Ive decided to get back into the grove of posting and try doing this December book challenge!
So a book by my favourite author, and hear me out here – Jeremy Clarkson.
Yes he is a bit of an oaf but I do get a proper laugh reading his articles and books, like cry laughter. I have some respect for Jeremy with his farming venture, and I’ve watched him from his Top Gear days since I was little.
He writes articles for the times on a weekly basis, and his books are generally compilations of these.
I genuinely think he has a way with words and I can just hear everything he writes in his voice and I’ll happily finish a book in an evening!
Hello, sorry I’ve been quiet recently. I have ideas for posts but honestly just sometimes don’t know where to start. The other thing Im struggling with is photos to go along with content and being on Instagram now is making me feel a bit useless when it comes to content in general.
I’ll get back to it, just taking some time to find my feet a little.
But I thought I’d do a little catch up here. I’m feeling quite content with life just now. Nothing major but the little things make me happy.
Little things like seeing a double rainbow at work the other day. The weather has been so cold but it’s been pretty dry so it’s been lovely to throw on another layer and crack on.
The RNLI part of my life is a wee bit quiet just now but come January that’s going to get pretty busy with the arrival on a brand new Shannon Class ALB to replace our trusty old Trent Class which will be turning 30 next year. It’s been nice doing odds and end around the station too and we even had some local school kids come and paint a mural at our local harbour to commemorate the boats and the local landscapes and it’s just brightened the place up so much! I’ll do a post sometime about lifeboating too.
Work is crazy just now and means I never really know what day it is! I passed my final exam last month which I kept quiet, but I’m over the moon to be able to say I’m now a qualified Electrician! I’m thinking about continuing with University but I’ll see where I’m at next year and see if I can handle the extra workload!
I haven’t done anything else in the garden since my last post. My plan is to still to grab some pallets and make a few raised beds so I can expand my little growing area. Once the frost has passed I’m going to try a little picking flower area beside the drive way too!
I’m trying to make sure I’m picking up on all the smalls things in life too. Like the fact I can take my doggy for a lovely wintery walk, watching all the little flowers still popping up or making the most of the weather.
I’ll start by saying that word took me four attempts to spell.
But this is something I want to do more of. Say yes more.
I’m very much an introvert. I really struggle with socialising, especially small talk. I don’t really drink anymore, I don’t enjoy going out.
But I want to see places, meet people, explore new places. That’s what Im going to start saying yes to.
The first spontaneous trip I think i went on was to Scone Palace in Perth, Scotland. I was already away for a few days with my friend and we had a day to ourselves so I did some Google mapping about what was in the area. We thought it might be boring as its not something either of us would normally chose to do but Im so glad we did it!
We just drove up and I parked. We went into the shop to find a little map and we just walked! First we came across the maze which we ended up running round with some kids! When you came out you were met by such an elegant fountain before heading down the path towards an old cemetery.
There’s something a little humbling about looking round old headstones.
We followed this by a walk around the walled gardens. There’s a little cottage in the middle where I believe the gardener stays and this was a beautiful area!
Following on we came across the kids play area and we just had to a have a wee go! This is just beside Perth racecourse.
We eventually found our way back to the palace and sat with a little coffee and cake.
The day wasn’t anything exciting but it felt lovely to just have a wander, have a laugh and explore somewhere I didn’t know existed (which i definitely should have, having spent a lot of time in Perthshire growing up).
This trip was a realisation that if I find somewhere that looks cool, just go. Even it’s just a quick trip. There’s absolutely no harm in trying new things and exploring new places.
Soup season is upon us. I was on the hunt for something filling and also nutritious! So I made a roasted vegetable soup!
We ate it so quickly i didn’t even get any photos of the end result but I have to share the recipe!
You can also change this however you want and and use what you have if you’ve got some veggies that need to be used but here’s my run down!
12 Cherry Tomatoes
2/3 medium carrots, sliced thinly
2 Red Bell Peppers, halved
1 Large onion, quartered
2 small/1 large sweet potatoes, chopped into chunks
1 large garlic bulb
Dash of paprika
Handful of basil leaves
Good splash of Olive Oil
500ml of vegetable stock
Chop up your vegetables up and place them on a baking tray. Make sure they’re not sat on top of one another!
Chop off the head of your garlic bulb and place in the middle of your tray of vegetables.
Sprinkle over some olive oil and your paprika. You can also add some salt and pepper to taste here too but that’s personal choice!
Pop them in the oven at 180°C for fan assisted ovens for about 40 minutes.
Once the oven is done, pull them and let them cool a little.
Into a blender, add your vegetable, add 500ml of vegetable stock and squeeze out your soft garlic cloves and blend until smooth!
From here you can either pop it into a pan with a dash of cream to heat or wait until it’s totally cooled and pop it in the freezer for up to three months!
Let me know how you get on and what you might add/change!
I also made a good old sandwich style loaf of bread to dip into my soup!
I go through phases of reading where I’ll read daily for a few weeks and then drop off and barely read for weeks! I’m definitely going through a reading phase at the moment though.
I joined the app Goodreads so I can log books I’ve read and also have a list of books I want to read! You can also follow friends and see what everyone else is reading! I’m also going through a buying books phase… I keep buying books that I want to read so my book shelf is growing and I’m not reading fast enough! However I do have books there that I’m desperate to read so it’s an incentive to finish the books I’ve started!
I’ve previously done a post about my reading but my favourite books are biographies and non-fiction. And all of my recent reads have been autobiographies.
I’m going to start with Heath Ledger: His beautiful life and mysterious death. I genuinely found this book quite gripping. I always thought that his death was around his role of The Joker but it actually wasn’t. I’m not going to give any spoilers but his own battles were so prominent but no one noticed. He adored his family and loved his work and I think he was a magnificent actor. I would reread this book several times. Obviously this book wasn’t written by the actor but is words from those around him over his life. He was so charismatic and always looked at life with a smile.
My second book is Ferne Brady: A strong female character. A Scottish comedian, brought up in Bathgate and now living in London. This book had me in tears laughing. An honest review of life and an insight into autism, particularly females. I would absolutely recommend this book a million times over!
A third book was a bit of a stop gap Ive had on the shelf a while. Jeremy Clarkson Diddly Squat: Until the cows come home. Again this book had me in tears laughing. This book is his newspaper articles in one. I know he’s not a well liked person, I adore the light he’s been able to shine on farming in the UK and all the ups and downs that go with it.
And lastly is my current read, Surviving the Storm. This book is a collection of stories from volunteers within the RNLI who share some heroic stories from their time on the seas. Im not sure if there’s another book but Im definitely on the look out. Being part of our local crew myself, I already know the perils about going out at times but this book really shines a light on the true life stories that people don’t hear about.
I’ve kind of neglected the garden for a few weeks! The weather has turned rotten so other than grass cutting and doing some weeding, I haven’t got much done!
I have got a few new aditions planted though. I dug up the spinach and lettuce I destroyed over the summer (although I think some have decided to try and grow through still) and popped in some garlic. Doing some reading up these need to over winter so they’ve sprouted now so i think they just need a period of cold weather to go dormant and they’ll (hopefully) flourish come spring time.
A few weeks ago I raided my local garden centre, and although there wasn’t much left other than some trees, heathers and other hardy natives, I managed to grab a lovely blackberry shrub (this was in an older post) and a couple of discounted potted goodies.
The first was another strawberry plant. I have a fair few already but my plan is to get a big planter for these because they do like to expand themselves into new plants and also they’re so easy to grow. At first I threw it under my net thinking I’ll get it into a bigger planter towards the end of the winter but shes decided to flourish in september and even has flowers! I don’t think these will fruit but I do need tto get her a bigger pot anyway so she’s happier and can keep growing!
The second was a sempervivum which I’ve been looking at for a while. I think they’re funky little guys and my plan is to get her into a tub maybe next to the front door? I do currently have a baby ivy there but I think he’ll have to get moved before he sticks to the wall and takes over.
The third, truthfully I can’t remember and she blew down the garden and I can’t find the pot with the name of it anymore but she hopefully going to give me some lovely pink flowers along the drive way next summer! My plan is to get loads of different flowers in along the drive that will flower at different times and attract and feed loads of little bugs and wildlife! That’s the plan but whether I make it that far is a different story!
Lastly inside I have some birds eye chilli seeds growing away nicely. These have tried to blind me, not once, not twice but three times! But I’m still very happy with them! I do think I’ve planted these at the wrong time of year but they’re indoors so I’ll see how they do. I have more seeds anyway if I need to try again coming into warmer weather. If all of these babies decide to keeo growing, I think I’ll be gifting some at Christmas though because I think there’s at least thirty growing and I read somewhere that someone was inundated with chilli’s with just two plants. I really don’t like spicy food that much to keep them all!
Over the winter I’m hoping to grab some pallettes and see if I can make some biggish planters for myself and get a proper little veggie/fruit garden going but although I’m good at trying new things, this might be a step too far! That also means A LOT of compost and some actual planning about mixing up some veggies in planters to give them a better chance with nutrients, but that’s why I’m doing this to learn and try!
So I’m a firm believe University isn’t for everyone. I hated the fact that school pushes you so much to aim for University with a total disregard for those that want to take a different route.
Yeah you get a careers day to explore different options but from what I saw it was generally nursing, caring, law etc.
I knew from as far as I can remember I knew I didn’t want to go to University. But what I wanted to do was something I didn’t know.
I had ideas in my teenage years of what I wanted to do. This ranged from hairdressing, being a jockey, crofting (farming), equine therapist or a makeup artist. I did enquire about joining the Royal Navy when I was sixteen but as much as it would have been an amazing job, I knew I couldn’t mentally do a deployment and be away for a year at a Time. I come from a family of engineers, and since I was little I always had the idea that it would be pretty cool to become an engineer of some sort when I got older.
Through school, my anxiety was awful and I was always nervous of new things and I wasn’t sure how to start the journey to engineering.
During school I did one day a week in my local college where you chose a course to give you a headstart in careers. I chose hairdressing. I really enjoyed the course, and when I left school I elected to to college full time to study my second year of hairdressing. I enjoyed that year so much, I got on really well with my fellow students, college staff and lecturers. I enjoyed the course and loved gaining a new skill but ultimately I could never see myself doing that as a career.
A hair up from my college hairdressing portfolio
I’d worked in a local hotel since I was thirteen and after I graduated college I went full time and took on the roll of duty manager, and then also began working three days a week at my local riding centre. I did this for two years and as stressed and tired as I was, I thrived on it. Then Covid hit. I stopped both jobs and I was lost.
My favourite part of working with horses was of course riding, and this boy is Christopher Robin who taught me to ride from day one and was my absolute heart horse
My Dad is self employed as an electrician, and had my brother working for him for a few years but after my brother moved away my dad went back to working my himself. I asked if he would take me on as an apprentice.
A melted fusebox we had to change out a while back!
Fast forward five years now and I absolutely love my job. Don’t get me wrong there’s days where I would love to just stay in bed but for the most part I love it. There’s so much happened in the last five years that I’m so grateful for and I’ve done things that I haven’t enjoyed to get here but absolutely nothing I regret.
Finishing touches on a new build we wired last year. I adored this customers style and really loved these lights.
I’m so glad I never tried to force myself to go to University, and I really want other people to know that there are so many paths to take. But also even if you’ve left school and you still don’t know what you want to do? Don’t worry. You never only ever have to have one career. Just make sure you’re happy and healthy and do what you have to do.
So as you can probably tell from my blog, I love baking. However I normally bake the same things every time. Usually a variation of vanilla cake (like a victoria sponge or cupcakes), flapjacks, lemon drizzle or occasionally brownies. I love baking, but when it comes to actually eating sweet treats, I’m such a plain Jane. And normally it’s just Dean and I that eat whatever I make so I’ve never ventured out of my comfort zone.
You’ll see on my last post, I attempted making a sourdough starter (actually I tried five times) but with it failing I gave up. But I bought some yeast and I actually make a loaf of bread from scratch today and it couldn’t have gone any better for my first attempt! I literally made a coffee and sat watching it rise for an hour… The smell while it was baking was amazing too, thats something that I’ll start baking it more often for alone! As with most people on their own homesteading journey, you want to know whats in your food and if you read the label on most things you buy there is an excessive ammount of extra ingredients. Knowing whats gone into my makes make me feel a lot better too. Admittedly you’re still buying ingredients from supermarkets with some of these extra ingredients but baby steps here. Up here on Skye we’re very limited to what we can buy without using our supermarket but I’m really making the effort to buy locally what I can, even if it’s just buying eggs from an honesty box.
I also decided to make some butter to go along with my bread. It was a day for trying new things. I really couldn’t get over how easy both of these were! I mean my presentation skills definitely need some work but that will come in time!
I did also make some good old flap jacks! I love these and they never last very long in my house! They’re very easy to adapt to different nutritional needs to so for Dean and I they make a great snack to have. They’re a good source of energy if Deans away playing Rugby or if I’m heading to the gym, but actually quite filling too if you need a little something to keep you going before dinner. I’ve also tried the 0 calorie syrup from MyProtein in them too and they taste amazing, I just haven’t bought anymore of this to keep using it!
I was so keen to get onto the sourdough bandwagon, but I’ve given up. I know I’ll try again but for now I’m going to stick with using yeast and making from scratch.
I started my sourdough journey about three months ago. I picked a recipe to follow and I thought it would work really well because I’ve used a few of this ladies recipes however for some reason, it totally flopped. My first attempt at a starter continued for around a week and I had religiously discarded and fed it every evening but it was so liquidy and the smell was awful, with absolutely no rise. Chucked it.
The next two starters went very much the same. I did forget a couple of evenings to feed them but after some research I figured it would be fine to just continue the next evening. But after around ten days on each starter, I chucked it. I wanted a decent starter to begin making bread with and since I’m such a beginner, if it didn’t seem perfect I didn’t want to use it.
My fourth starter, I chose a slightly different recipe and all was going well and it was doubling in size but after four days, I found mold on in the top of the jar. I didn’t want to risk it, so again I chucked it!
Attempt five actually went really well, wasn’t too runny and rose nicely every day, but I forgot I was going away and also forgot to put it in the fridge. And she’s not been fed in about two weeks, thanks to my brain that forgets everything. At this stage she might be okay to pour off the hooch, discard and feed but I’m realising I’m sure I’m ready to commit to owning a sourdough starter, it’s too much responsibility.
I know I will try again, but I’m off put for a while so today I made my very first loaf of bread from scratch and honestly, it was so easy! I haven’t tried it yet, but as long as it tastes alright, I think I’ll go with that!
I’m beginning to enjoy literally the littlest things in life so much.
Planning my garden and wintering schedule! I started this week by a little visit to my local garden centre telling myself it was just to plan and I wasn’t going to buy anything unless they had a raspberry Bush… I came home with a blueberry plant, another strawberry plant and a couple of patio flowers that I’m hopeful will all withstand the winter.
I won’t lie, I did a little dance tonight when I dug a hole in the garden and popped my blueberry tree in it!
I’m going to hopefully have a row of various fruit trees, I’m aiming for a raspberry Bush, gooseberry tree and maybe either a kiwi or grape vine but I’ll see what I get and what will withstand the weather here.
I’m going to see if I can get a few pallets this week too and see if I can make the ideas in my head for some planters and actually make a decent little area for produce for next year. I’m pretty confident for making just raised planters but I would really like to make a tiered planter for my strawberries but my carpentry skills are not the best although I try.
I’ve also got lemon seeds drying out that I’ll plant in a few weeks. I feel like I’m missing something with these though. Am I doing something wrong? Why don’t more people plant lemon seeds? Guess we’ll find out.
Also have a packet of birds eye chilli’s which I bought to make dinner with but only needed one so why not plant a few seeds and see what grows. Not sure what my plans are with these though, I don’t do spicy foods at all so if they grow, these might be gifts!
What will I let my brain do in the garden this week?
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Confessions of a Clumsy Scot 