Rain Dancing

This week has flown over and it's not because anything overly exciting has happened, in fact it's been a rather quiet week, where we've managed to get a few small jobs done around the house, I've made more stuff for my winter freezer stash and hubby has been busy with a woodwork project that is now finished.

We've had 20 hours of rain, so watering the garden hasn't been on the evening job list as much as usual, and although the rain was much needed it did get a bit monotonous and slightly reminiscent of a UK summer. But the ground is drying now and the plants look refreshed after a good drenching. My pepper and aubergine plants are producing well and the cherry tomatoes are being picked by the bucket load almost daily. Unfortunately the other varieties of tomatoes are showing signs of blight. The pumpkins and squash are doing really well and should make up a bulk of our winter diet. Along with the freezer full of  home reared pork we already have.

I'm still missing the kids dreadfully and hope they're doing ok. I speak to them on the phone when I can and look forward to catching up with them on facebook too. I'm finding facebook more and more useful now especially for keeping in touch with family and friends and also keeping up to date with what's going on in their lives. I've also made a lot of new friends via groups etc and love to read the jokes and see photo's of other expats enjoying their lives here in Bulgaria.

My daughter has finally started to learn how to cook, despite refusing every time I've asked her. It was somethging she said she wasn't interested in although my son quite enjoys spending time in the kitchen. Just shows how much things can change over a relatively short space of time. Hopefully they will find out over the next 3 weeks whether or not they have been accepted into school and then the fun will start in September as they get used to English education again.

Finally, just to let you all know that I am reading your comments but am having problems commenting on my own (and other people's blogs). I'm not sure why but hope this will work itself out soon. Oh and Alan, I'm just about to try and add a subscribe by e-mail button just for you :)

Where's My Wellies???

Ok so it's now July and usually we have fantastic weather and are starting to wilt in the heat. Siesta's are taken during the heat of the day and it's a mad dash before nightfall to get the animals in, settled and fed, the vegetables watered and tea cooked for us humans......or maybe not at the moment, as we've had awful, and I mean awful weather. Thunder, heavy rain and barely any sunshine, certainly not enough to dry my washing (that is still no the line by the way). Just pretty darn miserable to be honest, but spirits are high here despite the weather.

The kids are having a bit of a party tomorrow and have invited friends round, I've no idea how many and will probably just spend most of my time trying to keep out of the way, not embarass them too much and making a fool of myself with my pigeon Bulgarian.

Hubby is off out tomorrow to give an archery demonstration at a charity event held at Camping Veliko Tarnovo they are having a whole hog roast and I hope the weather is better for everyone attending. Although I'm sure it will be a great event and hopefully raise money for a very worthy charity. So it's just me, the animals and a bunch of teens at home! Should be an interesting day to say the least.

I've had some kind of bug since last weekend and have been suffering migraines, something I rarely get any more but hate having. I expect anyone that has had migraines or prolonged headaches would say the same, but it hit me hard as I felt so sickly with it too, aching and hot and cold. All in all though we've been fairly healthy since living here and I think it's due to the climate and better diet. The lack of takeaway foods has helped a lot! But I have put on some of the weight I lost when we first moved and really should be making an effort to get a few pounds off again. I'm happy though so will worry about it another day :)

Anyone For Waterskiing?

It's rained and rained and rained again this last week or so. The ground is waterloged outside and the sky is dull. Temperatures have fallen so we've had the woodburner lit most nights, it really doesn't feel like May.

Tomorrow is a national holiday here in Bulgaria so the villagers will be celebrating with friends and family for Georgiov day. It's a bit like St George's day in the UK. This is the time of year when usually you see more people out and aboutg but due to the weather most are staying indoors. I don't blame them either, even the chickens are looking pretty miserable and egg production has dropped too.

I finally gave in and bought a new keyboard for the computer, unfortunately it seems to have a minor problem and occasionally throws an extra 'G' in when I'm typing, it's not too bad but does mean I have to check anything I've typed for mistakes a little more carefully than usual. But it does have it's plus points as I now have the Bulgarian alphabet on the keyboard too - just in case I ever manage to learn enough to type a message or e-mail!

There have been a couple of trips into town this week, more than usual and tomorrow I'm off out for an hour or so to go meet someone who is interested in buying one of my saddles, fingers crossed all goes well. Hubby has some beautiful longbows and one flat bow for sale that he's made over the winter and I have to admit they are wonderful things. Almost makes me want to take up archery, although after my last attempt I think it's wise that I just be content watchingand let hubby get on with it lol

Hubby is feeling a little better but still won't take any notice and not try to do small jobs like splitting logs. It drives me crazy but there's nothing I can do and I do realise that the inactivity is getting to him too. It was probably worse today as the satellite tv had been disconnected because I hadn't paid the bill - easily fixed and after a short trip to town to pay a few bills it was back on within 3 hours. It's not the best system in the world but it does give us something to do when we can't get on with jobs.

Jam Season

Although my vegetable garden isn't doing fantastically the fruit is starting to ripen on our many trees. A couple of weeks ago I harvested some lovely sour cherries and mulberries which I turned into jam. The sour cherries were also added to various alcoholic spirits and we now have a nice sour cherry vodka and a sour cherry liqueur which is mellowing nicely and should be much better at Christmas time.

Over the last 2 days I've harvested plums and once again made plum jam which is one of our favourites, also made some plum liqueur and finally got round to setting the green walnut liqueur away too. Hopefully they'll all work out well. Hubby is quite impressed with the tiny taste of sour cherry liqueur so I may just have to go pick some more before they start falling from the tree.

Once again the weather here has been strange, sunny this morning, wet and overcast for part of the afternoon then a big thunder storm this evening. As I'm typing this it's just started to rain again too. This is not normal June/July weather for Bulgaria and it's making a huge difference to the crops. Next week is supposed to be warmer and drier and I really hope it is, although it means I'll have to start watering the garden again!

I'm quite sad that there are no more lettuce or radish to be harvested now. Despite the cooler weather they've all bolted and what we hadn't managed to eat was fed to the chickens, nothing gets wasted here! The extra rain has made the grass have another spurt of growth and my weeds are doing wonderfully too, so today I was out with the scythe again for a while, then collected what I'd cut for the pigs to munch on. Charlotte is looking quite pregnant now, although we can't feel any babies moving about yet. We've had to cut her feed down slightly as she was getting a little bit overweight, and the piglets are getting extra feed now as they're so big. I'd love to weigh them all and I'm sure there's a formula out there somewhere on the interweb but I'll look for it another day.