Rats

I was treated to a lovely Christmas lunch by my parents today at their local pub, the Royal Oak. We are having a scaled down, minimalist version on the day itself but we thought it'd be nice celebratory roast at some point...and we didn't have to do any washing up. My supermarket delivery yesterday contained the first batch of cocktail sausages ready for the day; I've got 90 so far. I bought my parents a mini Nordman fir tree for their house and gave them a few knitted decorations to embellish their own collection:

Cute huh? I am making another Christmas pud from the Mini Christmas Knits book and I think I prefer it to the crocheted one, although like Nicky I have incorporated the top into the base rather than made an icing top for it. I'll post a pic tomorrow as my camera is a bit rubbish in dark conditions. I do have lights in my house, obviously, but they are all low-energy bulbs which are pleasantly 'muted' but not very good for photography.

I went to listen to my brother, father and niece perform their Christmas Concert with their local community orchestra. It was great fun and reminded me how much I enjoy classical music. I dug out my old clarinet which I learnt to play at school when I was 8. Our school was very keen on music and I also played the violin, very badly, for a year or so too. I can remember all the pieces I used to play but have had to download an app to remind me of the fingering! :-D I am sure my music-reading skills are pretty rusty as well even though I tried to learn piano a little while ago. I'm hopefully going to give the orchestra a go myself when they start back in January.

I picked more crab apples on my way back from the pub as I'd like to make some Mulled Wine Jelly as seen in the December issue of HomeFarmer magazine.

It's basically crab apples with spices and a tot of red wine, but I bet it'll be delicious with the cheeses and home-made bread we'll have on Christmas Day, and the mini sausages, if there are any left after Tristan's taken his portion.

I have a rat back in the compost heap. It is so difficult: I bring all the poultry into one area to save my lawn and it becomes a rodent restaurant. I am going to invest in a treadle feeder for the big hens as in addition to the rat family, the dunnocks keep helping themselves to my expensive Garvo Layers mash. Henry doesn't help either as he tips the bowl over to spread the food far and wide in his desire to provide sufficient food for all his ladies, which the feeder will put a stop to. There is a tunnel into the duck runs too so I am having to keep the water bowls empty overnight and I am sluicing the run as well to remove any traces of rat piddle.

Anyway, it's now Countryfile and I need to make myself a cup of tea and pick up the knitting. Happy Sunday evening everyone.

Crab Apple Jelly

Watching Countryfile last week with their feature on preserves and jams, I realised the 3 trees laden with fruit by the Village Hall near me were crab apples. So, digging a bag out of the boot on the way back from lunch at the Merrie Harriers, we picked about 0.005% of the fruit. They are such perfect red little apples, I've never properly looked at them. Anyway, the girls helped me de-stalk them and I decided to try some jelly according to this Waitrose recipe having had little success with past jam and jelly making attempts.

They looked very beautiful in the pan:

and once they'd softened, I left the pulp to drain overnight through a tea towel and colander. Having measured the liquid and done the maths for 10 parts juice to 7 parts sugar :-/ I left it at a rolling boil for 25 minutes. And guess what? It set!! Yes! I forgot to skim it so it has lumpy bits of foam in it but one jar looks pretty good:

Sooooo pretty. We have collected some more as I want to have a go at crab apple wine....

The girls were at Stagecoach in the morning and did some Fimo when they got back so that kept them quiet of a few minutes:

Charles came over and brought me some lard - to make bird cake (he did also bring chocolate and about 15 bottles of real ale to replensish stocks) and we made enough to last us a month or two at least:

The bunnies came in to the lounge this morning for a bit as it was rather wet and cold for them to go in their run. Scruff was extremely good and managed to supress all his doggy instincts, especially when Scarlet hopped up and tried to kiss him.

I think the dog struggles more with resisting the ducks due to his Springer heritage. John (the grey call) has taken to trying to grab my feet as I walk through the garden which makes it a bit difficult not to trip over him, but it does mean I get to stroke him sometimes if I am sitting down when he attacks me.

I didn't do so well with my geology this morning; Activity 1.3.1 rather exercised me - the answer to Question 1 was about 4 paragraphs long, significantly more comprehensive than mine which was 'No'. But the video footage was good as it was all about the Grand Canyon and Sierra Nevada mountains.

My knitting has reached a hiatus as I ran out of cream wool mid-bauble and I've got to the complicated bits with all the hats. Still, it's Countryfile and Downton Adverts this evening so I should be able catch up a bit.