And the sheep are back.

Ten in the field and one in the freezer (but don't tell the grandchildren). 

Will anyone notice there is no door?

The bathroom door has come off for carpet fitting. 

Showery weather....

(Sorry about the shower jokes, they will stop soon. ) ( the jokes, not the showers) 

Still working on the new shower. It has been possibly the most difficult shower ever - trying to fit the new plumbing into the old pipe work, which is built into the solid wall, has not been easy. And then fitting panels over the plumbing......

Still it all seems to be working now...and should be finished tomorrow. Then there is the new carpet to go down.....

July showers.

The next few days will be spent indoors fitting the new 

New tray....

and Respatex panels for the shower walls. 

Back home after a week away.

We have been away for a week visiting family and friends all around! Birmingham, Tetbury, Stone, Warwick and Stratford on Avon. 

The garden continued to grow in our absence so we are one step backwards from the three steps forward we took. 

Today has been a day of weeding, pruning and grass cutting. Here are some highlights. 

The visitors have gone.....

Roger and Judith that is, the rabbits and squirrels are still here. 

Back to work....

Unbelievable mess under the shower. Much worse than we imagined. Because it is on a concrete tiled floor we never noticed the problem; if it had been upstairs we would have seen drips through the ceiling. The shower had been incorrectly fitted so all the frame seals were leaking. Pesky amateurs. 

 

All gone now.

Dumb animals!

We are trying to train the baby rabbits to eat the grass in a spiral so that they keep the lawn tidy. 

It is not working so Roger and I have been mowing grass today. 

Making the visitors work.

Fruit picking....

Flying visit.

We had put out some fat earlier and spotted the kite circling overhead. Judith had some rolls left over from their traveling lunch so I put them out on the table. Who knew that kites liked ham and mustard and cheese and tomato? Obviously everyone loves walker's rolls....

Visitors.

We have visitors in the house ( Roger and Judith ) 

and visitors in the garden

 plus a young squirrel eating the cherries and gooseberries. But he was too far away to photograph. 

Working indoors.

While the rain waters the grass I have been busy touching up paintwork and fixing the shower. 

Rain stopped play......

Luckily all the grass cutting had been finished and the trimming of the willows too. The grass was desperate for rain so it is good - it should all be nice and green for roger and Judith's visit next week. 

The next few days will be spent indoors touching up the paintwork and fixing a leaking shower. 

Today's tasks....

Clean RosieMay, continue with the grass cutting, standby and watch Neville and Liz rounding up the three sheep for shearing and weave the willow into the roof of the tree house. All done. 

The good new today was that there are lots of goldfish in the pond. I had seen three when we cleaned it out but now that you can see the water again we can now see lots of fish. 

When your remember that these are related to the original goldfish from the Rodborough pond it is quite amazing - I am not sure how many generations we are talking but quite a few. 

The fight back continues...

We are continuing to remove a month's worth of growth of grass, flowers and mainly weeds. Kate has done wonders in the borders and I have struggled with the grass. It is now all mown down and after some more sunshine I will collect it all up. 

Here are some flowers which are more interesting than grass......

And what is even more interesting than flowers? Alcohol. Last year I made some apple wine using a recipe off the Internet. It was very basic and didn't do fancy stuff like Camden tablets and sterilisation. I was not hopeful but I bottled it up and put it in the garage for the required six months. I have just opened the first bottle. It is a very nice sparkling white wine! I didn't expect fizz and I did expect the aroma of pea pod. But even Kate is drinking it, albeit diluted as she is not sure how alcoholic it is. Nor am I. 

It's been a while....

We have been away ( Italy, see http://www.rosiemaytravels.co.uk for details ) so now it is time to recover the garden. Cath comes in while we are away to mow the top lawns and keep the flowerbeds by the lawn tidy but the rest of it just grows wild. 

I have been trying to mow the grass - I have been strimming it with the push along strimmer, leaving it for a day to dry then picking it up with the ride-on mower - it can't cope with the grass when it is so high. 

The polytunnel and the greenhouse have been weeded and sweet peas, beans and tomatoes have been tied up. 

Today the main task was the pond which was overwhelmed with pondweed - Kate and I tackled it and it is now much improved; you can actually see water now.