The past couple of weeks have been a busy blur of mostly joyful activities, in between work. It’s nice to be able to report that, given that life has been generally a bit on the overwhelming end of the spectrum for months now.
My bestie came to visit, and we had a lovely few days of sewing, hiking, eating nice food, and exploring my new home. There was plenty of knitting and YouTube in front of the fire, my favourite activity especially with a good pal. We went to Glen Affric and managed a soggy but beautiful hike. Glen Affric is one of those places that makes me want to take a photography class, it’s so stunning I want to be able to capture it more realistically on camera. Maybe that’s a plan for my summer joy list?
The spring blossoms are just starting to come out in my garden, which is very exciting to see. One tree has gorgeous delicate blossom that I’m very much enjoying at the moment. It may need to come out in the not-too-distant future, which is very sad, but I’m making sure to soak it in whilst we have it. The coal tits are in and out of the trees in the garden at the moment, I’m pretty sure they’re a breeding pair, I’ve seen them checking out possible nest sites. I’m going to have to get a bird box soon!
I’ve been busy building a raised bed for my kitchen garden. It’s mostly to keep the dogs from running through my veggies, I’m going to move the herbs into this bed, plus my strawberries (if any survived the winter, they’re looking sad at the moment). I’ll most likely write a proper blog post about the raised beds in the future, but I wanted to share a bit of the progress I’ve made so far here.
Before
Progress!
I’m enjoying the longer days and slightly warmer weather. It’s inspiring me to make a bit more effort with my lunches, embracing the herbs and lighter salads that feel more appetising in spring and summer. I made some pickled carrots recently, and enjoyed the pickle brine so much I reused it to pickle some leftover purple cabbage (from Christmas!). It’s really tangy and fresh on salad, I used an Ottolenghi recipe for the mushrooms in a herby oil and garlic dressing to have with the flatbread. I’m excited to be growing my own herbs this year, it hopefully won’t be long until this lunch may have homegrown veggie constituents. A perfect spring meal, to have whilst reading the latest Gardener’s World magazine.
I’ll hopefully be reporting back in the next couple of weeks with a completed raised bed, I had a tonne of topsoil delivered last week, and I’m going to collect some free horse manure at the weekend. I want to give my veggies the best start in life!
That sounds lovely ke a lovely enjoyable week!