About Me

We moved out to Portugal to live a frugal but better , simpler and peaceful life, our house is a very basic, semi ruin, up in the hills outside Figueiro Dos Vinhos, where we work our land, enjoy life with each other and our dogs, and hope to make the smallest carbon footprint we can,

Thursday 2 December 2010

Busy week.

Well its been a busy few days ... the lovely Greg (our last helper) left on Sunday for pastures new, hes down the Algarve with a German/Portuguese couple for a couple of weeks and then off skiing for Christmas... He was amazing, so much work, so strong amd such a genuine bloke too. He and Rik really hit it off and ganged up on me and teased me mercilessly most days. That was good, generally we have female helpers and Rik often feels outnumbered... so it was my turn for the last few weeks... We miss him a lot...
I cancelled the other couple that should have arrived during the next few days, the money situation, coupled with not great weather and being so near to Solstice and Christmas, plus the upset over my dads death made it the right decision for us we feel. We'll be more upto welcoming people into our home again by spring...
Having said that, we've had plenty of friends popping in to see if we are ok so life hasnt been quiet either...

The weather has been a bit pooh ... plenty of rain, but its settled down to just a few scattered showers now and quite a lot of bright sunshine, not very warm though ... and if you get stuck in the wind... its damn cold!
But its keeping the garden going, we did have a couple of hard frosts last week but the rain has kept them off since, Im picking cauliflowers and cabbages and trying to weed the winter peas and leeks between showers. The carrots are finally finished, they were great and a absolute must for next year now we've had such success. The grelos is very slow, although the packet said 40 days... its been 50 and no sign of being near to eating size yet...
Rik has been repairing walls and trying to make as much water tight as possible, the last lot of rain didnt come in the house at all.... but Im not holding my breath just yet...
Ive been baking, and making soup most days, we eat soup for lunch almost every day now its cold... and I'll be looking out the sewing box and getting to the mending soon as well... cleaning shelves, and cupboards, and generally doing all the indoor housy type things that dont get done during summer...