Early plants and bulbs out in the garden

 First snow drops of 2013

Hellebore Christmas rose

 Iris, the cable is from the solar lights

 Witch hazel 

 Pink Catkins

Primrose in bloom with yellow archangel in background

Been a mild day so wanted to catch up with dead heading in the meadow 1st it was a walk down to beam weir & if you watch the nature programs on BBC2 as it was recently all about otters you would have seen the weir I talk about on this blog & Facebook. Well when doing the dead heading it was good to uncover snow drop bulbs & seeing shrubs coming into bud. Been such a mild start to the new year but thinking that will be changing in the next few days & over the weekend.

Dartington Crystal Factory Tour

We have lived in North Devon for for 5 years now & in our house 4 1/2 years 1st 6 months was in rent which we hated.
We have been many times to shop at Dartington Crystal due to it having Edinburgh Woollen Mills items for sale & also other clothes areas. The site is in our village yet we have never done the factory tour due to the fog & damp thought we would make the most of the drab day & do the factory tour & we were not disappointed the skill of the workers was great to watch with them cutting glass with what looked like scissors!  You follow the work from the furnaces to the finishing side of the business also there was also an excellent video showing the history of the company. For a better look & more information please visit the follow web site http://www.dartington.co.uk/

New Year 2013

 Swimming pond looking good for a summer swim 

 Broad Beans shooting up

 Japanese onion also starting to shoot leaves

 Bus bars fitted to Cobweb balun box

 All drilled with posts fitted & aerial socket

Starting to plan the 2013 with a few projects to keep me busy god willing. Going to purchased a new 8ft x 6ft shed for the garden tools concrete base all ready down they will free up the room I want to make my workshop with a proper bench inside it. Got three big jobs out front which is the roofs over bay windows & porch roof  also the wall on nice neighbours side desperately needs pointing up all the way along plus seal a small roof over bathroom. I would like to build a log store & also make changes to my ham radio aerials started on making a Cobweb which is basically five dipoles in a square made a start on the balun box for a more up date layout & you are interested please visit http://m0pzt.com/ web site for a radio ham it is a useful site. Need to move the VHF/UHF aerial closer to the house also been sorting out the electronic logging for the shack/study so looks like going to be another busy year

Another two NT Property Christmas Visits

 Castle Drogo Tree

 Dinning  room Castle Drogo

 Dunster Castle dinning room

Quantock choir singing carols on stairs sorry a little dark unable to use flash

Two other places we visited was Castle Drogo  & Dunster Castle in North Somerset this was the 1st time Dunster Castle had done the dressed for Christmas the atmosphere was excellent piano playing carols & the Quantock choir sing with the open fires lit made it was wonderful visit. On way back home drove across Dunkery beacon the high place on Exmoor & North Devon.

Killerton Grounds

Every part of the house & grounds plus church had something in it for Christmas wonderful amount of effort & all from volunteers brilliant work.

Killerton Church

Even the church was decorated for Christmas

Killerton Inside

Inside the house it was dressed to perfection in fact we did two visits during the week it was that good.

Killerton Collection Wordless Post

Build up to Christmas

Happy New Year to all my readers,

Hope you had a wonderful relaxing Christmas & great New Year celebrations. During the Christmas card post read of two people we knew who were not close friends but had spoken to at times had past away. Over Christmas Ros said not heard from her old friend who she used to go around with when in her teens, over the years they had gone their separate ways but still kept in touch with Christmas cards & phone calls anyway Ros rung her to find out from her brother she had passed away at 58 in October 2012 yet no one had told us. So I had a very upset lady in the house over the Christmas period.
The reindeer's are in Killerton near Exeter a National Trust owned house. The house & grounds were dressed for Christmas & this year they pulled out all the stops & made it a wonderful build up to the special day. The reindeer are made from willow & they were also lit up . We live near to about five different NT houses so we like to visit them all. We love the build up to Christmas more than the day really.