A new challenge for year two!

Looking back, just over a year ago, I was writing about snow! I delved into the recipes today to find my Hot Cross Bun recipe in preparation for Easter, which was earlier last year, and realised this fact. Today, luckily, the skies have been clear and the sun bright, although the wind is trying to make us feel that it is still winter. The old story about the sun and the wind's competition to get a man to take off his coat springs to mind.

It has been great writing this diary over the last year, and now being able to use it myself. I will still add to it, but as you may have noticed, the posts have longer gaps between them for the reason I have just said - I have my own recipe book online! Talking of which, Mother's Day came with a beautiful surprise from my children in the shape of a recipe file...

My beautiful new recipe file

 Perfect for storing my new ideas, and having somewhere to keep my current recipes - something H has already started...

A selection of Cabbages and Custard recipes!

This week, though, is going to be the start of a new challenge - a vegetable patch. R has cleared a border in the garden because it was looking tired. Now it looks like this:

Today I added some compost and re-raked the patch, so that tomorrow we can start to plan the vegetables. I have found some guidelines for growing a 1m square patch effectively, and will try to use this to help me. This will be a chance to try out my self-sufficiency skills! I like reading about it, but have never had the chance to put it into practice. Here goes! Watch this space...

P.S. I won't stop adding recipes and hopefully some will contain home-grown vegetables ;-)