Oh dear, once again, I notice the date on our last blog post is three months ago!! How time flies!

Autumn is well and truly here on the smallholding now and we begin to look to Winter, putting some things to bed and giving in to homely and cosy vibes of scented candles and warming fires.

The harvest is largely in now with apples and tomatoes in crates ready to be processed. Apples will keep for a bit longer, cooking with them as we need. I have been making jams and chutneys with the green tomatoes whilst the …

Growing food is a huge aspect of our smallholding life and we have been growing a large part of all the fruit and vegetables we eat. This year, with the large polytunnel, we will be able to expand the growing season up in the Welsh hills and also gain extra space to grow commercially too.

When, last Summer, I heard of the Pathways to Farming programme, I jumped at the chance of taking part. The project works on increasing the number of horticultural food producers in North Powys and creating new markets for local produce. I am passionate about …

How can it be 1st October already??! Before time runs away from me even more and the moment passes, here is something that we did in September.

We have Colchicum Autumnale, also known as Autumn Crocus, Meadow Saffron or even Naked Ladies, in one of our fields and we continue the work of the previous owners in counting the flowers each Autumn and passing on the numbers to the county recorder for the Botanical Society for Great Britain and Ireland.

These pretty wild flowers are rare nowadays but ours survive and thrive because the field has not been …

Is anyone else feeling that Autumn has been in a bit of a hurry this year? The end of the Summer seems to have occurred rather abruptly with cooler temperatures and unsettled weather pushing their way through August with much haste and determination. I have so enjoyed the long, hot days of Summer, a “proper Summer” of eating breakfast, lunch and dinner out on the patio for weeks, with glorious sunshine to help us feel well from the increased amounts of vitamin D being absorbed through our skin, where our water butts ran dry a couple of times (even in …

I am almost three weeks behind sharing this news on here! The fertile eggs I put under broody Betty hatched on 30 May, at least some of them, and we have been enjoying seeing chicks grow and learn with her.

Out of the six eggs, two hatched and we have two live chicks. We were down to five eggs anyway as we had broken one egg when we lifted Betty out of the coop once to encourage her to go for a poo, a bite to eat and a bit of drink. We were concerned she would lose condition …

Last week, I noticed that our mother hen, Betty, was behaving oddly. She spent a lot of time preening herself and was scratching in places where there was nothing to scratch... she was also spending an increasing amount of time in the coop when she laid her egg each day. She appeared distracted, a bit giddy and "on edge". Then, one morning, I found her in the coop, all spread out on what looked like a nest and in a sort of trance! I knew then that she was broody. I read up all sorts of information about it and …

My last blog entry two weeks ago ended with the joys of new lambs bringing playful energy onto the smallholding. Sadly, this post is about the sudden death of one of them.

Twin brothers Charlie and Chalkie, as we settled to call them, were coming up to three weeks old, playing in the field happily and with bounds of energy. Both seemed to be growing well and loved to jump on the hay bale we had put in the field for them. They were becoming increasingly inquisitive, always together and learning to nibble on grass whilst spending more and …

It's the Spring Equinox today and from now light makes significant gains over dark as days get longer and longer till the Summer Solstice. Winter is receding to be replaced by Spring, a season which brings renewed hope and energy for new beginnings.

This year, Winter appears reluctant to loosen its grip: we are only just emerging out of a very cold few days with a significant amount of snow and wind that left us snowed in for a couple of days for the second time this month. Spring serves as a transition season, a buffer between opposites Winter …

Dydd Gwyl Dewi Hapus! Happy St David's Day! The only daffodils around are those bought at the market last week and now in the vase on the dining table. They brighten the house with their vibrant colour and scent. The ones growing outside are a few weeks off yet - and may have suffered a setback with this week's snow, freezing temperatures and wind aka The Beast from the East and Storm Emma!

With extreme weather, life on the smallholding becomes stressful because it is tough to keep basic needs met. It's a struggle to keep sheep and hens …

When we sent two of our lambs to slaughter in September, I brought back their skins so I could have them made into rugs. They came back from the tannery this week and they are gorgeous!

Lambskins are a by-product of having a lamb slaughtered for meat and usually they are not returned to the producer. Some abattoirs send some to tanneries for them to be processed into rugs but most are thrown away. When we were thinking about keeping sheep and raising lambs for meat, I thought it was a waste and I looked into rug making from …