Preparing for Winter

Very wet. Too wet to spend much time gardening, and plenty of other people’s design projects to keep me busy indoors, plus site visits – weather permitting.

Vince the cat is enjoying the warmth of the range and must appreciate being warm and dry with generous regular meals after his cold hungry existence outside. He is still semi- feral which keeps us on our toes.

A new wood man came today with half a load of hardwood logs. He is a cheery young man and has promised to come back in February to cut back some conifers for us. The wood he’s delivered is lovely and dry and is now stacked in the inglenook ready to go, with the remainder in the shed.

Our old wood man let us down this season. No response to our calls, then tells us it’s a three week wait for an exorbitant half load which is too damp to use straight away. I suppose he’s short of stock but it’s no good at all for us. We’re hopeful that the new man will be reliable, as although we have a good supply of softwood, we need a mix with hardwood to keep the stove going through the winter.
Oh the luxury of having mains gas available!

There are plenty of outside jobs to do before winter sets in. We have replaced the shed ourselves with a very ugly (but cheap), new rainproof metal one. It is out of the way; out of sight, out of mind. It will be better suited for logs and garden equipment than the old leaky one. We will use the wood from the dismantled one around the garden as and when we need to.

The dome, which has been in place for some years now, is also needing attention. We’ve decided to save money we’ll replace the windows with marine ply and seal them with lead flashing tape on the joints. Unattractive but practical.

The stable hasn’t had a roof for years now. It blew off one winter. The wooden building was here when we arrived and not at all as grand as it’s name suggests. Again we have dismantled it and will store the wood for future projects,

Also, to add to our list of jobs, now we have been round to our new neighbours’ house, and have seen the state of our paintwork from their point of view, we really will have to await a dry spell and get to grips with repainting all the front windows, door and porch. Happy days!

These are the joys of country living on a tight budget. The mud, the cold, the dark days and endless back breaking jobs we have to do ourselves to save money. Still, while we can do it, we will, and there there is a sense of achievement gained from strenuous workouts, and a welcome warm fire to collapse in front of in the evenings.