Retrospectives

[hedgewizard]

Anyone want to share a summary of what they've been up to in the last year? You can read mine here.

[multiveg]

I think of 2007 as a non-year. I didn't get down to the plot much and somehow, my heart wasn't in it - things weren't planted out at the appropriate time and therefore got slug eaten/pot bound etc, and other plants were neglected...
This year, with getting a second plot (1st March), I hope to do a lot more, remember to sow seeds and plant on, and be organised. I also will be doing a German OU course this year (oh, how my German is rusty).

[MikeM]

I'm another who is writing off '07 as a non starter (well, fell at the first anyway) for reasons waaaaay to tedious to explain. This year, however...

[red]

2007 - we put up a greenhouse, dug 6 huge veg beds (about 28'x12' each one) raised lots of veg (despite the blight and terrible weather). Pictures hereWe planted some soft fruit and top fruit.
We put in lots and lots of fencing, by hand and looked after our first sheep for a year, and had our first experiences of flystrike, shearing, and general husbandry. We borrowed a ram, and hope for lambs this year.
We went on a 'dealing with your fleece' course, and a lambing course. We set up lots of water butts.
We built a hen run - 25mx4m and built a hen house, and got our chickens.
We took out a fireplace thingy, and installed a woodburner. We partly reconstructed the kitchen.

the rest of the time we just idled away!

[Annpan]

Moved from a flat in the city to small house with a huge garden in the country.
Dug 6 small veg patches and grew some beans, lettuce, spinach, cabbages and potatoes.
Found dry-rot in house.
Watched house be semi-demolished and rebuilt (poorly I may add)
Lived in a building site.
Got a Woodburner.
Just about managed (with a lot of help from a few friends) to get a livingroom by Christmas.
Learned alot, from books and 'ish.

Brought up a baby, who is now a wonderfully inteligent, cheeky and content toddler.

Still managed to smile a little at the end of each day


I did not bad... but I plan to do much more fruit and veg growing this year, and less of the re-building the house things.

[red]

oh yeh - I forgot to add that we both have jobs and I home educate our son....

Ann - I also did major house renovation when I had a baby, so do know how much harder that is!

[Chickenlady]

Spent lots of money greening our house: super insulation, new windows, new boiler and radiators, solar panel for heating water.

More or less gave up trying to make a living from teaching yoga and became a childminder. I am now more solvent and less supple.

Got some new chickens that were going to become pet food from the farm down the road.

Dug another veg patch (well, encouraged OH to do so).

Resigned myself to having two hormonal teenagers who do a lot of door slamming and spot picking.

Not a bad year, really!

[hedgewizard]

More solvent and less supple... can I use that?

[Ellendra]

Let me just say, I hope 2008 turns out better than last year.

I bought 5 acres of beautiful country in April

In May I planted 20 fruit trees and 2 bee hives.

In June, my brothers wife went psycho, took their 5 year old son and disapeared. When my brother sent the police out to find them, she used the magic word "abusive" and the cops refused to interfere.

A week later, somebody turned the gravity up by about 50x, and I found myself sprawled on the ground unable to get up. At the hospital they said I'd had a kidney infection that went systemic.

It took 4 weeks to get the infection under control, by which time it had done some serious damage to the soft tissues in my lower back. The muscles in that area are still useless. If I try to walk or stand for more than about a minute, it feels like I'm being hit in the back with a sledgehammer. I lost my job because I couldn't walk.

In August my brother went into the hospital with chest pains and shortness of breath. There was a pocket of air around his heart, which disipated on its own. But while he was there they discovered that one of his lungs was so covered in scar tissue that it was less than half normal size. The doctor described it as having a cest cavity poured full of concrete. He had a very dificult surgery to remove the scar tissue so the lung could expand.

Meanwhile, my brother's (ex)wife kept playing psychological games, saying one thing in court and another in person. It wasn't until September that the court allowed my brother to have court-supervised visits with his son for 1 hour per week.

In October, my parents sued for grandparental visitation. The court decided that both my brother and his son could stay at my parents house for weekends.

Today there was suposed to be another hearing to decide my nephew would be homeschooled by his mother or attend a public or private school, and whether or not he would be immunized. The hearing was postponed, allegedly because ex-SIL had agreed to put him in school and get him his shots. But, she hasn't, and in fact she steadfastly refuses to do so, even though she told her own lawyer that she would. She has pulled some stunts that have led me to believe that she's either a pathological liar or schizophrenic (possibly both). I'd rather not type some of the sicker things she's done.

And I haven't seen a paycheck since June. My savings will run out in February.

Happy New Year, God help us all
-Ellendra

[hamster]

Oh, Ellendra, that sounds like an immensely stressful year. Best wishes for you and your family that 2008 sees you all healthier and happier.

At least you've got those fruit trees...


In 2007, I:

Got a degree.

Started living somewhere bigger than a single room.

Had four attempts at growing coriander, which all failed.

Grew some spinach in a box, but I planted it too late and it stopped growing when the weather got colder.

Relearnt how to knit and made some mittens.

Acquired and mostly restored a clapped-out old sewing machine.

Started composting.

Made jam for the first time.

[eccentric_emma]

my 2007 was fairly eventful although it doesnt feel like ive achieved much! at the very end of 2006 my fiance and i lost our jobs and our home (we ran a pub so both came together), so started out the year living in my parents back garden cabin and feeling very hard done by (we basically got thrown out so our managers friend could have a successful business to run). soon got offered another job running a pub which ended up with us getting bar stools thrown over the bar at us and a crack addict living across the road from us gave us serious issues so we left there, did a bit of travelling in america and the netherlands (lived in a van for a while in the netherlands), got married, then finally found jobs that we like with a lot of time off and a lot less stress than the pub trade! i also got a bit better at cooking and have managed to knock up some cracking stews and managed to get my husband to start eating something other than bacon and chocolate. in november, one of the best things happened to help us on our way to self sufficientishdom - after finding out that the waiting list for allotments was 4 years long, we felt a bit defeated until a lovely man down the road donated us a quarter of his garden for free to use on an allotment style basis. and finally, after a year of living on and off in my parents back garden cabin, we've been offered a furnished house to rent from a family friend at a really low rent.

so 2008 is looking up!

[Cheezy]

Anyone want to share a summary of what they've been up to in the last year? You can read mine here.

Can I say Hedgy your summary is absolutly brillient. I have pissed about all afternoon reading it (at work bored ,cold and pissed off. Once I get Harry or Charley finished that's it I'm out of here), trying not to get caught by m'staff, or over heard chortling, with the more than occasional stifled laugh. I shall be thinking of mafiosa mice all evening.

We started the year with one raised bed and a hell of a lot of weeds. Ended in something which is locally called the plastic fantastic and 6 raised bed, with 3 more to build, plus 2 flower cutting beds and a fruit cage to go. They may laugh at my weed suppressant and free plastic fencing, but I'm the one still cropping cabbages,leeks,beets,fennel.
And this year is going to be even quicker and easier to get up and running.

[hedgewizard]

You're too kind - I'm here all week. Try the veal. (or not)

You got your fruit cage done. Jealous.

[mauzi]

I thought it was great to Hedgewizard. Very interesting reading.

This year for us has been quite a big one. Besides working further on a rammed earth loft cottage (prep for the house project which has been delayed further due to the very wet weather we have been having) we have been working further on developing our farm to be as self-sufficient as possible. The orchard and vege growing area (also extended) has been covered with hailnetting, breeding programmes for livestock and poultry are now well in place, more fencing happening, new power system is now in - yesterday in fact - which is a combination of solar, batteries, listeroid backup generator (you know the old chug, chug, ones - wind generator purchased but not up yet), medicinal herb areas now developed and growing away, delicious trees are now planted in their small groves - gosh it has been a busy year.

Great to hear what everyone has been doing. Thanks for the thread.

[possum]

In the past year, well we have done a lot, we bought this place in december, just over a year ago.
We have learn about keeping sheep (and decided not to do it again)
I have made my own black pudding having held the bucket whilst the homekill butcher killed the sheep
We got our first ducks (and second, thirds, forth etc etc)
we got our first chickens
I got and milked my first goat
Helped shear an alpaca (not mine)
I learnt the value of irrigation rather than drainage
I for the first time felt 38C heat