Blackberries

After several sessions, I've now finished painting the window frames for the year: I've done a little over half of them, and will do the rest in the spring.

In other DIY, I've replaced the fill mechanism in the downstairs toilet cistern, which seems trivial, but will be much better: it's taken increasingly long to fill since moving in, starting at about 20 minutes, and reaching a couple of hours, before packing in entirely a week ago.

We've sown a number of seeds, including some aquilegia ('Royal Purple' and 'Magpie', as well as some free-pollinated seeds from grandma's garden), and potted up a number of house plants.

It's blackberry season: we picked a couple of ice-cream tubs full -- all from the hillside. It's been really good to step out of the house and collect so much fruit: far better than having to schlep to the quarry, or a stretch of the lane, and lovely to have it growing in our own land. It's looking like nice fruit, as well, and there'll be more to collect in a few days, I think.

Some of the weekend's been spent putting together a plan of works for the next twelve months, to include, hopefully, wall insulation, a small greenhouse for the back patio (the 'big' greenhouse on the hillside will be another few years), the work on the colour-wheel garden, and a pergola/fence structure to enclose the drive. The greenhouse, if we go ahead, will be imminent; the pergola in the next few months; the wall insulation won't be until the spring/summer.