Veg Plotting

We had a lovely welcome home from the garden in the shape of these bulbalicious hyacinths greeting us at our front door when we returned from Italy. It was a serendipitious moment as I'd originally bought them to decorate our kitchen when Helen  came to stay back in February. However, our cat Skipper was paying them far too much attention, so I moved them to the hanging basket out front. The cooler weather there meant they've only started to bloom recently, and most welcome they are too. Once flowering is over, I'm taking a top tip learnt from my time at West Green House and planting them out in the border. I have a plan to revamp the front garden after last year's box demise and these will go there alongside a couple of ferns I have languishing in pots out the back. Waste not want not as they say. These are not the only bulbs I've been chatting about recently. Over on Insta I'm celebrating the pictured  poet's daffodil  posing on my windowsill as one of m...

  ... Happy Valentine's Day 🥰😻

This week we said our final goodbyes to NAH's aunt, who passed away peacefully in early December at the grand age of 94. With her passing we no longer have any distance caring responsibilities, plus the elder Chapman baton has passed to NAH and and his elder brother. I'm finding it quite hard to adjust to these circumstances, as part of what's made me who I am the past 13 years or so is no longer there. In the meantime, I've spent quite a lot of time over the past few weeks thinking about the good times with my aunt-in-law, who was a lot of fun and the source of many of our good times. Part of her lasting legacy is the family's love of cats and the annual cat calendar. For many years a December delight was the Whiskas one plopping onto our doormat; she'd saved many a label from her cat's favourite tinned food to provide this regular event. Whiskas stopped doing their calendar around 10 years ago, and we took on the mantle of providing one, firstly with photo...

Like many of us under lockdown the past couple of weeks, I've had a bit of a spring clean, both in the home and the garden. Yesterday I turned my attention to a huge bag of garden stuff  accumulated over the years from various events and realised here was an opportunity to inject some fun into the garden. Our gardens are fast becoming our sanctuaries and a healing space for our times, but oh yes, some fun is needed now more than ever. I felt a little down on Friday and a cheerful task in the fresh air was just what I needed. Half an hour or so's work and my little flowerpot man now greets me as I step into the garden as do my welcome flowers. I rescued the arch from the bottom of the garden last year and decided it was crying out for the string of solar lights I'd found in my bag. Childlike I couldn't wait for it to get dark yesterday evening so I could admire my handiwork and was delighted the moon joined me for the photo session. Skipper and Spot are always ent...

... well, we're not quite sure who as they haven't told us their names. Ginger and Tabby* arrived yesterday and have been busy exploring their new home. Stairs are quite new to them as they spent the first 12 weeks of their lives in a bungalow. They're not very talkative yet, though we've had purrs from one and chirrups from the other. NAH found them via a fellow volunteer at Midsomer Norton . He'd taken in their mother - only a kitten herself at around 1 year old - not realising she'd been 'seen to' already by the local tom. Whilst he'd enjoyed their antics, he knew it wasn't a long term option for him and was looking to rehome the pair together as they've bonded really well. We adore them already. * = these are the names they came with. We've toyed with Buster and Keaton as their new names, but we're not sure. I suggested Mac (for the mackerel tabby) and Sandy yesterday. The search for their 'proper' names cont...

Three weeks ago we had two cats and now we have none. I found our Jess in the kitchen on Sunday morning, her face pointed towards the garden through the patio door. It looked like she was going to join her brother. Like him, she was so peaceful in her final sleep. If Skimble was the stately cat, then Jess had a touch of the clown and scamp about her and kept us in stitches. She'd also purr for ages after you'd been near her, even if no stroke or cuddle was on offer. I went to sleep on Saturday night hearing her last purrathon from the bathroom where she'd taken up residence to keep cool. The house is empty without our favourite pair. Thank goodness NAH comes home from holiday today, so we can share our grief. Then tomorrow we'll set them free to play in the garden. On Sunday I completed this year's big butterfly count in her honour. There's nothing she liked more than chasing them around in the sunshine. You can read more about our cats' adv...

Two weeks today we lost our darling boy Skimble. NAH found him in his final sleep on our patio when he went down to get breakfast. He looked so peaceful, as if he'd just paused on his way back in to see us. Needless to say we are heartbroken. We'd been concerned about him for a while as he'd got very thin, though he seemed to be on the mend and was enjoying the garden again. He'd even earmarked a spot under the figs as his hiding place of choice for the summer. He had a different spot each year. Jess had a good look at him with calm acceptance. We fear its only a matter of time until we say farewell to her too. We lit a candle in the evening on the spot where he was found and then we watched the bats fly round the garden, just like he used to do. He even caught one once. I miss my garden helper. You can read more about our cats' adventures here .

I'm feeding our neighbours' cat this week, so I've had plenty of time to preview their pumpkin lanterns set out in the garden ready for Halloween. That got me thinking: if the nation's lantern innards were gathered together, they'd probably form a small mountain or three. How timely. World Vision contacted me this week with news of their Carve a Heart campaign , designed to create a gentler, more caring side to this year's Halloween shenanigans. Their pack includes a recipe for Moroccan Pumpkin Soup - a delicious way of using up those lantern leftovers, or in my case the solitary pumpkin harvested from my plot this year. As Julieanne wisely said on Twitter: "Pumpkins are for eating, not just for lanterns". Moroccan Pumpkin Soup Ingredients  These are tweaked slightly from the original recipe to fit with what I had to hand. 60ml olive oil 100g shallots, peeled and sliced thinly (or a small onion, or 1 leek) 3 garlic cloves, finely ch...

Skimble playing 'spot the pigeon' on our back lawn recently   If you were an ecologist and placed a number of quadrats  in a random fashion on our lawn, you'd consistently find much more than plain old grass. You see, I've been rather relaxed about having a perfect lawn the past few years, and I think we have something far more interesting as a result. Until the ash tree's demise last year, we had a back lawn which went from deep shade to a positively Mediterranean climate in just a few yards. Now it's merely light shade where all was dark previously, and all kinds of plants are trying to get in amongst the moss. It's an area which really wants to revert back to being a field again, plus it regularly weathers a veritable snowstorm of dandelions and other passing seeds. Realistically it's never going to win Britain's Best Lawn . I've decided life's too short and the hard work needed to try and win BBL is best left to one of our neig...

Seeing cats have a bit of a reputation re their wildlife catching habits, I was surprised to see this rather ironic looking bird bath at my local garden centre recently. Ahhh, but these are fluffy little kittens, I hear you cry, what harm can they do? Judging by the expression on this one's face, quite a lot. It looks like it can't wait for its next meal ;)

Our Skimble and Jess have a rival for our affections in the shape of the pictured Pickles. He's been a resident in our neighbourhood for about 9 months now and for most of that time we thought he was trying to adopt us as he's the friendliest cat we've ever met. It turns out he lives just around the corner, but craves affection when his owners are out during the day. This means he waits for the children going to/from school and also is firm friends with Nina, our neighbour's border collie . They frequently rub noses when Nina returns from one of her daily walks. It also means that anything we do out the front comes under intense scrutiny whether it's simply taking the bin out to the kerbside emptying area, gardening or whatever. Walking can be quite hazardous as Pickles at some point will trip you up and looks quite hurt that you've trodden on him. Our postie was asking if we knew where he came from the other day: this cat's been following me for the pa...

I met up with my friend A for coffee in Bath yesterday afternoon and was surprised to find a pride of lions has invaded the streets. I should have remembered that like Bladud's Pigs two years ago another public art project is taking place this summer. After all, they did appear on the local TV news a few months ago alongside The Lions of Longleat . It was rather funny seeing real lions clambering all over their model counterparts. 100 lions have been decorated by artists and local personalities , such as Amy Williams, GB's lone winter olympics gold medallist [skeleton bob] who hails from Bath. I managed to find 22 of them yesterday: simply by walking up from the railway station to the Royal Crescent, taking in the main shopping area and The Circus (how apt!) on the way. Some of the lions are located outside Bath, in Bradford on Avon and Corsham for instance and maps showing all their locations are available, should you want to find them all rather than see them in the r...

Snoozy days are with us again - see the right sidebar for 2008's version. My gardening activities are confined to early morning or the evening and in the middle of the day the patio is scorchio . Like my cats I retire for the afternoon, only unlike them I'm not content just to have a continental-like siesta. It's been lovely this week to catch up on reading and to put the computer to one side for a change :)

Skimble on top of the fridge again We've just had this note popped through our letter box: Our newly acquired kittens have taken a keen interest in catching small animals: unfortunately today they bought in a live guinea pig. We have taken the guinea pig to the vets - it is dark brown/black all over. If you are missing a guinea pig please contact us on the number below. We are trying as much as possible to stop the cats catching animals, but as you probably appreciate there is only so much we can do. As the note is signed by someone with the same name as NAH, our neighbours have been all a-giggle and agog as soon as we stick our noses out the front door. I've had to remind them our two are no longer kittens. However, one of ours did bring a bright orange hamster home and left it for me to find at the foot of the stairs a couple of years ago. It bore a striking resemblance to next door's beloved pet, but thankfully Harry was merrily going round in his littl...

Let me introduce you to Moly, our neighbours' cat. She had her nose severely put out of joint when they adopted a lovely collie dog last year and is refusing to enter their house unless she really has to. Most of the time she's sat on our other neighbour's front garden bench when it's sunny and under our garage overhang when it's raining. Why our garage is preferable to her real home's more sheltered front porch is a bit of a mystery. A couple of months ago I spotted she'd moved to sitting on our back garden bench irrespective of the weather. As the cover was on it was rather funny to see a cat shaped lump at one end. Jess and Skimble are a bit miffed but appear to tolerate her as long as she keeps out of their way. Last week the sunny weather finally made me remove the cover and whilst I was shaking it to get rid of the giant puddle which had gathered in one of the folds, out popped Moly looking rather disgusted at being so disturbed. She's now taken to...

... Felines in the Garden I'm doubling up on a couple of my regular memes this week, to tell you a little more about Skimble and Jess and the role they play in my gardening. As you may have noticed, I call them my 'garden helpers': that's because as soon as I start to do anything in the garden, such as weeding or digging, they're always there, shoving their noses into anything that's going on, trying to lend a paw and generally approving anything I do, particularly if it means they can thoroughly get in the way. Whilst it usually ends with me, gently pushing them to one side and shouting 'gerrrrroff!', I do enjoy their company in the garden. They certainly take more interest in my activities than NAH does! There's plenty of advice around about pets and gardening, but I have to confess I haven't read much of it. My garden's design didn't really take them into account, because when we made it they weren't here and their predecessor was...

Unlike most of the rest of England we haven't had snowstorms overnight, the worst for 18 years in some places. However at 7.30 this morning the weather decided it was time for us to join in. As you can see Jess wasn't that impressed, nor was our neighbour who's just started on her walk into work. I suspect if we had groundhogs around here, they'd be staying firmly underground, so we wouldn't be predicting an early spring. I wonder whether that's the case over the pond - happy Groundhog Day everyone! NAH decided that no matter what, he's still going on his regular volunteer day at Midsomer Norton, 25 miles away. He's helping to rebuild a steam engine and missed out yesterday as he was competing at a swimming event. He's promised not to try getting there via the 1 in 4 incline at Wellow though and has also packed a flask of coffee plus the snow spade - we may have moved down from the north east 25 years ago, but we're still geared up for northern...

NAH is finding competition for the mouse can be quite tough when he works at home and the cats' keyboard skills leave a lot to be desired too. We held our second board meeting yesterday - with a cake baking in the breadmaker at the same time after the last meeting's woeful sparseness in that department - and Skimble insisted on joining in with us. He just would not stop climbing onto the table, purring and nudging the various files and papers. The only way we could stop him was for NAH to have him sitting on his lap*. We went flat screen quite a while ago, so we have at least managed to cure the cat draped over the monitor problem before all this mayhem started. * = NAH's written up the meeting's minutes showing Skimble as an attendee, so I guess that makes him our company's sleeping partner ;) If you work at home, what unforeseen problems have you encountered which differ from office life?

Whiskas haven't produced their usual cat calendar for 2009, so one family tradition dating back more than a quarter of a century has been replaced by my own version, starring guess who? 2009 has not only started with a new calendar, it also sees me waving goodbye to two valued friends. Sadly Typing on the Void is no more and I learnt last week The Garden Monkey has also gone. I'm pleased TOTV is reinvented as The Ethereal Monad , but I don't think there'll be a phoenix-like resurrection for GM . I know The Garden Monkey wasn't to everyone's taste, but for me no other blog has made me say to myself - why didn't I think of that? - so often, or have so many must-read articles and events, plus loads of fun and mayhem. I found GM so encouraging behind the scenes too, not only when I was putting my Open Garden together and I know a number of blogs wouldn't be in existence today either. I wish you well for the future, dear friend and you're always mo...

In view of this auspicious day , I couldn't resist another post - especially as our two have been particularly endearing this morning. JAS has warned against the perils of cats on beds in his contribution, but it appears to have fallen on deaf ears chez nous: Skimble in his usual cat on top of the bed mode But what's this? Ah yes, it could only be - Jess under the duvet! For some reason Jess decided not to leap onto the top of the bed this morning, but to snuggle straight under the duvet instead. There she stayed, purring happily next to NAH's leg whilst we had breakfast. We think it harks back to her antics as a kitten. She would often climb up one arm of NAH's dressing gown, across the shoulder and down the other and nestle into the crook of his arm. Yes, this was whilst NAH was wearing it! This time I've enlisted the power of Google to find the poem below - this one's particularly appropriate for Skimble's usual behaviour. As a quality alternative, TS ...