I had a lovely Christmas post planned for you but it has all caught up with me. It's now New Year's Eve so Christmas greetings have passed me by. I hope your Christmas was calm, peaceful and happy. Our tree is still up but we took the decorations off last night. I'll have to wait for some help to get it out. We always try to get a tree from the side of the road, and this year, it seems, there was no holding back...it's a whopper.
In the spirit of the season, I really wanted to show you the first small crop of cherries I picked off our tree..they were beautiful. Connorville raspberries behind....just divine.
My fruit trees have been subject to lots of pests this year, not sure why. The crab apple has a shocking infestation wooly aphids and the pears. quinces and cherries have been hit by some awful black slug so are not looking their best. Fruit trees can be a bit of a labour of love, but I always forgive them in the spring when their blossom looks so pretty. Look how dry it is:
So dry in fact that the day before Christmas Eve we ran out of rainwater. Admittedly there had been people to stay and we have two English backpackers living in the house for the summer so the dishwasher and washing machine have not stopped, but still hard to believe. Same thing happened only two years ago. So a local water carrier came and filled it up with bore water which is okay, but not so good for drinking. Imagine if it had happened on Christmas Eve.....no water for two days, possibly four....
It's very busy in our region at the moment, Christmas is a mere blip in the radar of harvest, shearing, lamb selling, hay carting etc. We spent last Saturday weighing lambs:
In between long days there has been plenty of fun and lots of cooking. We took our visitors yabbying:
and I spent the day in the kitchen with an old friend who loves cooking as much as I do. She and Sophie made this beautiful pannetone bread and butter pudding for our Christmas work party:
I have also been making bread to feed the four starving teenagers:
Sorry, no recipe today as our internet is sporadically dropping out, but I'd like to wish you all a Happy New Year and may 2015 be happy and healthy for you all.
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