Category: The fields.

Cold when cloudy.

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We had frost again last night but just barely and nothing seems to have been damaged this time. The morning walk was really pleasant, especially since Alma had another good day. We could even pass the new neighbours without her going crazy 🙂 🙂

We had pancakes today and I did the dinner for next week at the same time but in the slow cooker. I really wanted fried potatoes this time so I had already boiled some in the early morning, I know I could have done them raw in the oven but sort of wanted some old time fried potatoes, no one seems to do that any longer. Every time I do I can see my Mormon (mothers mother) in her kitchen frying potatoes and what ever leftovers she had in the fridge 🙂

I’ve continued the war against the stinging nettles but they seem to pop up everywhere, this time I didn’t get stung by them though 🙂 The seed sown peach tree looked rather fine down in the cool cellar but died slowly now when spring arrived. It did get the leaf curl disease at the end of summer last year so I’m guessing that it killed the little tree. I had already planted it but dug it up and now one of the seed sown apricots stand there instead I’ve also planted a seed sown quince tree ( Cydonia oblonga) at the best spot, climatewise that is, just in front of the old patio.

I even managed to fall asleep in front of the tv for a while, clouds covered the sky and when the suns heat didn’t reach us it wasn’t as pleasant outside any more, so I took a break and fell asleep during that time. Now the sun reaches us again so I almost feel guilty by sitting indoors 🙂 It is a short work week again, I really started to work at that factory at the right time 🙂 Unfortunately the holiday is on Thursday so I do need to work on Friday again but then again I’ve always liked it when I have a day off in the middle of week, it sort of feels like having two short work weeks during that one week 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day and after that perhaps have a go at those nettles again 🙂

Have a great day!

Heavy frost last night.

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My blue White wood anemone.

-6C (21,2F) here this morning. One could feel it in the air already late afternoon that it would be cold but I didn’t think it would drop down that much. The morning walk was really nice though because the sun was blasting heat towards us at the same time as the ground still was so cold that it evened itself out in a way. Alma was really bad at yesterdays walks but today she behaved really well again. For some reason she behaves like crazy when we pass our new neighbours even though we’ve met them several times and she likes both the humans and the dog, Can’t say she likes they cats though even though they run away long before we come close 🙂 🙂 🙂

This morning we didn’t walk that way so she was calm all the time, she even managed to stay reasonable calm when a deer ran away from our path and even though she saw a big goose in one of the fields she still didn’t start to scream and pull the leash, I so wish that behaviour could continue from now on but I now that’s just wishful thinking 🙂 🙂 🙂 we went down to the creek and it might have been even colder there because there were ice in some places almost all the way down to the water. The plus side with that cold mornings are no ticks waiting to attack us because they have dug down into the ground so they don’t freeze to death.

Otherwise I’ve mostly done chores today, like mowing the lawn, doing most of the laundry (I still have my working clothes to do, for some reason this company doesn’t provide a laundry service for working clothes and that’s the first time that has happened to me, so I’ll do that tomorrow. I still have to bake some bread if I want a sandwich for breakfast though. I do have hard bread at home but I’ve had that for two days now and is a bit tired of it to be honest. We’re having a short work week next week again 🙂 May first is the workers day here but I’ll need to work on Friday again but that’s ok.

I guess it is time to start baking that bread, it’ll most likely be French rolls and since it is a weekend I’ll most likely will have a cup of tea even though it might keep me up all night 🙂 🙂

Some managed the frost really well.
Others not so.
I’m starting to fill up the blue barrel with stinging nettle roots, I can win the battle but not the war 🙂

Have a great day!

Last warm and nice day fora while.

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My cottage is the one to the right.

Even though it has been cloudy almost all day, with an exception for the afternoon, install has been a rather nice day. 15C (59F). Not especially windy either but then again I rarely notice the wind here in the hollow where I live.

Alma behaved really well while we were walking and Malkolm didn’t pull the leash especially hard either. Birds were singing everywhere and we had some geese visiting us in the fields close to the forest.I wore my anorak but that was a bit too much, the only reason I did wear it was because I had no where to place the treats I bring on our walks 🙂 🙂

Greylags.

This hole is too small for a beaver but really too big to a water vole (even though they can get rather big and purely evil 🙂 🙂 🙂 I wonder if we might have muskrats here? I also think the hole is too small for a Nutria.

I’ve been a bit busy in the garden both yesterday and today, ripping up stinging nettle roots, removing an annoying weed called cleavers. The entire vine is covered with tiny hooks, much like velcro, so as soon as it hits it stays and also spreads it seeds everywhere, especially my garden 🙂 🙂 I now have it everywhere  and it is important to destroy the roots, otherwise it just comes back again 🙂 🙂 It would take forever to get rid of it so I’ll concentrate to remove it from areas where the dogs tends to walk. I was thinking of perhaps spray it with very salty water to see what happens. One can make tea from them though so perhaps I can get rid of it by drinking it away 🙂 🙂 🙂

New leafs on the Rowan tree.

I admit that I’ve been standing in the most odd positions to get rid of both the cleaver and nettle so today my legs have been aching a lot 🙂 🙂 🙂 It does of course help to walk around a lot but as soon as I’m sitting still the pain comes back 🙂 🙂 Could be worse though 🙂 I’ve also started to move out the citrus trees I still have indoors and in the cool cellar, perhaps a bit early because it will be much cooler tomorrow and rain will follow. The different weather sites can’t agree to how much rain we’ll have but anything from tiny amounts to up to an inch is suggested 🙂 🙂 🙂

The monsterkitten.

The dogs and the monster have been outside with me the entire day as well, We did take a nap around 11 am and I was even more tired when the alarm sounded so I stayed in the bed for forty minutes more 🙂 🙂 Still that didn’t help a lot 🙂 🙂 I bought two more sacks with soil and poured them out in the big wooden box but can’t say it helped a lot 🙂 🙂 Halt the surface is for the autumn flowering strawberries (why the flower in late summer and autumn I have no idea and they continue to do so until the frost takes them. Now I’ll have to figure out what more to have in the box. I’m thinking peas and beans since there’s a net at the back of the box where they can climb.

Nanking cherry.

I could have carrots there or perhaps some Japanese kale from seeds I bought, easier to cover both from any pests to be honest. I still have time to figure that out because art is way to early to sow them here now.

The white checkered lilies are always a couple of days after the normal ones.
Tulipa tarda, spreads almost like a weed 🙂
White wood anemone.
This is a natural hybrid between the white wood anemone and the yellow one. It is milder in its yellow colour and the Swedish name for it is Sulphur anemone.

It is time for that last cup of tea and I think I’ll have a couple of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies as well 🙂

The yellow wood anemone.
The blue coloured white wood anemone.
Have no idea what this white wood anemone is called.
Mahonia. Has those thorny leafs that the common holly has. This one will give blue berries that is said to taste like blueberries.

Have a great day!

They say it’ll rain tomorrow.

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Lungwort.

Another really nice and sunny spring day here. Started a bit cloudy but warm so I didn’t feel I had the right to complain 🙂 No cranes in the field though but I could hear some trumpeting in fields further away.

We walked down to the creek but in the opposite direction to what we normally do. It would have been nice to walk to the older forest but the ground is so wet around there that rubber boots are a necessity at the moment. The sun started to shine while we were out warming up the air quite a lot so after a short while it felt too much to wear an anorak 🙂

I continued to weed in the garden, today only nice weeds but yesterday I started to rip up stinging nettle roots. I could see the first shoots for the spring and decided I would at least slow them down this year. The shoots are edible after heating them up and can be used as a sort of spinach. People who do that always lies about those new shoots and say that they doesn’t burn, lies lies lies 🙂 🙂 🙂 So yesterday my hands burned and today they itch something bad 🙂 🙂

Besides that very little has happened here. Can’t say I remember what I’ve been doing but at the moment it does feel like I could have taken a long nap and still hadn’t rushed to do what I have done today 🙂 Tomorrow we’ll have a much cooler day and they’re saying we’ll have some rain as well, we barely got anything last time they said that. It’s not like we really need it but nature will love it anyway 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day and after that I have no idea 🙂

The cranes had arrived outside the cottage when we were back home again, they didn’t like to see me so they flew away 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

Spring is sprung.

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Still rather cold nights but after follows sunny and spring warm days. It was supposed to be windy all day but it seems the wind lost its breath after noon, so both me and my neighbours have been outside in the garden today and when my neighbours are outside none of the dogs can hear my voice or understand what I’m saying 🙂 🙂 🙂 Not even the monsterkitten was interesting enough for Malkolm to keep an eye on 🙂 🙂 Then again she mostly lays on the kitchen stairs sleeping in the sunshine 🙂

It was just above 0C (32F) when we went out for our morning walk and there was still frost on the trees and snow on the ground where the sun can’t reach it. Cranes flew above us and the small birds in the forest sang their spring songs. We saw a deer out on the bog but it was too far away for Alma to start screaming 🙂 🙂 🙂 I didn’t mind 🙂 she screamed enough when we passed the new neighbours 🙂 🙂

I’ve been busy in the garden for three days now and I must admit that I have some training sourness all over my body 🙂 🙂 I’ve done the first more serious weeding both in the vegetablegarden and the bigger one that used to be for vegetables as well but I last year decided should be a sort of flower meadow. Well I failed badly last year but can see signs that it might be better this year. If I had wanted it to be filled with only our wild flowers it would take lots of year to be successful, so instead I’ll have any kind of annuals bees like and also a few perennials. Plus I have lots of garlic growing in there as well 🙂 Perhaps mice, voles and deer will stay away from it if I have 🙂 🙂

So I’ve now filled my composts till maximum and I still have more to remove, well that’s a problem for later. I have lots of vegetable seeds but perhaps I need a few more flower seeds, annuals.  Still lots of time for that since nights will continue to stay below 0C (32F) for quite some time more and one never knows what April will be like, could be anything from summer warm to snow storms. So my body is aching but in a sort of good way 🙂 I slept unusually well these two last nights though 🙂

Last years model, new one is approaching soon.

Since something bit off big parts of my Pawpaw seedlings last autumn I bought five more seeds this winter and they arrived three days ago. These seeds are really tricky and even though I managed to get five small trees last year means nothing, I’ve read that not even in nature are the success rate higher than 25%. So all I can do is to hold my thumbs and cross my fingers because they might just as well rot instead. If any start to grow I have no idea how to make them survive next winter since what ever it was that bit them off did it in my cellar. To be honest it could just as well has been a certain monsterkitten that did that job 🙂 🙂 🙂 She will not be permitted to be in the cellar next winter 🙂 🙂 🙂

I know I’ll have to weed it soon again but the big job is at least done. I’ll have potatoes, some kind of cabbage, beans and most likely some peas in there as well.
The coming meadow, I hope I’ll get a better result this year. Why the fence You might ask? Dogs I’ll answer 🙂
The garlic seems to like it, these are just a few of them.
This is a perennial Hollyhock and I do hope more will show as spring is going forward.

It is time for that last cup of tea and perhaps I’ll have one of the newly baked french rolls just waiting in the kitchen 🙂

Have a great day!

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Lets hope the new neighbours are good ones.

It continued to snow here well in to the after noon today, thankfully the flakes were tiny so we didn’t get that much more on the ground. The snow actually started to melt on the south side of the cottage during the day but tonight they say will be nasty cold, down to -10C (14F) It will rise to above 0C (32F) during the day though but Saturday will be even warmer so I changed my plans on going to the grocery store tomorrow and go on Saturday instead.

We’re getting new neighbours again. The Beekeeper moved since they rented and the owner was too greedy to give them a fair prise. All we know so far about these new neighbours is that they’ll be renting and possibly buy later but I’m afraid it will be the same outcome again. The place isn’t worth half of what the owner wants to be payed for it. I do hope they like dogs since they most likely will have a visit from my two 🙂 🙂 🙂

The monster kitten hasn’t shown any interest at all in going out to the cold snow again 🙂 🙂 I think that one time will stay in her mind quite some time. I guess that she will mostly stay indoors next winter when it snows again but then again memory can be short lived so she might go out the first time it snows again 🙂

I was filling in a job application today but hit a wall 🙂 They wanted my high school  grades! It is soon 42 years ago that I graduated from high school and I know I have them somewhere but not where 🙂 🙂 🙂 It sort of feels like they only look for young people 🙂 🙂 🙂 If I find them I will fill in the application anyway. I have a very small cottage with few places to store anything and yet I can’t find anything here 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time to bake some rolls and have that first warm one with a cup of tea. Is there anything tastier than that first warm slice of bread, preferable with cheese that slowly melts?

Have a great day!

So now the snow falls again.

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Not the best photo but it is at least Cranes, they were flying to the other small lake we have in the nature reserve.

 

It is snowing again and will continue for a day or two more. How much we’ll get is hard to guess since they change the amount on the web sites all the time. It will most likely stay for the rest of the week but after that they’re guessing we’ll get warmer temperatures again. I’m not surprised though because as the first Crane arrives here we usually get at least one more snow storm before spring really arrives.

The two days previous to this one was quite wonderful though, a bit chilly in the mornings but sunny and temperatures rose to 10C (50F) and above. Lots more Cranes have arrived though so now I can hear them every morning as soon as I go outside 🙂 I’ve also heard the Larch and the Eurasian curlew. The last one has become a bit rare so I always enjoy hearing it again. So even if spring has reached a temporary halt it feels good to know it’s just around the corner.

I’ve been a bit busy now, well busy isn’t perhaps the right word but I have been to an interview at a staffing agency for a job in the same village as where I worked before but for another company. I must say it did feel like a good meeting so now I’ll have to wait and see what happens. The staffing agency will now recommend the people they think will work well for that company so all I can do now is to wait and hope for the best.

A while ago the employment agency asked if I wanted the help from a job coach and I said why not and today I met her for the first time. She asked me what I had done so far to get a job and it turns out I’m doing what they want me to do. I’ll have a talk with her over the phone every second week and meet her in person the other weeks. When I returned back home she had mailed me some links to companies looking for hiring people. So tomorrow I’ll send an application to each place, as long as the orange idiot doesn’t disturb the world too much I might have a chance.

I would say that the cold is gone but the coughing isn’t. Still very little coughing during nights thankfully. Lots of people have that cold or flu or what ever it is at the moment so I guess I should be happy about having it early especially now when we’ll get winter weather back. I could at least go outside to enjoy the sunshine and warm weather, those having it now just have to suffer through it and not have anything to make the day better.

Can You see the back of the wild hog in the middle of the photo?

Our morning walk was quite nice though, despite the cold wind and dark skies. We walked out to the bog and stood at the end of the peninsula. Alma is behaving so much better now, even the whining is quieting down. We stood there at the end looking out over the bog, all quiet, when we suddenly heard something walking towards us in the thicket. Two wild hogs that must have known we were there suddenly showed themselves to us. This was a bit too much for Alma so she started to whine a lot, so they slowly turned away from us and walked in to the thicket again. I did however get a photos of one of them, even if it only was the back side of it 🙂

It is time for something to eat, haven’t had dinner today. Thinking something easy like sausage and baked white beans. I’ll have my last cup of tea for the day after that 🙂

More croci are showing up just before winter comes back.
Also some spring irises show now. They are built to survive some time of winter returning.
Dying needles on the Himalayan cedar, lets hope it just sheds of the old needles and not dies.

Have a great day! 

Another wonderful spring day.

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So any photo with sunshine is from yesterday.

Two days with temperatures above 10C (50F). Yesterday sunshine all day and today we weren’t supposed to have sunshine so it started to shine after we had come back from our morning walk and lasted almost until the sun was about to set. It has been so nice to being outside but colder weather is on the way. Tomorrow will be the last day with spring temperatures and after that it’ll cool down a lot.

However one isn’t getting any wiser by looking at the weather sites  because they show so different temperatures that it’s impossible to even guess 🙂 🙂 So I’ll do my best to enjoy tomorrow and the sunshine we’ll get.

Most of the cold is gone now but I still have the coughing and I know it most likely will stay for quite some time. I’ve either coughed so hard or sneezed, because I do that as well, that a new little muscle most likely is ruptured but now on my right back side. I know it isn’t Alma this time because she has behaved exemplary these last days. The only thing she still does that annoys me is the whining but actually less than normal. We have of course only walked where the risk of meeting anyone is minimal but I’m still impressed!

I drove to the grocery store yesterday and checked if I could see any Crane but no such luck, lots of different geese and what we call song swans (relatives to Trumpet swans). I think however that I heard a crane this morning but the sound was hard to hear because it was from a long distance. Still they will start arriving any day soon now 🙂

The first one I found today. The sun broke through and the croci opened up 🙂

Yesterday I also allowed Sara to be outside with us. The door was open because I was going in and out of it for a while and then she nonchalantly tried to walk outside not knowing I had my eyes on her the entire time 🙂 🙂 So I carried her around in the garden and then let her walk on the biggest branch of my biggest apple tree. I think she liked it but she wasn’t even close to want to go outside today, lots to so through for her I guess 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea and then watch some tv I think 🙂

Have a great day!

Windy.

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More or less s storm outside and it will be worse during the night so we haven’t had any walk today, too dangerous to walk amongst trees in these winds. The steady wind isn’t that bad but the gusts are, we’ve spent a lot of time in the garden instead, not the same but better than nothing.

Alma is close to ending being in heat and Malcolm’s injection is close to sick in to a 100% so tonight Malkolm and I won’t be leashed together so all of You cross Your fingers and hold Your thumbs for good luck and that my guess is right 🙂 🙂 🙂

I’ll also go the the grocery store for the first time in a long time tomorrow and I’ll bring the dogs, Alma in the back seat so she has plenty of space to be tangled into the safety belts 🙂 🙂 🙂 and Malkolm beside me in the passenger seat. The winds will still be strong so it’ll be fun to drive to the top of the mountain with no shelter from the forest 🙂 No risk of tipping over in the gusts but I’m pretty sure it’ll be a bumpy ride 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is soon time to bring out the monster kitten to the garden, I’ll need to make some kind of harness because I don’t want her to walk away by her own already now. She’s too small to meet any of the bigger cats in the area on her own yet. It is so much easier in summer when the doors are open all day and she can walk in and out as she pleases and most likely won’t walk away too far, I can say that all she wants right now is to wander the world by her self and she’s really not prepared for that.

It is time for that last cup of tea and then watch some tv.

Have a great day!

Feeling better and spring’s approaching :-)

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We’ve had a couple of wonderful spring days here. Chilly nights perhaps but sunny and warm days. The birds are singing spring songs and I hear the drum rolls from woodpeckers all over the forest. Earlier in February I also heard the owls when it went dark and I do like that sound. Haven’t heard the foxes or the Lynx so far though.

The cold is slowly going away, it shows no hurry to do so though but it is easier to breathe now when the pain is almost gone but a too deep breath only starts the coughing again 🙂 🙂 🙂 It doesn’t feel like I’ve run a half marathon when we come back home after our walks either thankfully. By the way the photos You’ll see today can be from three days, two days ago or from today.

The monster-kitten is back to her evil ways, every day she attacks the dogs 🙂 🙂 Alma has finally started to react to it so the little monster has realised she’s best to use when napping and not playing 🙂 Malkolm still accepts that she chews on him but then again he’s just a year old yet so that might change. His shot has finally started to kick in while Alma slowly is going out of heat. Every now and again though they show that I still can’t trust them being alone for any longer period of time 🙂 🙂 🙂 I must say that being leashed to him during nights is working without any problems at all, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have said that if it was Alma who had to be leashed to me, she would have been dragging me on the floors all over the cottage 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day. I’ll have nothing to eat though, a good thing with this cold is that I haven’t been hungry at all, normally no sickness of any kind has dampened my appetite but this one has 🙂 I’ve been under surgery lots of time and every time I have woken up I’ve asked when I can have something to eat 🙂 🙂 🙂

Have a great day!

Warmer winds.

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So today was the last day with cold weather and sunshine for quite some time it seems, I’ll miss the sunshine but not the temperatures 🙂 The low pressure is arriving with a roaring wind now and it might even be as warm as 10C (50F) already on Saturday.

This morning however was still pretty cold and the sun shone as well. Thankfully once again totally wind free (it arrived later in the day) so it was quite nice being outside walking. Alma behaved reasonable well but Malkolm pulled the leash instead. He’s not that big and strong though so that isn’t so bad to be honest but if Alma isn’t allowed to do it neither is he. I must start thinking about the possibility that the tutor on my kidney has grown and that I’ll get treatment during the summer so having dogs pulling the leash when I most likely won’t be especially strong is a bad idea. However we aren’t there yet so perhaps I can make them both calm down by then.

I’m so lucky that my neighbour works in a supermarket now when Alma is in heat and the shot Malkolm had doesn’t work properly yet because I realised that the cat litter wouldn’t last for long so she brought home a bag for me plus I suddenly had a craving for some soda, I normally don’t drink soda unless I have a head ache so it will be something with caffein in it. Today I wanted something else, so now I have pear soda at home. I didn’t think they still made that so when she said they sold it I really wanted it 🙂 🙂 🙂 I remember when being at my mormors’ (grandmother on my mothers side) I was always allowed to go downstairs to get a soda and I usually chased between raspberry soda or pear soda 🙂 I was also always allowed to take an ice cream if I wanted to 🙂

The monster kitten was allowed to be without the cone of shame for a couple of hours today and she really enjoyed it. Tomorrow it’ll be eight days after surgery so I’ll allow her to be without it even longer and on Saturday she will not have it any more. It should be totally healed already now I think but it might still be a bit fragile I guess so better be safe than sorry. The scar doesn’t seem to bother her at all though   but to be honest neither does the cone 🙂 The only thing is that the the place where the cone is tied together seems to be itching, as soon as it goes off the itching stops.

Today I won’t have that last cup of tea for the day, instead I’ll have some pear soda 🙂

Have a great day!

Foggy and cold.

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I woke up to a thick fog this cold morning, it was so thick that there wasn’t any idea to take a walk in it 🙂 at least not if I wanted to be able to take some photos. So we had a calm morning where all the animals took a nap on the sofas and I watched something on tv.

It was still pretty cold when we went out but no wind so it was quite  enjoyable walking around. Alma behaved pretty well for the first time in a long time so that made the walk even better. It was almost totally quiet in the forest except for some quiet tweets from small birds called Long-tailed tit. It is more or less a ball of white feathers and a tail just as long as the body. In my opinion the cutest bird there is. Unfortunately they never sit still for any longer period of time so I never got a good photo of them.

We were almost at home when suddenly tiny snowflakes started to fall around us. They must have been created in the fog somehow and it was an odd sight seeing that it snowed in the fog 🙂 🙂 We were supposed to have sunshine all day but since I like fog I for once didn’t think bad thoughts about our weather service 🙂 🙂  We did get a few hours of sunshine from around noon and till the sun set so we were out in the garden a couple of times, I don’t dare leaving Alma and Malkolm alone for more than a minute or so so even I was outside 🙂 🙂

I was going to do a simple meat sauce today and then boil some rice noodles but then I saw this opened package with frozen vegetables, so I tossed those in as well. I also bought white baked beans from a brand I’ve never tried before. To be honest they don’t taste bad at all but they don’t taste right and by that I mean Heinz baked beans 🙂 I had one package left so I tossed in those as well 🙂 and I do like mushrooms so why not have that as well 🙂 I was looking at it slowly boiling when I realised that I could put in the noodles as well and let them soak in some taste. I now have dinner for at least five day I think 🙂 🙂 🙂

Since I was going to be by the stove for quite some time making dinner I also baked some bread. Normally I always put grated cheese in the dough but I didn’t have any at home but they turned out quite well anyway. We were in the garden in between and I could see that both the apricot trees and the peach tree looks really well, not even the thinnest twigs had frozen, the same on the red mulberry tree, the white and the black one is badly damaged though. The persimmon has damages and so do the pawpaws but as it looks right now the pawpaws have just frozen at the tiniest twigs.  It is however the early spring that do the most damage here, when the air is warm and waking up the vegetation but the ground is frozen so the plants can’t get the water they need, so there’s still time for them all to die 🙂 🙂 🙂

It is time for that last cup of tea for the day but I still feel full after that dinner so I will not have a sandwich to eat. Almost sad since the bread is as its best while it still is a bit warm and it isn’t the same to heat it upon the oven I’m afraid.

Have a great day!