Liosach's Lines

After church, we had to pop in to a couple of shops for a few things.  The most important was some entertainment for the hens...a big success so far! I then popped next door to Argos, where Colin insisted on buying me a fitbit...well, ok, I've been after one for ages.  So, obviously the rest of my day was spent playing with my new toy...managed to fit in a  visit to the parents too though.

We had a disgustingly early start today, but after that, things most definitely improved.  Despite sore throats and blocked noses, we all trooped off into Oban to this year's Highlands and Islands Music and Dance Festival.  Ealasaid only sang in two competitions this year, coming first in the Scots song, with Skyscraper Wean and second in the song from the shows, singing Tomorrow, from Annie, despite her voice disappearing fast by that time.  Alasdair was taking part in the festival for the first time too...which meant there was no way on earth Ruairidh wouldn't be participating too!  Their rendition of Ten Little Squirrels was one of the highlights of the festival, according to at least one person - it was a unique, fun-filled, enthusiastic performance, which got the biggest cheer of the day in the hall.  It wasn't the best musical performance in the world, but their sheer joy at taking part was wonderful to see and promising for their future.

Well, yes, it is more gardening!  This time, the polytunnel got a makeover, with all the accumulated rubbish and mess being cleared out.  We're now back to basics, with several empty raised beds waiting for contents and the strawberries and the fruit bushes sheltering happily from the birds.  Lots of planters have also been cleared out of weeds and topped up with compost.  They're now positioned all around the garden, instead of being rammed together inside the polytunnel.  And my new flame gun and hedge trimmer have arrived, so lots more garden fun awaits!

So I decided that "work from home" meant complete said work before Monday, but not necessarily today.  Well, it was a dry, mainly sunny, not too windy and not even too cold day, so what else could I do?!  Tier one of my gutter garden along the fence is now complete...just waiting for Homebase to oblige with a delivery of more clips so that tier two can also be completed.  A lovely, long row of lettuce is now happily ensconced in tier one, which I was filling at one end before Colin had finished attaching the other end to the fence.  He was pleased!  Now I'm just hoping that the plants and soil will have a firm enough grip to withstand any gales or other severe weather.   The hen houses were also given an internal makeover, which also meant I gained lots more manure for fertilising my raised beds.   Colin had even more fun though, digging out my old raised beds, using the waste from there to fill in gaps along the fence so the dogs/ hens/ children ...

After work today, I grabbed a quick lunch and then headed straight out to the garden.  Dad and Colin were also having lots of outdoor fun, picking up the remains of the dyke wall, which had collapsed into the road.  Thankfully no one was injured during the collapse, which could have been kind of fatal to anyone unlucky enough to be passing at the time.  They've made not too bad a job of the repair, though Colin wants to add a bit more fencing to make the garden a bit more secure.   I avoided the rocky weight lifting and got on with some planting instead.  Three bags of potatoes are now planted, plus a couple of planters and a tray of lettuce.  I have also finally got two wall planters I bought several years ago actually attached to the wall.  They're now filled with lobelia and petunia, which will hopefully play well together!  Colin also lined the edge of the stone chip area, where it meets with the lawn area, with large stones, ably assisted ...

I was quite chuffed yesterday to find a couple of lenses for my camera that I'd lost a while back.  So, apart from work, plus a trip to the cafe at the Comann Eachdraidh with Nicky, the main highlight of today was playing around with the lenses, trying to get used to them again.  The macro one is working well, but I think I need to do a bit more practising with the wide angle one...seems fine at some points but a bit fuzzy some of the time.  Hopefully a good clean will sort it out though.  Interesting to fit so much more into a photo than is normally possible though, or on the other hand, to see so much more in a tiny bit of detail.  

Woke up to beautiful sunshine streaming through the windows...but by the time I was ready to go out the door, hailstones had started falling, closely followed by snow!  It was definitely an interesting day weather-wise.  Gales meant several ferries were cancelled, so Mum and Dad weren't able to get over till the 4pm ferry, instead of the 11am one, despite the valiant efforts of the ferrymen.  I'm just hoping my poor wee plants which have only just gone outside will be able to survive this delightful pre-summer weather.  The hens are most disgruntled with it, as are the children, though for slightly different reasons - the kids were hoping the snow would lie, whereas the hens were hoping for an end to this nonsense and back to their nice, spring sunshine.  I wonder what tomorrow will bring...!