Saturday 9 February 2008

Who would have thought?

I just can't believe the things we are doing at the moment. Just 4 years ago, whoever would have thought that we would have gone shopping in Spain? Before we moved here, I hadn't even been to Spain, we never went abroad on holiday when we had the children, we couldn't afford it, but we had some fabulous camping holidays. Wonderful times to remember. Yet, yesterday, we went to Spain for a spot of shopping! We are only just over an hour away from the border, so an hour and a half and we were there, unbelievable. We went with some friends of ours and once we had done the shopping it was time for our picnic. We headed off into the mountains and we found a lovely spot in a village quite high up and we parked by the church where it has picnic tables. Just wonderful, the weather was amazing, and my friend and I actually stripped down to camisole vest it was that warm. Just as well there weren't many people about, not a pretty sight. I took a photo of the colour of the sky and the skyline. As you can see there isn't much snow on the top of those mountains which is quite bizarre for this time of year. Climate change is everywhere. If my son-in-law sees this photo, he will cringe because I obviously didn't think of the pole there on the right hand side. Sorry Kenny. This is where it would be nice to have a really good camera that had a decent tele-photo lense or am I making excuses for not being very good at taking pictures?

Today we have been out in the garden for most of the day trying to get rid of a load of wood that was delivered for the fire. It all needed sorting and chopping up, then stacking away in the barn. It had been in the meadow for a little while, so it looks so much better now that the "stack under the tarpaulin" has gone. Richard had been down to the local stables and picked up a trailer load of horse manure, so guess whose job that was? Yep, me! I spread a load on the vegetable patch and hopefully it will rot down quickly. We have never grown vegetables before so we have made a very small raised bed and will have a go this year. Just trying to prepare the patch first. Haven't a clue what we are doing, but unless we try we won't know. While doing that, I couldn't resist taking a photo of the little crocus, I just love this time of year when Mother Nature is waking up and beginning to stretch her arms and pushing all the bulbs and buds out for an airing. My neighbour here said that she didn't like it so warm in February because it was going to make for a wet and cold March and April. We have been told that April is the worst month, so we will have to wait and see.

Tomorrow it is back into the garden and clearing the remnants of the wood pile and another bonfire to clear the rubbish. The warm weather is supposed to carry on until about Thursday so we will make the most of it while we can. Tonight while we were watching the bonfire, we made ourselves a drink (as you do) and just couldn't believe we were out there at 5.30pm in our t-shirts watching the sun drop down behind the mountains. By the way, the mountains had put on pink pyjamas tonight and looked very fetching.

4 comments:

Vixbil said...

Tee hee, red sky at night shepherds delight. Love ya moomin
xx

Locket Pocket said...

Hi! Thanks for visiting my blog! You really are living the dream aren't you? I can't imagine being able to pop over the border to Spain for a bit of shopping and a picnic - how fabulous! But I'd hate to be separated from my fabric and wool.........! Lucy x

Dawn said...

I came over from Big Blue Barn West. I made a comment about living the dream today on my post. Your climate is so different there than here. We are very cold now, well, the weather is, we have a wood stove and keep pretty toasty. You have cute kitty, supervising the work.

Frankofile said...

I've just started a veg patch here in Brittany, with the same reasoning as you. I hope it's not going to fall prey to dog (above ground) and mole (below ground) as well as all the usual pests. I've decided to keep a blog about it but I'm not boasting - it will be Very Dull. Two pictures of mud patch so far. But a good way, I hope, to keep a gardening diary.