Blwyddyn Newydd Dda

Not much news to report. As usual, I am going to start this year by promising to post more frequently -- we will see if it happens!

Some time ago, we bought half a pig for the freezer from our structural engineer. At the time he asked if we wanted the head as well and of course I said yes. It has languished hidden in the freezer since then, until the other day when Greg accidentally defrosted it thinking it was a leg of lamb! So we are now making brawn...

The recipe began by telling us to remove all the bristles on the head. We eventually discovered that a razor works much quicker than tweezers!

In other news, I had a small little accident in my car before Xmas on an icy patch of road and Jon has wonderfully been fixing my car for me -- so I made him this lovely apple pie -- I hope it tastes as good as it looks!

Other than that, not much really... Some rain, but what else is new? :)

Nadolig Llawen!

The frost is finally gone, but it got quite cold before it finished. This is a drainage ditch which normally has running water in it -- frozen solid!

And on to Christmas. We went to Greg's brother's house in the Cotswolds and had a lovely time. Some of my favourite presents: A knitting needle gauge so I can sort out second-hand knitting needles:

This isn't really a present, but Louise got a new toaster so we took her old (working) toaster home to have as a spare for when our current (Freecycled) toaster dies:

Greg bought me (us really) a new turntable -- ours had been on its last legs for a long time so this is quite welcome. If anybody wants our old one -- which I think is eminently fixable if you're of a mechanical mind -- it's on Freecycle.

Several books -- two of which are mine and one which is Greg's -- Bread Matters, which I hope will teach me how to make better bread, The Building of the Green Valley, which I hope will give me more insight into how people might have lived here 400 years ago (and ways that I can use that knowledge in my own life), and A Carmarthenshire Anthology, which I hope will have interesting information about the history of the area we live in.

Greg got this useful energy monitor so we can see what is eating electricity in our house. Of course it's made in China -- why isn't there a company here in the UK making these??? Having to choose between a device to help us reduce our electricity use (which is a good thing) and having yet another thing that was made in China (a bad thing) is not a fair choice!

I got this food mill which will make making ketchup and apple butter much easier!

I don't think I've done an egg post in a while, so here are two really cute fried bantam eggs -- check out the yolk to white ratio!

We've also decanted the first of the sloe gin -- yum! It is really a much lovelier colour than you can see here but I couldn't get it to photograph the way I could see it so you will have to use your imaginations...

Oer!

It has gone from non-stop rain to non-stop freeze... The fields are full of slippery patches from where the water was flowing down the fields and the pond has also mostly frozen! There is a little bit where the water flows in that's still water, but the poor little duckies are just so confused...


In other news, we got the scaffolding back up on the back of the shed so now we can finish the roof -- freezing cold metal poles -- yum!

Bwyd

Read this and this. What are you eating?

Gwau

Just made this from this lovely yarn... It is lovely and warm and soft and sparkly... I know this is a crap photo but it's really hard to photograph myself wearing something! Will try to get Greg to take a better photo of it this weekend...

Gwlyb, gwlyb, gwlyb...

It has now been over two weeks since we've had a completely dry day...

We've put the hen and the chick (now 15 weeks old, so she should start laying soon) in with the general population, and then hen is now laying regularly -- little bantam eggs -- so cute!

Diolchgarwch hapus i bawb:

I've been in the kitchen lots lately as I can't do much outside in this weather... I've made my own mincemeat this year:

And I also made these yummy pumpkin cookies for my Welsh class:

Stwff/Pethau

We've had a big problem recently with starlings. They discovered our chicken feeder. At first we didn't think much of it because we thought they were migratory and would leave shortly. After a couple of weeks I looked them up on the internet -- they are migratory -- but they are HERE for the winter! We were going through about three times as much chicken feed as normal. Bridget the ever knowledgeable suggested that we move the chicken feed inside the hen house -- I replied that the feeder wouldn't fit -- and Bridget said, "So make something else that does!" Here it is:

In other news, I hit a pheasant with my car today, so with the one that Bart brought round on Sunday morning, that's two pheasants waiting for me to pluck and clean them...

I've also spent a bit of time making this scarf for Max, my cousin's son, who will be two on Friday -- note to all Max's relatives who read my blog -- don't tell him -- wait till it arrives in the post!!! :)

Yn y gegin

Winter is here, and we are now eating things like kale... Faith sent me these seeds all the way from America ages ago -- it is yummy!

Greg made this delicious beef & ale pie:

And we cured the belly from the 1/2 pig we bought from Nick -- home made bacon! It is really delicious...

In other news, Bridget has now said that the chick who we thought was a boy is really a girl! More eggs!

O godiad yr haul i fachlud...

There is not much in between sunrise and sunset these days... We have had several frosts and the garden is now well and truly finished for the year. It gets dark at 5 pm and I must get back in the habit of doing things with knitting needles on these long evenings...

Ac mae rhaid i fi ysgrifennu mwy o bethau yn Gymraeg yma hefyd!!!

Newyddion Sied

Katharina and I have clad three sides of the shed now!

Dydd Afalau Bwlchyrhyd

Bart gave us a ton of apples, and it was raining today, so I made apple butter...

...and Katharina made apple strudel!

Mae ein oen cyntaf wedi mynd...

The big news today is that we were up at the (rescheduled) NSA Ram Sale over the weekend and we have sold our little ram lamb and purchased a new ram for breeding. I was quite sad to see the little one go although I know he has gone to a good home -- but he was our first little lamb and it is still fresh in my mind how I felt the morning I first saw him. I know I am a bit biased, but I think that he had the best markings out of all the ram lambs at the sale, and several other people agreed with me as well, so we will see if perhaps we see him winning things in the future...

This is the new ram we bought -- he is a shearling ram, and he is rather tamer than ours, but hopefully he won't be too shy with the girls! He won second place in the shearling ram competition at the 2007 Smallholder Show...

We've got another WWOOFer here at the moment, and she is helping us get the cladding up on the shed -- mae e'n edrych fel tŷ bach twt nawr!

In other news, I've been doing lots of food preserving -- red tomatoes into ketchup:

Runner beans to be frozen:

Green tomatoes into chutney:

And sweetcorn also to be frozen: