Posts that Didn't Happen: May 2026

May came and went, with work in the garden, being one of the major features of the month: planting up the greenhouse tomatoes, and courgettes in the veg plot (and earthing up the potatoes that were planted last month); starting to deconstruct the old fruit cage, and move strawberries into trays; and Martin's first hedge-cut of the year.  The iris in the kitchen courtyard 'well' also flowered - looking lovely!

Early in the month we took the new car on its first 'long trip' to visit the parents - did stop for a charge on the way, but were fully charged for the return journey and did it with 30% still in the 'tank', so happy that it will do the 250 or so miles without a stop.

The whole car saga continued to rumble on however - on a positive, we managed to sell the old car to a local garage, where it will be starting a new life as a courtesy car.  Less positively there was the question of charging the new car - and of whether we should change our electric tariff to an EV-friendly option.

Eventually agreed a price for fitting a proper charger, with us sourcing the charging unit, and the cable needed to connect it to the house supply.  With our consumer unit  on the other side of the house to the drive, we had to order nearly 30 metres (going with 'Doncaster' cable, the leading UK brand). 

[Random pic of a golden slow worm, we found on said drive one day - rescued and relocated to the compost bin!]

When the cable eventually arrived - very late - it was however a cheaper Egyptian 'substitute'.  It was still suitable for the task, and given time pressures (Martin was due to fit it round the house, with the installation date for the rest of the works only a couple of days away) we accepted it with a suitable refund for the substitution.

In the meantime, we'd been in contact with our electricity supplier, who offered us a 'trial' of their EV tariff.  It soon became apparent however that our wider set-up, with the solar panels and the battery, meant that what we gained on cheaper imports, did not make up for what we lost on our exports.  It was only on contacting them to end the 'trial', that we were told we couldn't move back to our original tariff (which was 'closed' to new customers).  Lots of toing and froing, and eventually they did move us back, although not without some billing issues, involving more stress and correspondence until it was finally sorted.

It doesn't all end there unfortunately - see next month! 

In other 'news', bottled last year's Damson Brandy, making jam with the boozy fruit - also 'birthed' a new sourdough starter.  And along the way I finished my latest Lego project - the River Steamboat.

On the campervan front - we did a bit of work decorating the back barn doors - but we really are at the 'tweaking' stage now - just need to get out and about in it!!

The end of the month saw us mid-heatwave and anticipating the arrival of an air-conditioning unit (until the order was cancelled by the supplier!).  The sunshine was lovely - the heat level less so - so it was blinds down / curtains closed as we tried to keep the house cool.

To end on a 'cute' note - here's a baby bunny chowing down on the plants in the kitchen courtyard wall (luckily I hadn't planted anything new there, so I let it enjoy its feast).

Bunny in the Flowerbed

Bunny on Film

More from Wildlife Cam . . .

Further East

From Stratford we moved on to visit family in East Anglia, and celebrate a 'significant' birthday.

Lovely family Sunday dinner out - nice country pub - a fine selection of fowl (chickens and peacocks) in the garden (assume they are there for decorative rather than culinary purposes!).







Next day took the folks on a trip out to Burghley House - another extremely impressive Tudor property.

The interior - which has been remodelled signifcantly over the centuries - features expanses of elaborately painted walls and ceilings depicting mythological scenes - including the so-called 'Hell Staircase'.

The parkland, landscaped by Capability Brown, survives and has been augmented with the addition of a sculpture garden and garden of 'surprises' - was interested to spot the 'bunny' in the sculpture bit!


All in all made for a fascinating day out - the house is magnificent, and there is plenty to see in the gardens too - not least Alan Titchmarsh recording a tv programme on the Lion Bridge!

Bunny On The Drive

Aww . . .

The Bunnies are Back . . .

The winter months aren't great for bunny sightings, but with spring well and truly here, the lawn is once more replete with bunnies:

No exceptionally cute baby bunnies just yet, but expect they are on their way!

They better stay away from my tulips though.

Snow CAT

Had a trip out today to the Centre of Alternative Technology (CAT) which was hosting a Christmas Fair (and free entry as a bonus!).


Although the rain was busily washing away much of our snow, CAT had benefited from a heavy snowfall yesterday, and there was still a good deal of ice and snow underfoot.  As such it wasn't really the day for looking round.



Managed a walk round some of the 'displays' anyway - including the subterranean 'Mole Hole' - and were greeted wherever we went by some very friendly robins.  Unfortunately they weren't very good at standing still.

The Christmas Fair itself had some good stalls (although some stall-holders hadn't made it thanks to the weather) - got some locally milled wheat flour to make some bread, and this stoneware bunny (or given the size of its ears, maybe a hare) caught my eye . . .




Did eventually get one decent robin shot as well:

Bad Bunny

Cute? Maybe . . .

But there are some things I can't forgive:

Bunny Biscuits

Not so happy with the bunnies these days - they're tucking in to our strawberry plants with gay abandon - a lot of them are more stalk than plant right now. (Which has at least pushed us in to action on the fruit cage front . . . see future post.)

The biscuits I made at the weekend were at least sweet, although they looked so much more like bunnies before they were cooked . . .

Wildlife

Wildlife is becoming a big part of our lives. One of the first things we did was put up a bird 'feeding station' outside the kitchen window, and it attracts a wide range of garden birds, including Great Tits, Blue Tits, Robins (one of which spent a lot of time attempting to assert ownership; eventually he got tired of chasing all the other birds away!), a small Sparrow colony, Chaffinches, Greenfinches, and the occasional Rook. The Great Spotted Woodpecker pictured on the left was a more exotic visitor, although not exactly rare according to the RSPB.

Then there was the day we came home and discovered the baby Collared Doves under and above the wooden arch - once they learnt to fly properly we saw a lot less of them . . .

Just the other day we found a Common Toad in the greenhouse . . .

And of course, there's always the bunnies . . .

First Post!

Welcome to our blog – it’s taken us a while I must admit. We moved to the 'country' on 19th January 2008, and decided then that it would be good to ‘blog’ our experiences of gardening, growing veg, etc., but things didn’t go quite to plan on the technical front. We thought we’d done everything possible to ensure a smooth transition of telephone / broadband supplier – but it was not to be. It took us nearly a month to get the phone line connected, and broadband, well…

We started with the Post Office broadband – who told us we had a DACS on our line, and that they couldn’t connect us until BT removed it. We switched supplier to BT (in the belief that this might speed things up); they said they would connect us on 4th March; when this date came and went, their excuse was (wonder of wonders) that we had a DACS on our line that would need to be removed. Eventually, after months of being 'reviewed' they worked out that they would need to undertake re-cabling work, which needed authorisation from senior management. Finally, the work was authorised, and we were given a connection date of 17th July. Interestingly although BT did actually meet that date, they don't seem to have realised that they've connected us, since they left us a telephone message to say our next review date is 5th August!

Well, we're online now - and here's the blog - and the first bunny … Why ‘Bunny On The Lawn’ – I suppose because there is, pretty much always, a bunny on the lawn. Quite often more than one. Usually small and very cute bunnies (we must be talking great great great great grandbunnies of the original bunnies by now), sometimes really BIG bunnies. Bunnies on the lawn is fine, bunnies in the vegetable patch was less fun, but more of that later ...