Home Alone

Paul is in Washington playing bridge for the next week or so.

I am now settling into my routine.

Dogs have been walked.

Dogs have been fed.

Cardbox has been cleared.

Yesterday was a first. I actually got picked as the lucky respondent to a freecycle offer. Assorted Kilner jars. They are actually Le Parfait 'super' jars and I need to get some new seals, which I have found are available from a few sites on the net. And the very large one is broken in as much as the metal clip is missing from the lid but I will find a way of using it. Maybe try to grow and pickle onions next year. All in all I am very pleased with them.

I swapped a jar of alpine strawberry and a jar of wild gooseberry jam (in photo) for Margaret's redcurrants yesterday, which she then helped me pick whilst we had a good natter. They need processing today. Maybe freeze some rather than use them all for jelly.

And I'm waiting for the rain to stop (hopefully this afternoon) as the raspberries up the road need picking sooner rather than later.

I don't know if it is just the very strange weather we have had this year but everything seems to need harvesting at the same time this year and I am failing to keep up with it all.

Departures and Arrivals

The bats departed the day before Paul got back from the States. Bliss - the first good night's sleep for a couple of weeks. Unfortunately Paul had picked up an air-conditioning cold which meant the bat's chirring was replaced by Paul's snoring.

Penny has returned from her European grand tour. It was strange not having her popping in and not being able to reciprocate on trips into Duns. But we have made up for it since. A couple of visits from her IT consultant (Paul) to try to sort out her laptop/internet connection that was playing up, and she came for lunch on Sunday. I had an appeal in the evening for redcurrants as Jean had cancelled their planned PYO trip the following day due to a lack thereof. I was a little surprised to find Margaret's bush still well stocked and we took a pound around yesterday - seems like a good deal as we will be getting half of them back in a chocolate cake at the weekend :)

I went gooseberry picking again yesterday afternoon - this time in the hedgerows. Two pounds of red gooseberries - I was a little late with these as many were very ripe and falling off the bush as I was picking and I was having to be careful to avoid wasps. Another pound and a quarter of largish green ones, very small 'white' ones and reddish ones which became a pound after topping/tailing and discarding the scabbier ones. All now squeezed into the freezer.

We are expecting visitors for a long weekend. Gerry and his two kids are over again from Bangkok and should be arriving in Berwick on the overnight coach at 6.30 a.m. on Friday. Paul has volunteered me to fetch them...