Quick update

After a little R & R in Putney, I'm back in France - my lovely husband is here for two weeks holiday, and we're making the most of it!

We've been all rufty-tufty the last couple of days... [OK, buying a set of blue-painted furniture wasn't so 'manly', but that's a nice cheap project for me when the builders have gone - cobalt sideboard, table & four chairs for ~£33 can't be bad, and lots of fun to be had cleaning it up; if I can't take it back to nice wood, I can paint it cream!]

We chopped down seven or eight trees to rejuvenate the hedge by the road past the house, and this has let masses more light into the meadow; the damson tree in the hedge will also benefit from not having thuggish neighbours.

Also started to clear the brambles from beneath the walnut that we don't harvest from, and I've lopped off the low-hanging branches to make it easier to strim under. The bit by the hedge where David cleared last year was much easier to cut down this time, so our efforts are paying dividends.

Rain stopped play, so we diverted back to making fruit liqueurs; now David's in on the "secret" life's much easier - two of us pricking fruit is so much better [for me!], than just me doing it...

The mirabelles, Reine Claude plums and pig damsons in the freezer had got frosted [which finally spurred us on to the purchase of a new fridge-freezer; one that's big enough to store most of the vegetables/salad and has three freezer drawers], so we had less than we thought, but still have made several jars.

We also made the last of the mirabelles [sadly, after we arrived to find quite a lot of ripe ones still on the tree someone came and stole them the afternoon we went out shopping, so we only managed a tiny jar!], a few more Reine Claude, some little red plums from the other ancient tree in the meadow and some of M. Lorin's huge plums [he has given us permission to go into his orchard and help ourselves] into more liqueurs.

We decanted all of last year's efforts, and now have an interesting stock that just needs ageing to be a wonderful cupboard-full of interesting after dinner treats!

Today we emptied the freezer of sloes [and put the last of Tuesday's sloes in to freeze] and made two huge and one medium size jar; it's now got to the point where I feel I want to keep changing supermarkets every time we go to buy gin! Apparently, I should have waited till October to make sloe gin (despite them tasting OK; yes, still wearing my 'tough girl' hat!), but as they were already picked, cleaned & frozen, it seemed a shame not to try...

Doesn't mean I won't keep an eye out for sloes again after the first frosts!

Our paint has arrived from Holkham Paint so now we are just awaiting a visit from M. Baty...

We've decided to go for a different colour on the inside of the windows this time: Old White in the bathroom, and Parchment in the bedroom. Hopefully, these choices will prove acceptable, otherwise Maria will be getting out the paintbrush again...

[Please keep fingers crossed for the former; Maria has seen enough paintbrushes in the last 18 months to last a long time!]

Speaking of artisans, work has (unexpectedly!) started on the house again, but I shall post about that separately: see next post.