With all the riots and redundancies, broken cookers and land grabbing landlords I have not had much time for writing about the things I love, tonight I shall put that right.
Perhaps I forgot to mention that a few days ago I was given custody of a small, heartbreakingly cute three legged hedge hog! He had been checked out by a vet and apart from the missing leg and the fact that he was rather under weight he appeared in good health and was amazingly totally devoid of fleas!
Since he arrived I have managed to return him to his normal nocturnal habits, during the day he sleeps in a large hay filled flower pot inside a small run, he has water if he needs it. His snoring has puzzled that cat Twiggy and she has become a little jealous of the attention I give to this unseen but snuffly guest. Shortly before dusk I move his bed, with him still in it in to the greenhouse , there I have made a small water hole and I leave a dish of the choicest cat food we have;one more reason for Twiggy to be humpty.
Blackberries are in season and the very ripe sweet ones are a hedgehogs favourite fruit, in the wild they will eat any fallen fruits they find.
Finding slugs has not been easy as the ground has until recently been dry but by spraying a little water around the plant pots and on the log piles I have managed to keep my guest supplied with his all time favourite nosh.
Today I added a few suet pellets, the ones with insects in as the little chap needs to gain weight as fast as possible, he is adorable and we all love having him around.....except of course for the cat!
I should love to be able to keep him and in normal circumstances the orchard would be ideal as it is completely walled round. This would mean the the hedgehog would have lots of space to roam about with the others of his kind who inhabit the gardens here, while at the same time he would have access to regular meals and some one to keep and eye on his disability.
The trouble of course is the spectre of the new houses that my landlord hopes to build here.
Having him in the garden if this happens would only be one more heartbreak and I need to know that he will be safe.
Hedgehogs I a told are not to be kept as pets, possibly because their habits are a little, shall we say unfortunate at times so I need to find some one with a nice big walled garden with no pond,no dogs and a nice quiet dry and bosky corner where he can sleep the winter days away safely and in peace.
The electrician did not turn up with my new knobs and so I am still without an oven, hey-ho.
Sterilising the jars for jam making is proving difficult as I need the jars to be hot so the the lids will seal. In spite of this I made a batch of damson sauce yesterday. This is a marvellously versatile condiment as it can be poured over iced cream ,or hot sponge pudding, rice pudding or on to pancakes. Whenever I am making a game stew, pie or casserole I always add a good dollop of this to the pot as it make the gravy wonderfully rich. We even use it to make milk shakes in a blender by whizzing it round with some milk and some iced cream. Whenever it appears at our charity stall it is always one of the fist things to sell out,
Today I made damson and apple jelly and tomorrow it will be elderberry and blackberry(I picked the fruit today) Tomorrow is also bread day so I shall be bothering the neighbours once again.
I am happy to report that my son is feeling all the better for having given some consideration to his future, and about time too, after all if he does not who else will, it is well past time that he put himself first and I am glad that he sees things more clearly at last.
I am off to a wedding on Saturday, I even have a posh frock for the occasion, since I hate posh frocks it will probably appear on e bay sometime next week! I am afraid that the Avie is most defiantly a tramp!
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