Four Years Old This Week!

Four years ago this week I wrote my first blog post.  I wasn’t really sure if anyone would want to read it, but amazingly people did and now I average approx. 2500 views per week (which isn’t massive figures compared to some of the ‘big’ bloggers out there-but I still find it incredible).

From the beginning I wanted my blog to be a mixture of simple living, vegetable growing, money saving and old fashioned cleaning with a modern day twist.  But overall I wanted  the blog to be helpful and easy to understand, as I had to learn the hard way from endless book reading and lots of ‘trial and error’…. I wanted people to be able to learn these skills easily.  I hope I have acheived this.

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When I started blogging my daughters were 12 and 14 years old and now they are young adults at 16 and 18 years old.  I am so glad I wrote about our birthdays, christmases and special events, as I now have reminders of these wonderful celebrations on my blog (and smaller details in life are so easily forgotten if they aren’t written down).

Many people over the four years have commented on my blog and the comments are the one thing that spurs me on to carry on writing….it is so lovely to hear from you each week.  In fact I was only planning to write for one year in the beginning and because of your wonderful comments it spurred me on to continue writing.

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There have also been some sad times and low periods over the last four years that I never expected to write about when I first started my blog in 2012….

…….One of my oldest friends passed away three years ago after a long battle with cancer and my father in law passed away after a long illness two years ago…..your comments were beautiful on both occaisions and I will never forget the kind words you all left for me and my family.

There was also a low period when my dad gave up ‘his patch’ at my allotment as it was getting too much for him……

 

And the awful time I had to make the aganising decision to give up my lovely four allotments…….

And not to forget Judy our highly ‘reactive’ rescue dog (the main reason for giving my allotments up).  I didn’t know how much she would change our life as she was so scared of everything (incl. dogs) when she came to us in October 2014.  Unfortunately it all came out as barking and lunging and I had many people shout at me while I was walking with her…..but it wasn’t her fault, she just needed time and love….and lots of training……and thanks to Havers Dog Behaviour Judy is so much better than she was and you can see in her ‘before’ and ‘after’ photographs below that she looks a lot less timid and scared and whole lot more healthy and confident.

Each week during these low moments, your kind words kept me going….thank you!

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However, there has also been many, many happy things I have written about too, such as family events….

Halloween parties……

Fund raising for charities…..

And being one of the runners up in the ‘Grow it’ magazine allotment competition….

And featuring in the Kitchen Garden magazine….

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As you know I love to bake using my allotment / kitchen produce and I hope you enjoyed reading my recipes, such as my lavender cakes, courgette tray bake, beetroot cake and also my cheesy courgette scones …..

….we have enjoyed eating them!  Together with all the jams and pickles I have made over the years:

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One enormous change to our life was when we knocked the wall between our kitchen and back room down, to make our kitchen diner…..it has made such a difference to our house and it is a room where we all spend many hours together.  Though I am still amazed we managed to live without a kitchen for six weeks and ate meals using our microwave, slow cooker and a ‘one pan’ camping stove…it definately took some organising, but it was worth it.

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Finally, my biggest passion in life is growing vegetables in an organic garden with LOTS of flowers to attract beneficial insects.

I hope you have enjoyed reading about the many ‘highs’ (and ‘lows’) that I have experienced in my allotment and my new kitchen garden…..

….And the produce that I have managed to harvest over the years…..

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I feel truely blessed to have enjoyed many moments that I have written about over the last four years and I am so glad that people seem to enjoy sharing these moments with me.

Thank you for your continued support!

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 I will be back next week as usual.

Have a great week!

XXX