OUTDOORS 40

In August, much in the vegetable line was croppable. Here you can see the horizontally growing tomato bushes beyond the corn with 2 cabbage patches. Our recent crops include the last of the raspberries - really - even the autumn ones are done now - and another handful of kale (I am getting 50% of it, as butterflies love to lay eggs which love to become caterpillars which love to eat it - and I haven't the heart to commit murder).

August continued and the array of crops varied, but basically consisted of corn, tomatoes and cucumber. Occasionally a stray potato is dug up as I dig ground over ready for the next crop or season and sometimes I will bring home a few chilies as shown above within my haul. The last week of the month brought me my first cabbage to harvest!

As evidenced above, tomatoes are piling up. A prolific crop from both poly tunnel and allotment plot this year, tomato sauce is on the diary agenda of things to cook and create - along with chili sauce and chili flavor vegan cream cheese. There are more crops building up...

...there we can see kale, cucumber, broccoli and chilies. It wasn't long before there were more tomatoes, though - along with corn, cabbage and our single passionfruit for 2018.

I was getting too many tomatoes - far too many. This is my second batch of tomato sauce - 6 jars total now, and I still have ripe and ripening tomatoes all over the kitchen - in the fruit bowl, on the dresser, and along half the windowsill....not to mention green and just turning tomatoes still on the plants!

INDOORS 63

To start today's post, I returned from a day out drenched from some heavy showers to find the interior not much better off than me. A trail of water was running down inside the window of the spare room... I have since polyfilled the entrance hole on both interior and exterior.

The bathroom saga continues - after the quote came in, I made an appointment to discuss details, while asking my son what he would prefer to do - JUST the bath replaced by shower at 3 grand apiece, plus basin/one wall paneled at around 3500 each, or 'everything' we want - at a bit more than we arranged or I had without raiding my fixed term deposit - providing he could loan me a grand til my term deposit matured and I could repay him the grand. He chose the 'everything' option.

We are getting the bath ripped out, a shower installed - the main 'essential', plus the ceiling lowered, walls panelled, a new basin with vanity to hide the pipes, and new flooring - all the extras to make a fancy, perfect room! Taking a look at the gross result of what we already have, I am sure you can feel my relief and joy at the thought of having an easy-to-clean, posh bathroom in a few months...

Currently, I really like our cabinet - which was Liz's 'old' one when she had her bathroom renovated by these guys 2-3 years ago - but far better than dad's wooden cabinet that was paint-peeled and stained. We are keeping the cabinet!

The coffee table that I collected with Liz of course needed assembly. Had it been Ikea, the 2-step instruction would not be the only simple part of this task - but it coming from Argos, screwing double ended screws into table legs took more than an hour - yes, for just 4 legs! Once I had clamped the screw in pliers, I could push/wind-on the legs, but this took a lot of time and sweat and was extremely difficult. Had I got a woodworker's clamp, I could have done this faster, but...

Once inserted into the legs 50%, it was just a case of screwing the leg with the protruding 50% of screw into the table top - this task was easier than the former and I was soon able to stop sweating and gathering blisters with the completion of my new coffee table.

INDOORS 62

A bagfull of recently dug up spuds is illustrating my latest crop from the plot. I have potato leaves gradually yellowing out and am able to bring 2-3 plants worth home per week. I have had a lot of trouble with wireworm this year and about a third of my crop is unusable, though. Next up was clearing, cleaning, and refilling the dresser.

As you can see, I have used former face flannels as lining. My late father had about two dozen in stock - as he bought new ones everytime one got a bit rough or stiff, only liking very soft ones - but I don't use them myself. As you can see below - it really needed a thorough clean! Actually, I think it will also go on my list of things to paint - which now includes the wine closet and coffee lounge pathway along with the pantry, as you will soon observe.

As you can see, even after a scrub, it looks kind of grotty in the corners - so it is also added to my 'painting jobs' list. As regular readers might recall, turning out the pantry is one of my favored chores. I don't know why, though.

Going back to the coffee lounge, you can see my windowsill has come up clean - and I exchanged my overgrown former flower tray for a lemongrass plant, throwing the former into the yard. Here was the seating arrangement - alas, only room for one person to sit and sip.

Oh look - I seem to have collected a proper coffee table - with room for more than one cuppa to be popped on top! Liz & I popped into Argos one Tuesday early in August and grabbed a coffee table for £20. That saved me carrying the package home balanced on my head! Now....to get it 'built' - no worries - I am used to assembling Ikea furniture, I thought...