From small ideas ....

I have been blogging for a short while about knitting and weaving and such like, when we were fortunate enough to move house to live with my inlaws. They had moved to a remote house just outside Burnham on Crouch, Essex nearly 18 years ago and at the time, we moved in with them too. Things didn't work out then. We had two children under 5 and two dogs which didn't get on with the inlaws dogs, etc. and after two years, we moved out. But now we are back. The children are now much bigger, the two dogs have passed away and been replaced by one dog, four cats and six chickens. The oldest of the cats was a young cat when we moved out so he has returned too. 

Henry the light Sussex cockerel

So this blog will be about our plans for the space we now have. During our time away we have learned how to make sausages, bacon, cheese, wine, cider and butter. We want to use our space to graze animals for milk, fleece and meat. We are blessed by a small orchard to which we have already added 12 cider trees. We have also been given Henry, a light Sussex cockerel who has sent the girls running each morning. They were starting to look a bit fat but he will get them trim and fit.

During our time away, we joined the East Essex Smallholders Group who have been and constantly are a great inspiration and support for us. These are like minded people who are themselves at various stages of smallholding. I would suggest anyone who is looking to do something like this to seek our their local group.

Plans are already afoot for the erection of a polytunnel. We have a large space to play with and so we opted for a 16 x 48 foot polytunnel from First Tunnels. This is a commercial sized tunnel but it comes with industrial fittings - something we will need in our exposed, windswept location. More of that in future blogs. 

So follow me on a journey of blood, sweat and tears to our smallholding dream. There will be laughter, there will be mistakes and there will definitely be sausages and bacon.