Its been a while since I last blogged. Tons of stuff has been gone on in my life and that does not include the weather. A super quick catch up in six bullet points:

• Nearly made redundant.
• Good allotment idea did not turn out so well.
• Started a little business
• Weather affect the bees
• Trouble and strife within the family diverted me from applying to my usual stuff
• Weather affected my allotment schedule

Have a look at the Diamond Awl website, click HERE, to see what the business thing is all about. It has been quite an interesting set of challenges. In the end I have a website and an on-line shop. If I were not producing pretty much everything to order the shop would make a bit more sense.

The good/bad allotment idea was to follow an idea that said do not weed through the winter. The weeds will preserve the soil structure and nutrients and when composted the weeds would give back again. Good idea but British weather put paid to that idea, too dry then to wet. Result a very weedy allotment.

The weather has affected to bees in that they have not been able to gather enough food. They have also had a bad time in swarming and subsequent need to mate. I seems to have five viable hives but they seem a bot weak going into the winter. I project the winter to be relatively mild so food resource is going to be an issue in the early spring. Anyone care to guess what the weather will be like in the spring of 2013?

The family stuff is just time spent. I hope the parties involved come to a decision. Christmas will be tricky.