the shed so I can get my neighbour to build a hard standing for them, and will spend the weekend getting the greenhouse cleaned and ready for use. I need to do things in manageable chunks rather than starting lots of things and ending up in a muddle. 

Now the crocuses are over, I will aim to move some of those from the beds to the orchard.

LadyWithAPlan

Lots of stuff getting sorted over here - I do wonder does Stinky have a IRL name ? Or do you indeed yell Stinky  for all to hear? 

You are making me long for a cleaner 

greenbee

Yes, Stinky has a name  

greenbee

Feeling very virtuous. Early start (switching off the SC with the chicken wings that cooked overnight for pet food). Dawn chorus was so loud Merlin didn't know what to do with it!. Short nap, then a walk. Animals fed. Coffee drunk. Coffee grounds and f&v peelings to compost bin. Yesterday's washed cleaning cloths hung out. DW emptied. Cat water fountain washed and put on charge. Coffee machine descaled and cleaned. DW filter washed. Pet bowls washed. SC cleaned up and refilled with chicken bones to make stock for pet food. 

Next stop shower, then a bit of time in the greenhouse interspersed with more prep for pet food (pressure cook a bag of carrots and three BNS to cook up with mince, chicken, and chicken livers). Hopefully the greenhouse will be sorted and the pet food portioned and frozen by the end of today. 

Must open windows too...

greenbee

Electricity bill for this month is -£45, so I hope Octopus will be refunding me my credit balance soon as requested. I've lowered my DD as well, but I think it will need to go down further if that's the bill for Feb/March! 

Greenhouse was cleaned - it took a lot longer and a lot more effort than planned. The pressure washed didn't really do the job, but luckily I remembered I had a microfibre window cleaning thingy and squeegee that fitted on the end of the extendable pole for the cobweb brush. So that helped. I clearly need to get a proper scrubbing brush and an extending pole that fits all of them though. And to sort out the hose connections that are suddenly not fitting either the pressure washer or the spray gun properly. 

There are still a few bits to sort out, but the greenhouse is ready to use. More seeds have been sown (indoors) too, and all the RHS seed packets have been checked online for sowing dates. I really need to find a better way of storing things by sowing date with instructions. My seed storage is currently a bit of a mess and things get lost/missed. 

BNS and carrots were cooked. This morning I've filled kongs and prepped lick mats to freeze. When there's a bit more sunshine I'll cook a big batch of pet food and freeze most of it. I think I might stop making my own now, as the cats are happy with the commercial stuff they have, and frankly Stinky will eat anything, so just doing veg/yogurt/PNB for his lick mats and kongs is enough. 

I need to have a good think about the veg plot fencing. I have masses of deer mesh, so it makes sense to use that. I just need someone to put the posts in, which means I need to mark out the boundary and think about gates. I was looking at arches with gates so I can grow things up them, but it may be cheaper to put in wooden gates and then get the arches separately. 

I really need to think about breaking up the garden now I've built the veg plot and planted the orchard. The far end is starting to have some definition, but there's a lot more that needs work. I also need to get moving on the planning for the next stage of the house - upstairs (bar the landing) will all be done soon, which means the hardest bit next - reorganising the utility/kitchen space, and possibly converting the garage to give me a nice office, a boot room, and a plant room, as well as a nice downstairs loo/cloakroom. I think I need an architect for that bit. 

greenbee

Smoke alarms are playing up... I just need to work out which one is sounding once every 4 hours and disable it for now. I'll get some new batteries to replace the backup batteries in the mains wired ones, and have messaged the electricians who will be here in a couple of weeks to ask them to look at replacing the lifetime battery ones with wired ones linked to the other wired ones. 

Tulips for naturalising in the orchard have arrived, so I need to get those unpacked and in the ground today, as well as sorting out some of the germinated seeds (moving from heated to unheated propagators indoors) and sowing more to go in the heated propagators. 

greenbee

Found the culprit smoke alarm so it's in the pile for the electrical waste collection. Also identified a whole lot of puppy toys that Stinky has outgrown to go to a friend who has a new puppy. Tulips were planted (the fact that a whole lot of other stuff has been hanging around for ages is irrelevant, obviously).

Gardener is here, and as it is raining he's clearing out the little shed, despidering it, and making and putting up shelves and hooks so that the storage in there is more organised. Hopefully the sunshine will come out later as i have the afternoon off and plans to go and visit a local garden with a friend. Plus I want to get some towels washed and hopefully dried in the TD while the cheap electricity is availble (and I need to set the electric heating and battery charge for them too!).. 

greenbee

Shed is now much more organised (obviously I need to rearrange everything that was put back in, but if fits better, and means I can move gardening stuff from the workshop to nearer the veg plot). 

Friday was sunny, so all the laundry was done (and I remembered to fish out the sheet with holes in to put in the dust sheet pile), and electric heating used). Garden visited, dog walked, pub for dinner and a nice quiet evening catching up in front of the fire. 

Saturday involved planting masses of snowdrops and talking through lots of garden ideas, lunch at the deli, and back to the garden to buy plants from the nursery after they'd been thought about. I was good and only bought some stuff for my mum... as thanks to my visitor I have lots of hellebores and cyclamen to plant as well as all the bare root supermarket stuff that's still hanging about. I want to get rid of that in the next couple of days and regain momentum on the seed-sowing.

Neighbour has measured up for the hard standing for the IBCs, so I should have a price and a date for that soon. Arches have been ordered for the veg plot entrances/exits, and more fencing pins for the fence (I already have miles of deer mesh), so everything will be adjustable (and I can grown my squash/beans/loofahs up the arches!). 

I'm now working out how much wire of what gauge, and how many vine eyes I need for climbers along the fence. And then I'll need to buy a lot of climbers... they need to be ones that won't pull the fence down, as despite the repairs it's still fairly fragile. The alternative is to put in posts in front of it for the wire (which I did at my last house, as the fence was my neighbour's). 

I've also managed to do a short session of Pilates every day since Tuesday (I think!), which is good - need to do todays.

Lots of admin to do after mothers' day lunch and doing useful stuff for my mum... plumber, drain man, builder, dog walker, package return, amazon missing package etc. All just need dealing with.