Entroido Again

It is that time of year when madness hits the streets of Friol and everyone dresses up and bar crawl around Friol playing music and enjoying themselves. Yes it is Entroido or Carnival, an ancient celebration,  traditionally frowned up on by the Catholic Church where tricks are played upon people and masks are worn.

As ever the evening turns to merry making and feasting with traditional food. Pigs heads, stuffed pigs stomachs, turnip greens, potatoes and chickpeas. For desert we had pancakes, a sweet biscuit called pigs ears and all was washed down with wine. This is one of my favourite fiestas of the year and a wonderful tonic when the weather is at it's worst.

First Snow 2015

We have got away with a mild winter so far but yesterday the first proper storm of the year hit called Hermann with heavy rain and very strong winds, followed last night with snow which continued into this morning. It is as ever, very beautiful and proved to be very exciting for the dogs.

It is now sleety so I expect the snow will be gone fairly soon.

Tim is still here and we have had a wonderful six weeks together, four of which he has spent working but just having him here is great. We both hope he can spend more time here in the coming year. A new sowing year has arrived and I am busily planning what I will grow. It will include some unusual tubers this year, yacon and oca, a first for me. We didn't exchange Xmas presents this year but we did order some old style perfumed bare root roses from the UK and another small order from Martin Crawford's Agroforestry Research Trust. This includes sea buckthorns, juneberries, a damson a dogwood etc. which will add to our more unusual plants and trees in the steadily growing forest garden. We also spent time over Christmas brush-cutting the brambles which have been engulfing the land.

We both follow various blogs such as the Archdruid Report and this combined with economic and environmental news makes for depressing reading. We have also been watching some videos by John Pilger, which has opened my eyes further to the activities of the CIA  and backed up my rather poor opinion of them gained from reading the book by Naomi Klein called The Shock Doctrine.

In summary, the current world order is continuing to fail, and it will get worse for most of us unless you are one of the super rich. Buying As Petas and trying to decouple from the current system has been the best thing we ever did and whatever the future holds, we hope that our family can continue to eat well, keep warm and sleep safely at night.

Seasons Greetings to All

This year we are celebrating the 25th Dec as the 21st coincided with the local Capon Fair in Vilalba which is always an excuse to buy wonderful Artisan cheese which we couldn't miss. Tim is a bit of a 'cheesehead' and I am pretty keen on the stuff myself. Our home reared Turkey went in the oven early as she is 12 kg of loveliness and we spent some time this morning selecting the best of the garden vegetables. We have green beans, field beans, leeks, sprouts, broccoli and cauliflower, most of which is fresh. The stuffing was made yesterday along with a huge vat of mulled local wine from our nearest town.

We made an evergreen bower on the 20th to decorate the sitting room which smells lovely as it includes bay, rosemary, flowering gorse, holly and ivy. Tim's family made them when he was a boy so many years ago.

Some plants are still flowering in the garden so I have a vase of fresh flowers and a vase of fresh herbs next to the lit candles. It feels  very christmassy and we are relishing just being together at this time. We spend so long apart during the year, it makes it extra special when we are together.

We also have blue sky and sunshine, the first for a few days so more reasons to be cheerful. Thanks to the joys of modern communication we have spoken to family back in the UK and all feels right in the world. Underneath the joy is an awareness that many people are not so fortunate as us. Poverty, war, disease, the list of horrors are endless but occasionally we just have to live in the moment and appreciate the life we have.