Perfect timing to write a blog post! This morning I am having a glucose tolerance blood test. So I've fasted since last night, they  have no took my blood which is hard work it doesn't like coming out! I have had a sugary drink and now have to wait two hours, before they take my blood again. I have been given the lovely maternity day room to sit in, a lovely comfy sofa I do hope I don't fall asleep! 

Well it has been another eventful week at Furzedown, pigs departed on Tuesday morning and arrived home on Wednesday. Dad, Gareth and I had had our bet as to what the weight would be. Goodness me we were all so wrong! The max size we agreed on was 85kg. However one was 115kg and the other 113kg as much as this ment they were fattier, we still had a good eye of meat.

Unlike weeks when we make sausages, we didn't start butchering until Friday which was nice. Dad and I tinkered around on Saturday and how lovely it now is to have the sink and water supply and to be able to work out the front still in a chilled environment but no fan motor blowing at you. 

On Sunday morning the expert arrived Eddie the Master butcher. He is so so clever, it's amazing what he can do with meat. Dad and Gareth had a wonderful morning with him, we had smaller boned out joints, steaks and so many different cuts. I think he is going to come back next time we do pigs  to show him more. Mum rendered all the fat down, so we now have jars of it for using for roast potatoes as well as lard for making the pastry for pork pies. They also made a lovely batch of pork pies Sunday afternoon. They both love making them. 

The Inlaws came over on Sunday afternoon to help look at the renovation works, for Gareth and I to swap rooms with Dad to make us a little more contained for when the baby is born. Terry is going to tile the bathroom so it's fully useable it's never been done! He is going to lay some nice flooring in the airing cupboard and bathroom and we are going to get bathroom and bedroom painted. Quite a big job and we must crack on otherwise the baby is going to be here! 

Our little one did some moving around Sunday afternoon, I'm not sure if laid on a nerve or something but goodness me did my back hurt. I had no sleep Sunday night, every way I laid it hurt, I walked up and down sat on the sofa but no I was so sore. Needless to say I didn't go to work on Monday, it finally eased mid morning and the beauty of modern technology allowed me to work from home.

Well this lovely sofa and warm hospital is wanting me to shut my eyes!

I'm not liking this going back to work lark! the alarm going off was not a welcome noise but i am starting to get back in the swing of things!

Its been a lovely weekend, despite being a little windy the sun has been shinning!

Bit of a lazy one for me with snoozes both days, I keep telling our little bundle of joy that we can't keep sleeping, the smallholding has jobs to be done!

The animals are all well. The goats and sheep enjoyed the day out in the field today. The goats are so funny hopping and skipping around, they really did let off steam!

The wild birds are hungry, all the feeders in the wood were empty. I do love the bird song on a lovely sunny day.

The wood does feel empty with no bees. Our membership for the local bee keeping group is due for renewal. This has prompted us to discuss bees for 2015, We are hoping we will be able to get a swarm to help keep the cost down. Dad is going to take over looking after bees with Gareth as having a baby around might make bee keeping a little challenging. It will be great for Dad to be so involved he has really enjoyed watching over the last few years.

I must take some photo's i am sorry my snapping has been rather useless of late. New Years Resolution, I will take more photo's!

Great food this weekend. Dexter burgers last night and Home grown chicken tonight with Carrots and parsnips out the garden.

Not a bad life.

We have pigs going on Tuesday so butchery is planned for next weekend. Eddie who butchered the beef is popping over for a few hours on Sunday to show Dad and Gareth how to butcher the shoulder of a pig into more intricate cuts.

I wish you all a good week.

Danni

I would like to wish you all a belated merry Christmas and a happy new year. 

We have been rather busy and are now enjoying some much earned Christmas lazing around! 

I finished work on Friday 19th December and it all started then! With pork being boned and diced ready for making pigs in blankets. 

Saturday I spent the day hot smoking pork loins for our thank you presents for friends and family. Mum then gave them a marmalade glaze, they looked and tasted fantastic. 

Sunday we cold smoked our hams and cheese. Several friends also brought their produce over for smoking. We had the smoker running for 14 hours, so everything was really well smoked.

Mick also came and dressed the turkeys. We had a really good production line with them all boxed, with their giblets, rosemary and cooking instructions within two and a half hours. We had a real whopper of a bird weighing in at a massive 12.04kg, that is safely tucked up in the freezer for us later in the year. 

All in all a very productive day. No stopping us though! Monday morning we picked up the beef carcass just after 7am. Gareth just managed to hang it up himself in the fridge before a bacon sandwich and then Eddie the butcher arrived. 

Wow is all I can say that man is an excellent butcher, he boned and rolled most of the beef. It worked really well, he broke the carcass down and then passed anything for boning out for diced and minced to Gareth. 

Tractor Bumble arrived mid afternoon to stay with us, we had promised him Dexter Beef steak on his return journey and what perfect timing. So we cooked T-bone steak for Mum, Dad, Nanny, Grandad, Tractor Bumble and Chris. Despite so many people Gareth cooked it a treat and we all sat down at more or less the same time for steak with all the trimmings. God bless Red Boy. 

After a late night we didn't wake up until 8.30am a real treat normally we are up long before that. That was only prompted by a phone call that an old friend Kev was on his way to collect his turkey! 

So after being a little late finishing the animals we packed all of our orders and I delivered some and then Gareth set off to drop of a few to work friends. Another long day but so rewarding and proud to see what we had produced. 

Christmas Eve was far more laid back to start with, as one person collected their meat another arrived by 1pm all the turkeys apart from 1 had been collected. The fridge was looking bare! Gareth went to drop the meat off at his parents which left me at home with Mum, Dad and Chris finishing those last minute bits for Christmas, or noticing than the brand new range cooker had decided that one oven wouldn't work. GREAT with a turkey, pork and beef to cook on Christmas Day! But we decided we would just have to manage and that Grandma would cook the pork only for me to hear HELP, THE COOKERS ON FIRE! Mum was warming the wok for the stir fry we were having for dinner some how with the new massive worker burner the oil had caught fire and the top of the cooker was engulfed in flames. They managed to put it out and all was under control. What a Christmas Eve.

Christmas Day flew past, we were all spoilt. Gareth and I had a certain theme with our pressies BABY. Which is perfect we have many of those essential things for those first few months. After a request I made a changing Mat must have farm animals on it gareth found one with sheep and Mum and Dad had a wonderful canvas of photos done for me of the animals.  Thank you to everyone who spoilt me I am very lucky. 

The food was excellent and a real treat to have home grown pork, turkey and beef. As well parsnips and leeks from a friends vegetable garden. 

I must say since Christmas, being pregnant has caught up with me I have done nothing but sleep. I have been trying to write this post for days! The baby has started moving around and generally as we are going to bed the baby is awake at around 9.30pm it's great to feel! But today I have been a little more productive. 

The pigs are in the concrete stie now, much better for them. Although they are nearly ready to go. Good old Uncle Maurice and Grandad have cleaned the other side of the stie out where the turkeys have been. I am so lucky with all the help they give us. So already for two new pigs in January. 

I have weeded some of the garden, trimmed back plants and planted bulbs. My plan is to get it finished before I can't bend over as easily! 

Haylage is all moved thanks to Uncle Maurice and Gareth and I am just finishing this post with my feet up in front if the fire with a lovely lime and ginger cordial! 

I hope I've not bored you with such a long post, I hope you have all had a wonderful Christmas and I wish you a happy new year. Here is to 2015. 

I'm sorry it has been so long, life is just very busy at the moment getting ready for Christmas.

It's been a hard week emotionally here! Tuesday morning saw the departure of another three lambs to the abbatoir.  Followed by Red the Dexter leaving us on Friday. I don't struggle with the lambs as much as Mum, I like it that they always go in a group. But the cattle are different we only raise one at a time and of course they are friendly. Which I don't think is a bad thing, I think it shows they have been raised with love. But it's very hard, he was a true gent to the end, he loaded well, travelled well and walked of the trailer into the barn at the other end. I was very proud of him. 

I did worn the lads at the abattoir,  I am pregnant and my hormones may get the better of me so please have the Kleenex ready! But I was strong and kept myself composed. The day flew past as I was out for the afternoon with customers from work. However when I got home to find the offal and his hide, the days events really tugged at my heart strings. 

Because Red was such a beautiful colour we have made enquiries to have his hide tanned into a rug, it's going to cost about £200, but it will be great that he will live on and we have utilised him as much as possible. Currently it's laying in the trailer on a table with 12kg of salt smothered across it. It's much wetter than a sheep skin and we have had to jack the trailer up with the jockey wheel to enable the liquid to run off. Fingers crossed it will be suitable to be tanned and we will have a rug. 

The carcass is being hung at the abbatoir   until the 22nd when it will be delivered home and butchered for our Christmas Orders. 

I also have the three lamb skins back and I am salting them ready for tanning into rugs.

We have been out twice in the past few weeks with the preserves. First to the local secondary school, which was ok, far fewer people that the previous year but we sold 15 jars. On Saturday we attended the Wilderness a Foundations Fun Festive Fayre. It was a rather chilly morning with a hard frost, but the sun was shinning. We sold an amazing 47 jars and met some wonderful people including a couple who live in Crete, who were telling us tales of their small scale farming. There was also a visiting farm from Bedfordshire, they had a donkey, a tiny dexter cow, a goat, sheep, ducks, chickens, geese and two Labradors all in one pen. I did loose mother to them a few a few times. I think she dreams of retiring and taking her sheep off to visit local schools. 

I also had my twenty week scan last week, all is well and the sonographer was excellent she explained everything she was measuring. Although when it came to the baby having a photo taken for us it didn't wish to pose it was fed up. So Claudia the vet who works with mum said I could lay on the operating table and she would get me a better photo at the vets for me!

The fridge is nearly finished, a good clean out this Saturday and the refurbished sink plumbed in and we are ready.  The drink frame has all been powder coated it looks fantastic!

Saturday is the day, Mick the turkey man arrives at 7am and the years raising of turkeys will come to an end. We have two birds left to find a Christmas Table for, if anyone is looking for a bird. 

Anyway off to bed now I am finding i need a little more sleep each night now. 

This week has flown by, I was 29 on Monday and goodness me wasn't I spoilt. Gareth brought me a new pair of Le Chamaeu Wellies, they are wonderful. Mum and Dad gave me money and brought us our first baby things, some baby grows, dummies and a rather lovely baby on board sign. 

One of my customers brought me a lovely Victoria sponge from his daughters tea shop. 

Dad has been away working all week, we have really missed him, but Gareth and I have been busy finishing bits in the fridge ready for dad's return each night. Today Dad, Maurice and Gareth has been bust putting up the wall sheets in the front of the fridge, it's really taking shape and we are on track to be finished for Christmas.

Mum and I have made over 50 jars of chutney, marrow and beetroot and mint. The shop we are supplying have sold their first ten jars so Nanny has delivered more this week.  It's been nice having a break from preserve making, but we still have produce to turn into preserves. So it was great to cross two off the list. I have labelled the marrow so just the beetroot left. We have red onion marmalade, pumpkin chutney and rosemary jelly still to make. It would seem the 4 oz jars are the most popular. We are hoping to order Mum a new cooker this week, we really have killed the current one. We had a lovely rather large joint of pork for dinner and it wasn't cooked all the way through so we have put it back in the oven, six hours later and it's still not cooked! Poor cooker she has been a faithful cooker but she is now exhausted and ready for the scrap heap. 

Mum and Dad were out at my grandparents for dinner last night so we enjoyed wonderful rump steak from Dennis, god bless him! 

The cattle have spent all week being hungry, but Red gave us a lay in this morning 7.45 before he was mooing for breakfast. They are really enjoying bananas as one of their five a day. They would do anything for a banana.  

We are off with some fellow smallholders tomorrow to give a talk to South East Essex Organic Gardeners, so I am creating a PowerPoint presentation of photos, so I shall wish you all a good week and carry on uploading photos. 

  

It's been a lovely weekend, I love it when you feel such a lot has been achieved!

We have been busy preparing for the sheep and cows to come home for winter this weekend.

Saturday saw mother and I moving All the electric netting for the sheep, about 300 meters of it. There is nothing that annoys poor mum more, it gets twisted, she stands on it and I even recall her falling over wrapped up in it once! But we have a good system now, I move it and lay it out flat and Mum pegs it into the ground. A few hours later job done! 

A nice warm up and poached egg for breakfast meant we were ready to prepare the barns for their winter guests. 

Dude and Fred the ram are in their winter quarters in the horses barn. Barricaded in as well as possible. Fred is rather revered up the moment, he should be working by now but as we aren't having lambs he will have to stay in the barn away from the ewes. 

The lambs are now in the barn next to the cows, with a few ewes who will be moved later this week. They will be finished on our haylage and then sold as freezer boxes of lamb. Apart from Peaches who will be joining the flock. 

We collected the cattle Sunday lunch time, thanks to Simon and Sally they were ready and waiting in the horses yard. All we did was drop the ramp and move the gate and and they walked on. They are now snuggled up in their straw bed. 

I can't believe how much Tulip has grown she is a real young lady now. Sadly Red will be departing on the first of December but he has had a lovely summer.

We have filled the Christmas Turkey Pen with bark, it was starting to get a little muddy.

Mum made me and early birthday cake, which was lovely for tea at three! I can't believe I'm 29 tomorrow. I remember leaving school like it was  yesterday!

Two excellent meals this weekend. Jamaican curry made with some mutton from our friend Nigel on Saturday. It was rather warming,  the peppers from the poly tunnel were a little hotter than I thought. But a really delicious way to use mutton. 

Tonight we enjoyed a pot roast Dexter beef joint. Delicious!!!

Anyway I wish you all a good week. 

 

I thought I had posted this a few days ago needless to say I posted it on the East Essex Smallholders Blog! So second time lucky here goes!

Goodness me what a long time it has been. I have so much to tell you all!

I think our first news should be that Gareth and I are pleased to tell you a new addition is coming to Furzedown in April. No it's not a lamb, piglet or calf but a baby! 

I hope that this place will be a wonderful home for child and we can't wait.

I do think that our smallholding plans will have to slow just a little next year to accommodate our change in life. One of the main things being Mum isn't going to have lambs it's just a little close to me having the baby and as I won't be able to help I think it's a sensible idea. There is no reason why we can't buy some weaned lambs for fattening so we can have some lamb. 

It seems so long ago, nearly a month when we sent lambs off. We had a lovely weekend butchering. Thanks to you tube Dad and Gareth had a go at boning the shoulders. Such a huge task but once rolled and tied looked fantastic.  

I also spent ten days tending and  salting the sheep skins. I did four of ours and five of Nigels. His skins were Jacobs and some cross breed brown skins. I think they will look amazing if the make it through the process.  Finally after two hours packaging them all up they left on TNT.  I look forward to them returning in January. 

Maurice has used his Trusty Tractor to lift some of the potatoes. That machine is a beast she makes him sweat, but what a good job it does. There are still some to come up but we will defiantly be doing it again next year. I have planted some onions and garlic in there now. 

We also hosted the second East Essex Smallholders Group Apple Day . Several families attended and we pressed a huge amount of apples into juice and cider. 

Dad has been working on the fridge in preparation for the Christmas meat to be prepared. It's looking really good.

Mum and I are booked to attend a couple of events to sell our preserves at. Not to mention they are now stocked at  Maldon's Tourist Information Centre.  

Busy weekend this weekend, the cows are coming home for the winter. The lambs are going into the barn for winter. And if time allows the ewes are coming home. 

We are busy taking orders for Christmas. We have a couple of turkeys left as well as Dexter Steak, mince and diced beef. 

Gareth is working nights this week and Mum has been to my Grandparents for dinner.so Dad and I have enjoyed a lovely roast chicken of ours. I am really enjoying our delicious meat birds.  A definite for next year.