Hay supply

We were getting a bit stressed before last weekend that we were down to the hay scrapings off the floor in the hay loft. We have several arrangements with local farmers which had been interrupted by snow. Then two of them delivered within a couple of days if each other so we had a bale straight in the field for the cows and 7 bales put in the barn for sharing between the horses, sheep and cows. The rabbits are still eating hay that we made ourselves - we are looking forward to being able to make a little more hay this year with the two wheel tractor. But it will still not be anywhere near enough for the amount that 2 horses and 4 cows guzzle.

Not a very good picture, but we are very happy to look in and see it so full.

1st lamb of the year!

It is a girl, we have called her Blizzard as she was born in one. She was born yesterday morning and seems to be surviving the horrible weather (pouring sleet and snow, wind etc) ok. Her mum is a good carer and is feeding her plenty of milk, keeping her out of the rain a bit and only occasionally stepping on her. She is quite inquisitive and less shy than many lambs.

You know...

... when you have been mini Doug - That is Doug's joke (having DESTROYED something with the mini digger). Which reminded me if one if my dads favorite jokes. 'What do you call a man wi a spade in his head?' - 'Doug' 'What do you call a man without a spade in his head?' - Douglas. Cue hysterical laughter. He could have heard it 5 times a day and still laughed I think. His favorite was 'What is brown and sticky?' - 'A stick'!

Anyway... we have an ugly lean to roof against the barn which has looked very shonky and in danger of imminent collapse since we moved in (we didn't store the car there for that reason). Under the weight of recent snow it fairly gently gave up the ghost, fortunately not crushing the mini digger that we did keep under there. We were planning on moving the tractor out of the garage and under here too so we need to do something about it before we can get on with the house. Aaarrgh.

It isn't super clear in the pictures, but the far end in the 1st picture and the right hand end in the 2nd has dropped down. There is a massive steel girder which has dropped down from being balanced on the bank to sitting on the ground. The other end has remained balanced on a post.

 Doug used the mini digger to pull the post out. We were a bit worried about the metal supports crashing down and roofing firing off, or something smashing through the barn wall. But it was fine.

Shortly all the metal sheets will be removed and the beams brought down to the ground. Not sure what we will do with them then as they must weigh a lot.

Eventually we will build a wooden garage/shed here but as we want to stabilise the bank behind, remove a tree and resculpt the entrance to the area we don't want to do it until the house is at least more on the way to being done. So in the mean time we plan on getting a temporary canvas garage to keep the mini digger and tractor dry.

Course liver pâté recipe

Liver, heart and tongue from a pig

The liver will be about 1kg

Same weight of pork as the tongue

100g lard

1 onion

1 clove of garlic

200ml of milk

100ml of apple juice (or other fruit juice)

100ml brandy

1tbsp herbs de provence (or thyme or rosemary)

1tsp salt

1tsp white pepper

1tsp nutmeg

Mince all the meat

Fry the onions until soft and mince them too with the garlic

Mix everything together in a large bowl

Test the seasoning by frying a little of the mixture.

With a stick blender mix the gloop around until it is a lot smoother. When you cook it the bits seem to grow and won't stick together like pâté unless you have blended it quite a bit. But you want it to stay chunky still. You can get an idea how it will turn out by frying it. If you end up with a big pile of lumps then blend some more.

Put in to foil trays and cover with tin foil. Pile in a pan and simmer for about an hour, or put in a bain marie in the oven for similar time, It is cooked when 70C in the middle or when a knife is inserted the liquid that flows is clear not bloody.

More snow is coming...

... but today it was lovely weather. Easy to kid oneself that winter is over and spring has sprung.

Hay hay!

We only got this on Friday and look at how much they have eaten already! Bluebell likes to climb on top, and they all like to sleep around it.

The phone line

They have not finished fixing our phone line from when it blew down 2 weeks ago. A man came on Friday because the internet worked but not the phone. not sure what he changed but it all works now. he wasn't sure when the proper fix will be made.

That white wire is temporarily connecting the broken ends. It seems slower than before. The wire is thinner so I guess fewer electrons can squeeze through...

A benefit of all this was that the nice man who came to look at it fixed where a falling tree knocked the wire off one of the poles on the drive a few years ago. We had asked them to do it before but the said we would have to pay a call out fee. Clouds and silver linings or something.

Hot Pimms Toddy

3 parts apple juice

1 part Pimms 

Spices - I would say cloves are almost essential, but go with what you have of ginger, cloves, nutmeg, star anise, juniper berries, cardamon pods, coriander seeds.

Optional a few little sugar

Optional some cut up fruit

Put the apple juice and spices in a pan and heat slowly. When hot but not boiling add the Pimms and heat for a few minutes more on a low heat. Taste and add a little sugar (brown is nice) if you wish. Add the fruit if using.

Mmmmmmm warming!

Progress and snow

Progress slowed (halted) while it was really snowy because the helpers couldn't get here and Doug was busy keeping all the animals in hay. There are still a couple of sheep in the barn as they kept jumping over the fence in protest at the lack of grass. There is still snow on the ground but it has melted off the drive and some bits of the fields. The dog enjoyed the snow, but you can see she likes the sun too.

However one helper was able to make it in last week and good progress was made

Here is the blue of the shutters against the red and white tiles. We are planning on the doors being blue and the stand being white as it is now.

The door in to the storage room will be varnished, to be similar to the wood on the ceiling (which you can see top left of photo)

Better photo of the mini tractor

As you can see the snow has melted a lot, but there is still quite a lot around. The drive is a lot more accessible thankfully though.

Doug has now been able to get time to take the new two wheel tractor out for a test run. It needed a bit of a run to burn off the oil that had got in to places it should not in transit, so he just took it for a little walk. Soon he will unpack some attachments and try them out too. There is a trailer for moving wood and the like as well as a sycle mower for hay and a flail mower for mowing and mulching (chopping up really fine) the weeds in the fields.

New Home in London

I have moved in to our small flat in Southwark for a while as the tenants moved out.

So far it has been a bit tiring running around replacing light bulbs, taking meter readings etc. And most importantly getting the internet working. I am trying a phoneline free one called Relish. Seems good so far as they were able just to courrier it to me rather than stupid waiting for the BT man to come - they never seem to be able just to reconnect.

Generally the flat is looking very nice and clean. Annoyingly I can't get the light in the bedroom to work even though I have changed the bulb. Time for the eletrician!

The boiler overflow is dripping a little outside and the flat upstairs seems to have some kind of slow leak in the bathroom which has made a corner in the sitting room a bit damp. 

The boiler room thermostat also seems to have not been reconnected when they replaced the boiler about 18 months ago. I need to contact the guy who fitted it to find out why not. I don't suppose he will remember.

The joys of property ownership!

Pigs are in the freezer

Doug managed to get the pigs to the abattoir despite the snow storms. We now have them back - slightly less alive - and everything is processed in to salt or the freezer.

Despite having the butcher at the abattoir do a lot of the butchery (and vacuum packing it) it still took much of two days to wrestle it all under control and ram it in to the freezer.

We made farmhouse liver pâté. It came out better than last time which was too big chunks, too crumbly and didn't tast very like pâté. It is fairly solid this time, but can be spread and tastes very good. It looks a bit gross before being cooked.

It has tongue, liver and a bit of pork along with spices, salt and garlic and onion

Black pudding - the blood was really really fresh as it didn't come from our pigs (they forgot to keep it or something) but the nice man at the abattoir got us some more. Red! Not many photos as my hands were all overed in blood for a while!

Mmmmmmm lunch of fried belly pork sandwich!

That is a big knife! This is a side of port which Doug is cutting down in to some chops, some bacon and some ribs.

Both freezers are very full now. We need to get eating! As well as the pork there is lamb and rabbit as well as pâté, haggis, black pudding, soup and various other treats.

Hurrah internet is back!!

The title says it all. It is a great relief as with the snow as well poor Doug has been feeling quite cut off. The workers couldn't get in all last week. There was one day when we thought the watr had frozen too. I was all for moving out in to a hotel. However some jiggling of the pipe freed it up so we didn't have to go that far!

Last chance for internet!

I am at the airport, travelling home a day earlier than normal because we are getting the pigs back from the abattoir on Friday so I have the day off.

Unfortunately our phone line is still down and they are saying it may be the 11th of Feb before it is fixed. Apparently they have to put in a new cable from somewhere or other (the exchange?), and the cable has to be ordered. So I will be working from home from some kind friend's home instead of my own. So technically I will have internet tomorrow. Think of poor Doug though, cut of for 10 days!

Drive to the airport

I hummed and hawed about leaving home given the amount of snow that has fallen. But from the forecast I could see, only a few miles away it was not snowing and in Toulouse there was no snow at all, so I decided I had better brave it. If I don't work I don't get paid! Other people who have been here seven or more years say they haven't seen this much snow - but I only found that out after I had made it to the airport!

The drive

The road out of Bagneres de Bigorre. The snow plough had been, but a little while ago. Just before this photo there is a steep hill that quite a few people were not making it up. Our winter tires did a good job and I didn't even find it slippy.

Just before getting on the motorway at Tourney. See, no snow! There was a stretch of motorway that is quite high which was snowy again but the winter tires did a good job again.

Survived the night

The cows survived the night. We went out to them several times in the middle of the night to check on them and give them more hay. Buttercup seemed cold but ok and the rest all seemed fine. They are happier today with the break in the snow though. During the night it snowed and snowed and the weight of it has brought down quite a few trees. When we were out seeing the cows there were load *crack* noises quite often as huge branches pulled off trees. Scary. We have a number that have fallen over from the roots too. Nothing big that we have seen yet although the top of a big fir tree has fallen off.

I am very thankful for my 'farming onesie' which is too warm to wear most of the time even in winter. I was cosy warm even in the middle of th night in a blizzard. I don't fancy living outside like the cows though.

The sheep are all fine too and grateful for hay this morning as now they can't reach what little grass there is. Doug is going to have a busy time keeping them all fed.

The internet a syou will see from my previous post did not survive... nightmare! I have withdrawal symptoms after only 1 day.

Phone and internet out!

We have had more and more snow over the weekend and the phone line has broken. We can see where the break is. It is by the road so hopefully they will get to it soon. There are only 3 houses about the break so maybe we won't be a priority though.

This is the most snow we have seen (this is our third winter). A lot of snow has stuck on to the fence wires and formed kind of tubes of ice around wires and dragged them down, I guess that is what happened to the phone line too.