One word? When seven would do…

MiFi battery running out so have plugged it into laptop which is also draining fast – don’t think the technology likes the cold!

Yesterday I did blog over on WW – we were with Chris & Owen all day. In the morning we did fence building – really enjoyed that. We’re using brash (cut branches and leaves etc from felled trees) laid into stakes put into the ground in X shapes diagonally to each other. We did the third side to add to two sides already made to go around some young hazel trees to protect them from the deer.

We then did some moving wood about and clearing in the afternoon, stuff I am finding really hard, not least because my boots just aren’t up to the job of keeping me upright on the steep and slippy hill. Honestly, if I’d known in advance just how testing the hill was I would not have brought us here but I am so glad we are here because it is an amazing experience, regardless of the hill!

Another bath in the evening, oh how I am loving that bath 🙂

Food yesterday was porridge in the morning, stew and dumplings for lunch and curry in the evening (rice and peas, veg curry and a fab salad with garlic oil very similar to the one KFish makes with carrots). I’m coping well with the food, trying everything and actually quite enjoying most of it. I can’t deny I’m missing meat and although it is now a veggie kitchen rather than a vegan one the stuff like cheese and butter gets consumed super fast so I am missing my dairy produce too. But I will definitely be eating a wider selection of veg and it will be a bigger part of my diet alongside the meat. It’s a total detox really – I’m getting by on about 4 small cups of tea (equivalent to 2 of my big cups at home, which I’d normally have before I do anything in the morning) a day, no alcohol aside from a speedy swig of brandy (which I don’t actually like) to warm me from the inside before getting into my sleeping bag each night. I’m very pleasantly surprised to find I am not suffering at all from withdrawal so maybe I’m not as much of an addict as I always suspected. Will be having a glass or two of wine tomorrow though I reckon to celebrate the end of a bloody hard weeks work!

Todays work has been way gentler – more fence building this morning. We had two French WWOOFers with us until this morning when we waved them off but a new guy arrived yesterday, Lee, who we’ve been working with today (and another guy arrived this evening who I have not met yet, from Tai Wan). Davies and Scarlett worked with us this morning on fence building and Davies particularly was really helpful.

After tea break we did some bringing bark up the hill to lay around the bottom of fruit trees to suppress weeds for a forest garden that is being planted. Again Davies was really helpful and worked hard on this, Scarlett had a minor thumb injury so was sitting it out. Davies spent some time with Owen who has a saw mill and runs green woodworking classes chatting to him about how the saw mill works.

Just before lunch we spent some time with machetes clearing a path for another fence so the kids went off to find the other kids to play at that point.

Lunch today was not communal as loads of people were not around today, so it was us, Chris and Owen and Lee the other WWOOFer, so C&O brought out some of their own cheese stash and we had cheese and marmite sandwiches with the remains of the salad from yesterday.

Ady and I walked down to Willow as I need some female supplies (argh, of all the timings!) and then this afternoon we built a wood store – six posts to lift three shelves off the ground for sawn timber to dry and season on. We had to find suitable logs lying around, dig them in so they were all spirit level straight and then construct the base of the wood store. Lee was really good at this and pretty much did it himself with us standing watching and doing a bit of helping here and there. We broke for tea and the cry ‘RIVERFORD’ came (everyone just shouts to each other for stuff here, voice carry a long way in quiet woodland), so we went back to the communal longhouse to gather wheelbarrows then down the hill to empty the Riverford van of a weeks supply of fruit and veg. Four barrow-fulls and several of us carrying stuff.

That was the end of work for today aside from bathhouse burner lighting so Ady, Lee and I all went off to sit and chat and man the fire, and I brought along our dirty washing to have a go with the washboard and mangle. I really enjoyed it actually, but need some decent detergent as I was just using shampoo, will get some hard soap at the weekend.

Dinner – roast potatoes, steamed veg and gravy. There was a salad too but it had mushrooms so I didn’t try that. Then Ady suggested I go and have 10 minutes all to myself in the bath which was just lovely :).

Tonight we’ve been invited to the jamming session that happens here on a Friday night, told by 4 different people how fab Davies and Scarlett are and how amazingly well they have settled in and how cool all the kids think they are 🙂 And we have also been invited to a big get together a load of them are going to this weekend somewhere nearby for some fishing and shooting. We won’t go, partially because we want some family time and partially because we offered to look after the chickens here so one of the other people could go, but we are really touched to have been asked and feel like we’ve been really accepted here, not just as WWOOFers but as part of the community 🙂 🙂

At the beginning of the week I was really wishing we’d only booked to be here for a week as I thought it would just be too tough, we are all loving it though and challenges aside are so pleased we still have another week, particularly as we are working with different members of the community next week and are really looking forward to learning more about them and what they do. We’ve been assured it’s not moving wood about which is good! 😉

Hot water bottles are in sleeping bags tonight so bed and kindle is calling me.