Woke this morning to torrential rain. Looking out of the window and seeing all the water rushing down the drive had me rushing into waterproofs and outside to limit the damage. Simply putting some wood and soil across part of the road higher up diverted 95% of the water onto the field. All I had to do then was clear the small ditch in the yard and rake the gravel back up the drive to fill in the holes that were beginning to form. The rain had stopped by then so I was able to plant out the sweet pea and beetroot seedlings in the veg plot. That's as much as I can fit in my tiny plot. The beans don't look too good but everything else is growing well and in the conservatory the first green tomatoes are beginning to appear.
There were a few dryish spells and during one of those I loaded up the car with old plastic chairs and moss covered body boards and took them down to the dump. On the way back from the dump I called in at the supermarket and bought a new plastic bucket to make my elderflower champagne in. I'll bottle the first 10L tomorrow and start another batch so hopefully I'll have 20L if I can avoid the exploding bottle scenario that happened last time I made elderflower champagne. I'm also going to try and make some elderflower cordial but I had to buy the citric acid on-line as I couldn't get any in Ilfracombe. I also made a tray of flapjacks and a large pot of warming chicken soup.
Finally, our new toy. Peter part exchanged our ttemperamental heavy duty chainsaw for this much lighter and easier to handle model. Gone are the days when Peter would be out cutting down trees for other people and now we only need to use a chainsaw occasionally so this smaller one should be more suitable.
