Here we are on the shortest day of 2020. What a year it's been. But I'll save my reflections for the end of the year - who knows what will happen over the next few days. Today is a good day. I was up early, and lit a candle while I ate my breakfast, and I must say candlelit breakfasts are a marvellous thing and I plan to have many of them in 2021. After breakfast, I went for a stroll as the sun rose. Well, I assume it rose, as it did get marginally lighter, but it was difficult to tell through the gloom. I don't think we've got much chance of seeing the conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter tonight. Later in the morning, an exciting thing - a delivery of woodchip, from a friendly tree surgeon. I'm very excited about this. The chickens are confined to their run because of the bird flu outbreak, and the hay we had on the ground was getting rather muddy and needed changing every week. I'd been looking for hardwood woodchip, as it's said to last many months in a chicken run, which seemed perfect. Sadly, the only places I could find that delivered used pallets, which require lorries, which do not fit down our narrow lane. Eventually I found a tree surgeon, who charged a little extra for delivery as we're an hour from him, but who dropped off this giant pile of hardwood chips this morning. This is about four times what I'd estimated we'd need, but he charges by the load, so I've taken it all, and will use the rest for the paths in the veg patch. I put a couple of barrow loads into the chicken run, and they're delighted, as it's full of woodlice and other critters. We're trying to change something about their environment every day or two while they're shut in, so they don't get bored and start pecking each other. A new bucket of woodchips will provide a nice bit of entertainment. I had to make a trip to the post office late morning, and while I haven't managed to get all cards written, I've done more than normal, mostly to people I don't see or talk to much. It's been nice writing long waffly letters these last couple of weeks. While I was out I nipped to my favourite bookshop cafe, ate a takeaway mince pie in the car, and bought lots of things (principally for myself, oops). I'm back home again now, and things are quiet. I've watched the end of a film I started yesterday, and eaten another piece of Christmas cake (there'll be none left for Christmas day at this rate). In a minute I'll take the chickens a bedtime treat (the older ones take themselves to bed about 3.45 these days), and I was contemplating a sunset walk, but I can barely see the end of the garden through the fog, and the sideways rain is making it even less appealing.
I've created a cosy little solstice corner on the windowsill (with my beautiful new solstice print from Kt Shepherd, which fortuitously arrived today, and some reduced-to-30p supermarket tulips), and I think I'll end the day where I started it, between candle and fairy lights, contemplating the year ahead and looking forward to the longer days.
2 Comments
Georgia
22/12/2020 02:43:16 pm
That sounds like it was a truly delightful day! Any day with chickens, bookstores and cake is a win. We’ve had a bit of rain in California, but for the last few days it’s been bright and sunny..The Great Conjunction was a bit of a disappointment as it looked much like the stars in the night sky.
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TDQKaren
29/12/2020 06:36:38 pm
Love the idea of candlelit breakfast
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Hello!Sit down and make yourself comfortable. I'm Jenni, and I write here about our new foray into country living, which includes growing food, knitting, baking, wandering around the fields, and seeing which local cafe serves the best cake. Categories
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