Chicken sitting for the old women

It occurred to me while i was  just in the middle of making  plum jam (in the microwave of all things) that i promised you a post this weekend.

I feel slightly fraudulent offering you the ramblings below as it's something i wrote on return from my epic week in Shropshire which has languished on my desktop for nearly two months. Still, reading it again did make me chuckle, especially as it starts with my usual grovelling over the length of time between posts. Perhaps i should rename the blog 'Apoligies from River Cottage Croydon’. Anyway, enjoy.

Howdy. Apologies for the delay in posts, blah, blah (can’t even be bothered to summons a decent excuse).

Oh, hang on – I’ve got one. Apologies for the lack of recent posts but I’ve been in the absolute middle of nowhere house/garden/chicken sitting for my mother. Yes, I’ve survived my week living in the grounds of Hodnet Hall, returning to the bosom of River Cottage Croydon to report on my expedition.

There are very few people, for whom I’d sacrifice a week of my holiday to get up every day at 6am to tend to a ragtaggle bunch of chickens, but my mother is one of them. A week living in the grounds of a bona-fide stately home (isn't it beautiful?) has certainly been good for my stress levels and my education in all things outdoorsy. Here’s a summary of my main learnings from a stint in the Countryside.

Hens can kill mice. Really, they can - I’ve seen it with my own eyes. Kill them stone dead with a single blow to the head. Left alone with the murine corpse for any length of time they will peck its little body into an unrecognisable pulp. Extrapolating the carcass from said hen is not for the feint hearted. Also, best not done in the dark.

Toads like living in the shoes you keep by the back door. ALWAYS check before sliding your feet in.

Mum's garden is so vast you can listen to the album  'Contra' by Vampire Weekend twice over whilst watering it. 

It is a fallacy that mommy birds reject baby birds touched by human hand (thanks RSPB website). However, it is a truism that any fool trying to return a baby bird to its nest using a decrepit stepladder on uneven ground is in for a big surprise.

One sunburnt ear is never a good look.

Not dead yet

Just in case you thought I’d deserted you, fear not! Huge apologies for the lack of posts over the last couple of months. There's been so much going on i don’t even know where to begin. I'll pen a proper update for you over the weekend but (in no particular order) here's some potential blog titles heading your way:

• Shambles O’clock sewing club
• Eli and the gigantic grass seed in eye debacle
• Chicken sitting for the old women
• The two grand fence fiasco
• Massive veg fail

See you in a few days. L

Back from Chelsea – quick match report

What a wonderful day. I’ll report back in full later but thought you should know how i got on following my own advice from earlier this week.


1. Get there early A+, gold star, etc. Was at the entrance at 7.55am, programme in hand.

2. Play BBC presenter Bingo. Not bad. Managed to spot the holy trinity – Alan, Joe and Carol. No bonus points for parallel sightings.

3. Pack your own lunch. I packed my own breakfast, does this count?

4. Splash out on a glass of Pimms. Failed – had a few glasses of prosecco last night and didn’t fancy hair of the dog.

5. Control your impulse to buy multiple bits of gardening tat. Fail, fail, fail, fail and fail again.

Purchases in no particular order:

• Wicker grow bag fencing
• Two bone china mugs
• Tin for holding string (with string)
• Two metal life-sized cockerel garden ornaments (One for Mum)
• Two robin garden decorations on sticks (both Mum’s – brought to order)
• Dibber for planting seeds
• Garden utility belt (like Batman's, only better)
• Two keyrings – for ‘shed’ and ‘back door’
• Three leaf bags (turn leaves into mulch over time) – annual Chelsea purchase
• Seeds from Heritage seed company

I’m sure I’ve missed about half a dozen items off. Mr Swift is going to have a coronary when he gets home.

6. Take change for seed catalogues in the Pavilion. Pass

7. Take lots of photos and ask lots of questions. Pass and pass (sorry to the man on the South African exhibition in the Pavilion. I bet you didn’t think one person could have so many questions about Aloe)

8. Finally, get a cab back to your main transport hub Another massive fail. Walked with my multitude of purchases to Victoria. Officially the longest mile of my life.

Chelsea

My favourite week in the gardening calandar has arrived!

For those of you heading to Chelsea, perhaps for the first time, i have compiled a survival guide to making the most of your day.

1. Get there early. In fact, get there when it opens. Not only will you be able to get round the show gardens whilst most people are still having their breakfast you’ll also have the chance to see the BBC filming their coverage. This brings me nicely onto point two...

2. Play BBC presenter Bingo. Main targets are Alan Titchmarsh, Joe Swift (normally wearing a Panama), Jekka McVicar (normally manning her stand in the Pavilion) and Carol Klein. Bonus points for spotting two of them together. Marvel at how much make-up Alan is wearing.

3. Pack your own lunch. This may seem tight but the Chelsea showground is a parallel universe where everything is quadruple the price of anywhere else.

4. Ignoring point three for a second - splash out on a glass of Pimms. It’s Chelsea, you deserve it!

5. Control your impulse to buy multiple bits of gardening tat. You don’t need a decorative string holder however much you think you do. Same goes for lace-up wellies, pink watering cans and plastic garden clogs with a ‘wacky’ tomato design. I’m speaking from bitter experience here.

6. Take change for seed catalogues in the Pavilion. The exhibitors will look at you with the contempt you deserve when you offer up a tenner for a 20p brochure.

7. Take lots of photos and ask lots of questions.

8. Finally, get a cab back to your main transport hub (Victoria in my case). There’s no point in being a martyr trying to carry home all those impulse buys on the tube.

Behold......

.....the fruits of my labour at Oh Sew Brixton’s ‘Make a skirt’ workshop last Monday.

The tutor described my seams as ‘perfectly straight and neat’; I almost cried with joy.

Just need the weather to improve so it can get its first outing. For the meantime I will stick to trying it on once a day and marvelling at how un-handmade it looks.

Where's my cat?

From time to time you hear tales of how attempts to rescue an animal in distress, normally a dog in the sea, can lead to the death of several people. We experienced something a little similar at RCC over the weekend (thankfully without the deaths).


I won’t go into too many details out of respect for my lovely neighbours but needless to say an incident last Saturday with a missing kitten lead to an injured leg and a visit from the paramedics, fire brigade and six police officers.

So, the moral of this story is - cats are a pain in the arse.

No excuses

I’m not going to bother apologising for the shockingly long time that has elapse between posts. My only excuse is I’ve been busy doing things in order to write about them. Swings and roundabouts, people. Swings and roundabouts.

First up is my new found love of sewing. You’re all aware of my inability to knit so it stands to reason that there must be one craft on the planet that i can take to, even on an elementary level. Having been inspired by the quilting exhibition at the V&A I am now the proud (?) owner of an Argos value sewing machine – a snip at £60. It’s hardly the most sophisticated piece of kit (I’ve already discovered it won’t do a decent satin stitch) but given my tendency to start crafts only to discover I’m rubbish at them a nanosecond later it seemed like a sensible level of expenditure.

Having played around for a week on my own it was blatantly obvious it was time to call in the professionals, so i enrolled on a beginners course at Oh Sew Brixton run by a lovely lady called Fiona. The result of her beginners course was the lovely bag below – i am so proud of myself (and Fiona for having the patience to push me to the finish).

In other news, i helped out Omlet (the Eglu makers) at the Ideal Home Exhibition. It was great to spend a day talking chickens. The level of interest from the general public was incredible; we were swamped with enquiries all day and i chatted to interested novices and experienced urban hen keepers alike. I managed to sell a couple of Eglus so, clearly impressed with my sales patter, Omlet have invited me to work for them at the Grand Designs Live exhibition. I’ll be there on 8th and 9th May - if you’re going please come along and say hi.

Everything at RCC is in full spring mode, but shamefully I am lagging behind the in garden. One of the reasons for this is the hens have eaten everything I’ve planted so far. They’ve launched a full scale attack on the strawberry plants, reducing them to stalks, and trampled the rocket and lettuce into submission. There was no other alternative but to curtail their free-ranging to the bottom third of the garden with some chicken fencing. This, as expected, went down like a lead balloon - cue angry clucking and much giving of the evil, beady chicken-eye.

To sweeten the blow I scrounged an old tyre off our local mechanic to give the girls something new to play with. Nice idea in principle; but how on Earth was I supposed to get a car tyre and my vast collection of shopping bags back to RCC on foot? Never one to be overcome by logistical barriers i came up with the genius idea of rolling it alongside me – big mistake. All was going well until the path dipped rapidly downhill and the tyre shot off at breakneck speed towards an unsuspecting pensioner. Only the last minute intervention of the park gates prevented said man from becoming a geriatric skittle. Despite my frantic apology he was distinctly unimpressed with my blatant disregard for health and safety. I carried it the remainder of the way home, head hung in shame....