Autumnal Clumber Park Adventures.

So I'm back! After a long, old hiatus I have decided to start blogging again, a rest is as good as a change after all. Life has been busy and has bought me many wonderful experiences and challenges, it just meant that some aspects of my life had to be put on hold for a while. It has been an amazing summer and I will be updating you on some of the adventures I have had over the next few weeks. 

For most of the morning I lay in bed reading, listening to the rain patter on the window, so I was really happy when the weather broke and we could hit the road. Doris, Ed and I headed over to Clumber Park for a walk and a picnic, it was lovely being out in the fresh, autumnal air. We visited the walled garden first and were amazed to see the renovation work that had been carried out on the glasshouse. It looks absolutely beautiful, all clean, pristine and white. I'm excited to see what the gardeners have planned for it next year. 

After we finished looking around the walled garden and glasshouse we headed back to Doris to rustle up a spot of lunch, then we went for a walk around the lake. I love exploring woodland this time of year, everything is awash with ochre and amber hues. The light had started to gloam by the time we got back to Doris and Ed and I were ready to say goodbye to Clumber and head back home. 

Hope you have had a beautiful Autumn weekend <3

Much Love,

Kirst xox

Forest Frolics.

Today has been another beautiful, breathtaking day in Sherwood Forest. The weather has been dry and crisp, whilst the forest bursts with autumnal hues. I went on a walk with my parents this morning and witnessed the mist transcending into the sky whilst hearing the leaves crackle and crunch underfoot. 

Ed and I went mountain biking this afternoon for a couple of hours. It was amazing! I must admit that when I come to a slightly scary spot I do squeal quite a lot, but I was a bit braver today than I was yesterday. It was a lot of fun and I loved seeing parts of the forest I would not have seen otherwise if I had just been on foot. The hot tub was a complete solace for my aching body when I got back to the cabin as well. 

Hope you are having a wonderful week <3

Much Love

Kirst xXx

Holidaying with Robin Hood in Sherwood Forest.

A few months ago Ed and I went to visit a friend in Sherwood Forest in these beautiful, modernistic log cabins. I totally fell in love with this place and it was top of my list when Ed and I decided we needed to get away from the city for a few days. The first image below is the view out of our cabin's living room, I could look at this view every morning for the rest of my life and I would never get tired of it. It is so beautiful and peaceful here that it is the perfect break to recharge our batteries before the manic Christmas season kicks off.  

We rented some mountain bikes today, this is the first time I have ever been mountain biking. The first bike I was given was a unisex one, it was huge, scary and the breaks were a long way from the handle bars! This bike hated me and I hated it, so I was very pleased to swap it for a ladies mountain bike. I had such a wicked day (once I got the right sized bike) in the gorgeous, sunny, crisp, autumnal air. Now all that is left is to have dinner and lounge in the hot tub with a beer.

Hope you are having an autumnal wonderland <3

Much Love

Kirst xXx 

Autumn at the Allotment.

The allotment adventures are winding down now Autumn is in full swing. Today Ed and I went and dug up the last of the potato crop, picked the beetroot stragglers, collected the onions that have been drying in the greenhouse and did a small amount of tidying up. 

We have had the allotment for about a year now and it has definitely been a story of ups and downs. We have had some amazing food such as blackberries, garlic, onions, beetroot, raspberries, strawberries, plums, runner beans, lettuce, potatoes, nettles, dandelions and courgettes. And we have also had some disappointing ones, those being sweetcorn, Romanesco broccoli, bak choi and the kohlrabi. Pretty much anything that the cabbage butterfly could lay it's eggs on got chomped. So next year we have decided to get plenty of netting.  

It feels amazing to eat food that you have grown. I know exactly where it has come from and that it has had no chemicals poured all over it. I also know when it was picked so its always super fresh when it ends up on my plate.  

One thing I have learnt is that allotments are a lot of hard work! More than I could have ever anticipated. The upkeep has been really tough and what with having a 30 year old campervan to maintain and repair, this summer was a lot more hectic than planned. But it has definitely been worth it. That said, it will be nice to have a few months off battling weeds so I can get down to figuring out what I want to grow and eat next year. 

How have your green fingered plans spanned out this year?

Much Love

Kirst x

Harvest Day at Attingham Park.

As it is my birthday weekend I got to pick the Saturday adventure (no real change there hehe), so I decided to go to the Harvest Day at Attingham Park with Ed and my parents. The weather was warm and sunny, which made a change because usually my birthday weekend is shrouded in rain, so it made it really special to be able to get out, get some fresh air and a walk around the beautiful park. 

The walled gardens at Attingham Park are absolutely beautiful this time of year. I could spend hours there meandering around with my jealousy slowly building at how large their pumpkins and squashes are, how lavish the heads of cabbage and how intoxicating the huge herb beds. The work the National Trust must put into this immaculate garden is absolutely amazing and I dare anyone not to feel their green fingers becoming inspired leaving this place. 

(... and yes I know Ed and I accidentally 'co-ordinated' our trousers, that's what marriage does to you.)  

I love snatching the last few summery weekends of the year, they always feel special because you can remember them over the chilly winter months. 

Hope you are having a lovely weekend full of adventures. I am going to have a pj day and wait for Ed to get home so I can open my presents!

Much Love 

xkx

Greenhouse Day!

I won this greenhouse on eBay last week, I really wanted to get one before the spring arrives (I know it is a long way off yet) so I can be all ready for the growing season on the allotment. Thankfully the weather held up and it was a lovely, sunny, Autumn day.

I think Ed and I were a little intimidated when we walked up to it, I just thought 'where do we start?!' But Ed got his toolbox out of the car and away we went.

Ed was gurning away trying to unscrew the bolts at the same time as dodging all the spiders. There were so many! Really big fat ones. They gave me the creeps. My job was to pull out all the clips that held the panels in, which pinged everywhere when released from the frame.  

And ZAP, as if by magic one and a half hours later the greenhouse was demolished! The guy we bought it off also let us have the potting up tables which I was super happy about, that was the only shelf that wouldn't fit in the car.

Just in case you wondered what a greenhouse looked like packed into a Ford Focus, here is the picture evidence. Ed teased me all the way home that the spiders were going to come and get me in the car! Which I think was a bit mean as I was scarred for life when I was little and there was a massive wolf spider climbing up my seat belt in the car... Eeeek. I will have to find some way of getting him back hehe. 

We didn't have time put the greenhouse up at the allotment, I think it will take most of a day. It needs a really good scrubbing too before we put it up. Ed was also very restrained, as he didn't get his DIY bossy head on! It was a test for our marriage but one we definitely passed. Can't wait to put it up at the allotment and for spring to come so I can start growing seeds!

Hope you all had a great weekend. 

Make Raised Beds and get the Digging Done, While the Sun Shines.

There is an old saying that goes 'Make hay while the sun shines', it was a beautiful sunny weekend so I took advantage of it and 'Made a raised bed and did some digging whilst the autumny sun shone'. I was so pleased that we managed to get these jobs done, the combination of fresh air, autumn sun and a flask of green tea really helped me feel better after my day in bed on Friday.

We went and got some wood on Saturday morning and just managed to squeeze it into the car. And Ed went to work on building the raised bed. I must admit I left him to it because he gets a bit scary when he is holding tools, its like DIY Jekyll and Hyde! So I decided to get some weeding done on the four front raised beds. I then dug in some organic manure so the soil will be in tip top condition in the spring (Ed had disappeared back home by the time the smelly poo came out). 

Today I set to digging over the large veg patch at the front of our plot. This was very hard work but it needed to get done before the heavy frosts starts to fall. I just thought about my dad when I was digging because I used to always help him out in the garden when he was digging over the veg plot, usually I would have to pick up all the weeds. Once I had dug it all over I sowed half of the patch with my green manure (because I vastly underestimated how much seed I needed) and hope the birds didn't swoop down and fill their tummies with my rye when I went home. I also got two bulbs of garlic planted as well, which is very exciting. Can't wait to see them peeking out of the soil.

This is a sneaky pic that I took over one of our neighbours fences in the allotment, that pumpkin is huge! I wonder what they are going to do with, it would look amazing as a jack-O-lantern, then made into a lovely soup or something... *yum*.

Hope you have all had a great weekend in the autumny sun.

Toadstools in Sherwood Forest.

As Autumn is starting to creep in slowly it means that it is a perfect time to go and search for fungus. So here are the toadstools that I managed to snap yesterday in Sherwood Forest. I have tried to identify them using my Mushrooms and Toadstools book and I think I have got some nailed but others I just couldn't identify.

This one seems to be Heterobasidion Annosum. I think the colours of this is really unusual and pretty. 

This one is Scleroderma Citrinum or more well known as the Common Earthball. If I'm right with this it has a black inside and it sometimes mixed with truffles as an adulteration! This is not good news as it is mildly poisonous and can make you have fainting spells and gastric problems. So watch out for dodgy truffle sellers. 

This one is Trametes Versicolor. I think it kinda looks like weird ears.

I think this one could be Hypholoma Fasciculare or more commonly known as Sulphur Tuft. I'm not 100% sure though.

This is a troublesome one to try and identify, I'm still pondering over this one. 

I couldn't identify this one either, but Ed said it looked like little ghosts, which I thought was quite cute. 

I think this one could be Kuehneromyces mutabilis commonly known as the Sheathed Woodtuft.



This one is Dacryomyces Stillatus or more commonly known as Orange Jelly. I think Orange Jelly is a rather forgiving name for this one, it looks absolutely gross!

This little beauty is Piptoporus Betulinus also known as the Birch Bracket or the Birch Polypore. Ed and I thought this one looked like a nose exploding out of the tree. It was a tricky one to identify because apparently it only looks like this when it is young, as it matures it looks more like a shelf fungus.

It was a lot of fun hunting for these in the forest and I spent a good part of yesterday evening trying to identify as many as I could. I must have been concentrating so hard on them that I even dreamt about mushrooms & toadstools! All I know for sure is that I don't think I would ever be brave enough to pick and eat my own mushrooms, there are just so many that you can't eat.