I still don't seem to have sorted out the few photographs I have taken this Autumn. I will get around to it, but other things seem to take priority.
The bird table has been moved to its winter position in front of the sitting room window, so that I can walk easily to it when the weather's bad and can see the birds easily from my chair beside the woodburner. Everything seems to be visiting at the moment from chaffinches, starlings, blue tits, great tits, robins, sparrows, magpies etc. etc. I am afraid I wave my arms at the magpies to scare them off. I don't budge from my chair about 12ft from the window, but their sight is so good that they see the slightest movement and fly off straightaway. Each day the table is loaded with different things, often depending on my own food the day before. Today, cooked rice from my prawn dish at lunchtime yesterday, some crusts from the banana toast I had for supper, and topped off with golden sultanas and bird seed.
This year, for the first time, I have a window seed feeder too. It's lovely to see the blue tits land on the stones of the window reveal and then hop onto the perch to eat. Daisy and Alfie, my cats, are fascinated by this new entertainment and stare, wide-eyed, for hours from the comfort of their sofa.
I don't remember a better year for Autumn colour. The leaves have stayed on the trees much longer than usual, perhaps because there haven't been the strong winds well not until 10/11 November when very strong winds took out broadband and telephones to the entire village, except that, for some inexplicable reason, I alone retained my broadband connection. Luckily, because I have Freecall, I am able to telephone through the internet and became a bit of a lifeline for neighbours too. It was 8 days before I was reconnected to my telephone and over 13 days for my opposite neighbours. The engineer came out and did one house on each visit instead of the whole village of 7 houses simultaneously. I shall never understand large organisations and their bureacracy.
The last of the pumpkins are now in the polytunnel drying off and all that remains to be picked in the veggie beds is spinach, which I collect as and when I need it. I have sown winter lettuce in the polytunnel, but have yet to see any seed leaves. Yesterday, I made spiced red cabbage. I cook the red cabbage with onions, apples, sultanas, butter, cinnamon and nutmeg. I just love it, especially reheated the next day when the flavours seem even better. With fried or oven-cooked pork sausages and butter-mashed potato it's just scrumptious.
The little fish who were born in October in my aquarium are now swimming freely without their parents repelling other interested neighbours. This is a photograph of father Kribensis.
They have now taken on the appearance of their parents, Kribensis, and are about an inch long. I have a Gourami who is looking very fat and I'm wondering if she too is going to have babies - it's all very exciting.
We had our first sprinkling of snow here yesterday, but it was followed immediately by sunshine and didn't last at all. It was very frosty here this morning and I had to change the bird water on their table for some without an ice covering. The sky is blue with white puffy clouds and the sun is really bright out there, but the temperature is deceptively low when I opened the door to friends just after lunch. In Cornwall, where my children live, there has been more snow and it did settle. The forecast is colder and more snow expected tomorrow, Saturday, and nothing warmer for a weeks at least. Brrrr!
The first of my Christmas group lunches is on Friday next week, followed by the Bowls club lunch the next day. It hardly seems possible that Christmas is less than a month away now. Where does the time go to?
The last of the pumpkins are now in the polytunnel drying off and all that remains to be picked in the veggie beds is spinach, which I collect as and when I need it. I have sown winter lettuce in the polytunnel, but have yet to see any seed leaves. Yesterday, I made spiced red cabbage. I cook the red cabbage with onions, apples, sultanas, butter, cinnamon and nutmeg. I just love it, especially reheated the next day when the flavours seem even better. With fried or oven-cooked pork sausages and butter-mashed potato it's just scrumptious.
The little fish who were born in October in my aquarium are now swimming freely without their parents repelling other interested neighbours. This is a photograph of father Kribensis.
They have now taken on the appearance of their parents, Kribensis, and are about an inch long. I have a Gourami who is looking very fat and I'm wondering if she too is going to have babies - it's all very exciting.
We had our first sprinkling of snow here yesterday, but it was followed immediately by sunshine and didn't last at all. It was very frosty here this morning and I had to change the bird water on their table for some without an ice covering. The sky is blue with white puffy clouds and the sun is really bright out there, but the temperature is deceptively low when I opened the door to friends just after lunch. In Cornwall, where my children live, there has been more snow and it did settle. The forecast is colder and more snow expected tomorrow, Saturday, and nothing warmer for a weeks at least. Brrrr!
The first of my Christmas group lunches is on Friday next week, followed by the Bowls club lunch the next day. It hardly seems possible that Christmas is less than a month away now. Where does the time go to?
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