A Little Cottage in the Country

Not very nice is the answer, but that would be a short blog post! I've been very unwell with migraine for quite a few days although I'm thankfully up and about now. Migraines are something I've only suffered with for the past five or so years, they started after a particularly stressful period in my life and unfortunately have never gone. My migraines don't have any form of visual disturbance, the first signs I'm getting one is either nausea or a drilling pain in my right temple. When I first started getting them over the counter medicines did used to help, and if taken early enough could stop one developing but that's no longer the case unfortunately. In fact anything with codeine in it seems to make things worse now. The drilling pain usually increases to the point it's almost unbearable and this is accompanied by retching and vomiting. On Saturday I was retching every half an hour, all day. I couldn't keep down any fluids at all and the result of ...

I was reading with interest about the environmental benefits of not washing your clothes as often - longevity, less shedding of micro particles into the environment and so on. And I will be honest great as it sounds my first thought was: don't these people sweat? I generally try to get all animal jobs and dog walking out of the way in the mornings as much as I can and I'm not kidding you at this time of year I am soaked in sweat right down to my underwear. I can dream of not washing my bra for five days but I think in reality by day five even I wouldn't want to be near me. It's a massive irritation that nearly all bras for sale now are the hideous moulded cup ones, and most don't withstand more than a few washes before the cup distorts and begins to curl. I have to ask: should we be wasting resources manufacturing this crap that can't withstand use in the first place? Years ago M&S was the premier store you bought your undies, yes they were a bit pricier...

Most people think of sheep as docile woolly creatures that hang around in fields. I think the consensus among the general public is sheep eat grass and lay down, and that's all they do. Well sheep are surprisingly characterful and are actually very boisterous things, both amongst themselves and with you. I am frequently covered in various bruises, feeding times I'm basically a human skittle. Get in amongst sheep with a bag of food and you'll know about it. Willow has terrible spatial awareness issues and has frequently hit the back of my legs with the force of a truck trying to get to the food. Put it this way, they won't stand on ceremony. The smaller varieties of sheep will also jump up, it's not been uncommon for me to be wandering about with muddy hoof prints on my bum. And they will quite often ask for attention, or a scratch, in the only way they know how, which is a friendly butt. A friendly butt is uncomfortable and non friendly one bloody hurts. Mit...

I use some of the fleeces from my sheep to spin into yarn, and through a process of trial and error have come up with a preparation process that works for me. I don't like to over complicate things, so try and keep preparation to a minimum. I sort the locks into baskets, making sure I keep all the tips and cut ends aligned, this helps save time later on. I arrange them in layers until the baskets are full. I do three baskets at a time to save on water. I then put two buckets in the bath and fill with hot water, it has to be as hot as you can as that helps the lanolin come out. Have them both the same temperature to avoid felting. One bucket just has a squeeze of ordinary washing up liquid in it. I'm not looking to scour the fleece completely, I just like it clean enough to be able to spin. I try to keep some lanolin in there as I don't see the point of removing it all then having to spray oil back on the help spinning. I submerge a basket in the soapy water for a...

Okay this was going to be a Merv on Monday post but I ran out of time yesterday! Merv has been having the world's longest moult - he's been itchy and cross for months as his winter fluff has been shedding out. I guess the variable temperatures really haven't helped matters. He's also been going alarmingly blonde, causing me to ponder the question do goats get like their owners or do owners get like their goats? Well I was blonde way before him. Thankfully a lot of his coat has now shed although he's retained a blonde gruff and also what looks like 70's style shaggy chaps on his back legs. I have told him he looks like he's auditioning for a spot in a Village People tribute act, I half expect him to burst into a rendition of YMCA when I go down there! Quite whether these creations will stay or not only time will tell, we're all just relieved he's not as cross and itchy as he has been. He still enjoys a side helping of my pocket at teatime t...

One of the things I'm most grateful about living here is the peace and quiet it affords. Our nearest neighbours are some 400m away and we're mostly surrounded by fields. Being an agricultural area of course we get farm machinery, sometimes early in the morning, but it's not 24/7 and to be honest even a combine harvester isn't really obtrusive. In the evenings at this time of year the air is filled with birdsong - we're lucky enough to be an area where skylarks are just about hanging on. Blackbird song is also one of my favourites too. Plus obviously I have my aforementioned noisy guinea fowl, the odd cock-a-doodle, cluck and quack. So it's not silent, but what it is is peaceful. Being an introvert I need regular quiet space to recharge myself. I find a lot of man made noise too much or over stimulating. One of my biggest bugbears is continual music thudding in supermarkets. Firstly music, like art, is a very personal taste, and secondly I don't actual...

A lot of people ask me about my guinea fowl and how hard they are to keep. I started with one female some years ago, who came along with some other birds I took in from a chap with cancer.  I keep guinea fowl in with my Brahmas as lookouts for foxes. Brahmas are very quiet, docile birds and one particularly bad day a fox was able to kill four hens without us hearing anything. The birds are penned if I'm not here, if I am they're allowed free range in the garden. Guineas have a reputation for being eagle eyed, which they are, however they can also be very noisy about something only known to them causing me to rush out periodically. After losing the original female I bought a couple more, both males. They were sold to me as females but guinea keets are hard to sex, and it is better to get them as keets so you have at least some chance of training them to stick around. Even if you have them from very young they always retain a wild spirit, they don't become as domestic...