The garden is coming along and the neighbours are getting greener.

Since my last post I have finished painting all of the fence panels and the other side of the back gate and the two panels across the back of the garden.  We have also erected the shed over the weekend and made a start on painting that too as well as installing a small gate to stop the dog from going down the bottom of the garden and weeing everywhere killing all my plants.  We had one there before but thanks to a certain person messing with the fence it got wrecked and we had to remove it.  We put one back on so that I can reclaim that bit of garden back and she will no longer get under our feet when we are in and out the back gate bringing things in.  We have also bought two small cheap fence panels to replace the rotten ones that separated the garden and provided shelter for the chickens.  Its not what we wanted to get because what we wanted to get you can buy in multiples of 5 panels and we only need 2.  It will do for now.

I actually fell asleep on the sofa the other day after painting 5 more fence panels, that is not like me, but it has been very hot as well.

I'm still seeing jealous faces and hearing grumbles from a certain local couple and I am still laughing at them for their childish behaviour over us improving our property.  It needed to be done and it's what normal people do from time to time to maintain their homes.

So, the new huge shed is up so even more green eyed monster looks from the neighbours and we have dug over the vegetable garden and laid a bit of a better path between the shed and the little garden using the stepping stones from the main garden that just kept sliding everywhere.  We will sort that part out with something else or just put extra bark chips down and walk on that as it is.  The doors weren't on the shed when I gave it a first coat of paint so they had to be painted first and then I gave the whole thing a second coat of paint as in the last photo.

I've tidied up the little garden at the bottom properly now, ready to plant up when we get back from our impending camping holiday.   I did give it a quick tidy after the builders left because they had completely covered up my black mondo grass at the back, the thing that looks like a scrumpled up black plastic bag and there were piles of clay, stones, bricks and rubbish all over this little garden after they left.

I bought these garden light/sculptures a few weeks ago from Aldi, only £14 each.  They spin in the wind and they're solar powered so they light up at night.  I have noticed that the green eyed monsters have a large sculpture in their back garden, different to these but along similar lines and at the local garden centre its over £150.  Wow, I wouldn't pay that for a garden sculpture, not to put in a garden around here anyway!  I also noticed they were selling the same ones I bought but they were charging about £40 each.  Guess who doesn't shop at Aldi because she's too posh to shop there and guess who now has these same sculptures in their garden after I put mine in.  Yep, green eyed monsters!  So, guess how much they paid.  Ha ha ha ha ha.

May's Fibre is here - Emerald City

I've only just received last month's fibre and this month's is here.  I'm not sure about this one, wasn't entirely sure from the description in the letter and now I'm really not sure.  Will have to see how it spins up, they often look completely different when they're spun up.  Nice and soft though but that will because its 50% Merino, 25% BFL, 12.5% Mulberry Silk, 12.5% Bamboo.

May's Fibre Club Letter

Back to a slightly earlier date of the month, I'm getting whip-lash, but May's fibre club letter has landed.

The letter reads:

Your fibre this month has a double inspiration because the colour themes fitted together so nicely. One hundred years ago, on the 6th May 1919 L. Frank Baum died, he was an American novelist, most well known for writing the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. This was first published in 1900, after selling out of it’s first print run of 10,000 copies it was quickly made in to a Broadway musical in 1902, which was in turn made in to a film in 1936 staring Judy Garland (incidentally June 22nd is the 50th anniversary of her death). According to the Library of Congress it’s the most seen film in history. The book was notable for its time due to the large number of lavish illustrations. The story might regarded as an American fairy tale, and Baum himself acknowledges the influence of the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen. 

The Emerald City is the capital of Oz, and is found at the end of the Yellow Brick Road. In the book the walls of the city are described as being green, but the city itself is not. When the characters enter they are made to wear green glasses, supposedly to protect their eyes from the “brightness and the glory” but in reality it just makes the city appear green. This is what’s known as a “humbug”, meaning a person or object that behaves in a dishonest way. The phrase originated in the 1750’s as student slang, but eventually enters common usage, most notably by Ebenezer Scrooge in Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol. 

As with much classic literature there’s been a great deal of analysis about the political analogies that can be drawn from the book, and the reasons for the Emerald City being green. Baum himself never confirmed any such theories in his lifetime. 

The second inspiration comes from the foundation of the National Women Suffrage Association, established by Susan B Anthony on 15th May 1869. The group was formed after a split from the American Equal Rights Association. This disagreement occurred due to a dispute about whether to support the Fifteenth Amendment, which would allow all citizens the right to vote regardless of “race, colour or previous condition of servitude” This gave black men the vote, but not women. The Fifteenth Amendment was ratified on March 30th 1870. It took until 1920 for the Nineteenth Amendment to be ratified giving women the right to vote. The colours of suffrage are white, green and purple, so I’ve added a purple streak to your Emerald City green. In March 2015 we had a fibre that was inspired by the Suffragette movement, and in the inspiration letter I urged you to vote. I’m going to say exactly the same thing again, European elections are being held this month, they might seem minor and unimportant, but they’re not, and you deserve to have your say in who represents you in the political system.

So, it going to be green and purple, that's pretty obvious, and presumably a strong green as opposed to a subtle, soft green.  Hmmm, I'm not sure I will like this one.

From the spoilers chat she has revealed that it has a high percentage of long staple fibres so will be best spun worsted, smooth and sleek and will work at different thicknesses.

Painting the new fence

Oh dear, we seem to have some green eyed monsters living very close to us.  The looks we have had since we put the new fence in.  What???  How dare we make improvements to our home and garden so much so that ours now looks better than theirs.  I've overheard them whispering to our direct neighbours about the new fence, asking who put it in, hinting that its not in straight, that the posts are leaning blah blah blah.  He needs to put his head on straight because I've had a spirit level on those posts to double check and they are perfectly straight, as is the fence, but what clearly isn't straight is our neighbours shed, its higher one end than the other.  Nope, not our fence on the piss mate, its your best mate's shed.

We really have had some stares and looks of them, really jealous looks as well.  Grow the hell up, you're not the only ones allowed to have nice things in your garden.  Gees!!!!

So, one of the things that has put the cat amongst the pigeons is that I have started painting the new fence at the back the same blue that I painted the front fence last September.  They looks they gave me back then were hilarious.  I just laugh at them because they're reactions are so ridiculous!  At least I get free entertainment.  Today though, I had been out there painting for literally less than 5 minutes when I could hear them whispering just the other side of the fence.  I'm not deaf or hard of hearing so could hear everything they said.  I was painting the back gate so it wasn't like there was blue paint seeping through to their side or anything but it took all my strength to stop myself from saying "Yes, I AM painting it Tardis Blue, you have a problem with that?  Cos tough shit, its our house, our fence, not yours so mind your bloody own business".

Now, I did say I was painting the fence and not myself didn't I?

The first place I started was the bottom corner so that once its dried and we can see if it will need a second coat of paint or not and then we can make a start on building the new shed as soon as hubby gets to his day off if we can and then finish painting the fence afterwards.  I've painted four 6ft x6ft fence panels using a brush today in the blazing hot sun. In the meantime, I can carry on painting the rest of the fence.

New fence

With the neighbours from hell gone and we now falling back in love with our home and garden we decided that now is the right time to replace the rear perimeter fence in its entirety as it is rotting, is a bit of a mish mash and looks a mess and I'm sick of looking at it.  To aid recovery of my mental health it needs to go and be replaced with nice new stuff that looks great and I can be proud of and happy to look at.  We have plans to renovate other parts of the garden and a nice new sturdy fence is integral to that work also.

We are responsible for the cost of the fence on the right hand side as you look out from the back door and also across the bottom.  The owner of the house next door is responsible for the cost of the fence on the left hand side of our property (the right hand side from his back door).  We approached him about it, and after several messages back and forth, some a little heated, he finally agreed that it needed replacing.   

We understand the stress he went through with her not paying rent for the last 12 months of her time here but we put up with her for 9 years. 9 years of sheer hell, parcels going missing, things being thrown over into the garden breaking our stuff, her kids and their friends climbing into our garden breaking and stealing stuff in the early years, cars damaged, harassment, being followed around shops, all night parties, loud music, loud voices and shouting all day every day, lies being spread about us, the constant bad smell of cannabis being smoked, rubbish and broken furniture littering the local area (which coincidentally all stopped and totally disappeared after she left making the area much nicer).  I think after that, and that is just a small amount of what we put up with from his tenant, that to ask him to replace the fence that she destroyed is not an unreasonable request.  We are also getting rid of the trellis from around the top, which added height and helped stop kids climbing over and instead we are adding a kickboard to the bottom so that the total height remains the same, just more solid.  Security strips will added to the top edges once its finished to help prevent anyone from climbing over.

We had already booked for the fence to be replaced before he gave us the go ahead for his side.  May Day weekend starting on the 3rd May, as we knew that the neighbours the other side would be away from the crack of dawn on Friday morning and less likely to be any "issues". We had had a few issues with the neighbours boyfriend on the other side ever since he moved in a few years ago.  We had replaced the fence on that side when we moved in 12 years ago because it was falling over and we had a young child and I was pregnant with our next.  At the time we couldn't afford much so it was only cheap fencing but it was better than what was there and it was upright and straight, until he moved in and messed with it.  Everything in "his" garden, its actually her house, has to be pushed right up tight to the fence, screwed to the fence with the longest screws ever, meaning that the screw ends are protruding by a mile and we have to cut them off for ours and our kids safety but by doing this he has pushed the fence over and out of alignment.  Time to get it straightened and re-aligned and claim some of our garden back whilst he isn't here to argue and throw a tantrum.

Whoops! I've written war and peace but that was the situation we were in. So, first up, some before photos. We had already removed trellis for plants that was attached to the fence and installed two new garden arches for the plants to grow up as this is better for the fence, better for us and better for the plants.  We also removed both sheds from the bottom of the garden that had seen better days and put everything into storage so that the guys could build us a nice big flat concrete base once the new fence was in.

This view is of the side shared with the landlord of the property that had neighbour from hell. No kick boards on either side which meant weeds and grass from neighbours would creep under the fence into ours, not for much longer though!

This view is of the fence with neighbours in their 60's looking towards our house.  See how the trellis is pushed over by the door, which causes issues with us opening the door fully.

This is view of side with neighbours in their 60's at the bottom of the garden.  See how straight the fence isn't!  This is where its really been pushed over and distorted.  Wait for the aerial photo further down!

This photo shows how he pushed his shed so far into the fence that it pushed it over and originally the drain pipe went straight down but he had put two bends in it and then faced the end of the pipe towards our property, which explains why our path is always wet, slimy and icy in the winter.  On the other side of that pipe is a bolt which went through the centre of the original fence post when the houses were built in the late 1960's and where the fence post that we put in 12 years ago was aligned against and screwed to the wall so at some point he has moved the fence post and wedged the pipe between the fence post and the bolt, I kept saying I thought it had been moved, crafty git!  Needless to say our team of guys managed to move his shed over a bit and that pipe was turned so that the water now runs off under his shed and to ensure it couldn't be turned back concrete/cement was placed over and around it to keep it in place and divert all water that comes from his roofs away from our property.

 A few photos of the new fence before a few comparison photos side by side of before and after.

The photo on the left is what it looks like by the back door now, not as far over as it should be but not hanging over so we can't open our back door properly.  Head on view looking at fence with neighbours in their 60's.

View taken from my daughters bedroom, ignore the moss on the utility roof that I've pushed into piles with the broom from the open windows toward the edge that hubby hasn't removed yet. Bloody Magpies, they pick it off the main roof and toss it down with a thud! Second photo shows the new concrete shed base.

Now for the before and after.

What a difference, isn't that much better!  We still have to decide what we are doing about the little divider fence but we will do that ourselves when we know what we want to do.

Its straight again, and we've regained a few inches of garden back, not what we had originally but its better than it was.  The path is where its always been and years ago that bit of garden was wide enough to plant Hebe shrubs in.  The before photos shows its hardly wide enough to put a few daffodils in thanks to the antics of him next door.

Aerial view of before and after.  The fence should have been moved over quite a bit more to the right but because of his structures and paving next door they couldn't move it as much as we and they would have liked, not without having to go through a lengthy court process to force him to dig some of it up and its just not worth that much hassle.  It has been moved over by a few inches, as much as they could, and the main thing is that it is now strong, well concreted in and he can't mess about with moving it anymore.

All we have to do now is paint the fence and get the new shed built.

April's Fibre is here - Peak District

We've had to wait for this one as she had issues with the processing company so the letter was late coming out to us as well.  I love this, its so pretty and different to anything else I have.  Its 50% Corriedale, 25% Whitefaced Woodland, 20% South American Wool, 5% Viscose.  Its not overly soft but its still lovely, certainly nowhere near coarse.

The Blue Llanwenog

Last year I bought a Llanwenog sheep fleece, split it into four amounts, left one undyed and then dyed the other 3 amounts in 3 different colours.  This is the blue part of the fleece that started out at 400g and now that it's been combed I only have 153g left due to some of it felting, and an amount of coarse fibres which I have removed.  That is a lot to lose, more than 50% but I am fussy and would rather not spin rubbish and waste my time spinning rubbish.

It is pretty as it is but I wanted to make it something special and to add things to it that would help to soften it a little.

I went and raided and supplies cupboard and came out with all these that work well with the turquoise blue Llanwenog and they come from various supplies I've brought over the last few months, mostly small amounts with one or two larger amounts thrown in.

I split everything in two and blended each half on my blending hackle to get this fabulously interesting fibre ready to spin.

I'm really happy how this has turned out, very interesting.  I have two skeins of double knit weight yarn, 99g/284m and 96g/262m and the fibre content is about 65% Llanwenog Wool, 12% Merino Wool, 10% Tussah Silks, 4.5% Sari Silk, 3% Bluefaced Leicester Wool, 2% Alpaca, 1.5% Shetland Wool, 1% Linen (Flax), 1% Sea Cell.