Moved the grape vine stocks Sunday, 19-Apr-26 19:08:40 CEST

Sunday, 26-Apr-26 19:48:40 CEST

All seeds started

This week, we got all the seeds started.

Monday 20 April

Good morning! This morning it was cold, 4°C. DW's bus was canceled, so I drove her to the train station. That was an unplanned start to the week, but DW appreciated it.

My shoulder has improved, but I’m still feeling pain at certain movements. The leg is still a little swollen, and I have some pain in the leg as well. But I should not complain because the sun is shining and we had a magnificent weekend.

Along the road, rapeseed flowers are blooming bright yellow, completely unapologetic about their beauty.

I worked from home today. In the afternoon, it started to be overcast.

DW had a good day at the office. She’s highly appreciated for the work she's doing, and I’m proud of her.

We decided on a fast-food dinner. When I drove to the snack bar to pick up dinner, it started raining. It is good with rain! We need every driplet of this rain.

Tuesday 21 April

The first task of the day was to check out our seedlings. The zucchini Ola Gabriella has come a really long way. We got some buckets of cucumbers. The Spanish chili pepper is still nowhere to be seen. You can see the larger leaves being moved slightly by the airflow. That is supposed to make the seedlings stronger and more prepared for outdoor life. DW is counting her indigo seedlings; there were 11 Japanese Indigo buckets with seedlings this morning.

I’m biking to work again, and that’s a privilege I don't take lightly. We got a clear blue sky today. It is a bit chilly in the air, but we didn't have any frost.

Here I stopped to take a photo of the tractor set to pump water to the carrot field.

This is the field with the Commander carrot that I told you about last week. So this tractor was standing there, running in place, to pump water from the nearby canal. I’m pretty sure it’s biological carrots, but diesel is diesel. I could see the shaft rotate, and it's not rotating on its own. If the Strait of Hormuz is closed, the shaft of that tractor will be more expensive to move.

Along the larger road, the wind is picking up; it's cold. And I’m biking under a motorway tunnel. The urban part of my commute is just short because soon I’m biking into a nice park landscape. Older adults walking their dogs. Young people are on their way to school—the daily choreography of ordinary life.

I asked myself this morning how I feel, apart from having cold hands. I feel optimistic! I mean, at the end of the year, we will have a severe El Niño, but apart from climate change disasters, it feels like I have options and my creativity. Who can be unhappy when your bike isn't ticking?

I had a great day of work today. I fixed a bug in the morning. Luckily, bug fixing is the best there is. That’s where my detective skills are shining, and I love it. Then I continued with the tasks I should have worked on last week. This is really good. I took a break from this challenge ‘cause when I came back, it was pretty clear how I should fix this part. Not all solutions come in sequentially. Sometimes you have to take a break from them.

When I was a kid, I could bike long stretches without holding the handlebars. With this bike, I’ve not been able to do that. I refuse to believe I've lost this capability, but it has to do with getting older and having less balance. I was missing this feeling.

A few moments ago, I heard ticking sounds. Because I still have the Allen keys in the bag and WD-40, and because the weather is nice, I decided to stop and work on this. I also adjusted the saddle's position in relation to the saddle pin. I made it so that the saddle is further back. I tried it, and my theory worked! I can now balance the bike without holding the handlebars just by angling my hips. It is still a little wobbly, but hey, I haven’t practiced this for over 10 years. Another factor is that they have a mobile phone mounted on my handlebars, which will be like a disturbance. This is fun, I feel younger!

Wednesday 22 April

Today I worked from home in the morning. I had a productive morning! DW had a day off. She handled the bookkeeping for our cottage in Sweden. Is that a task you wonder? It sure is, and DW has been doing it for 18 years.

When I logged out of work, and it was time to do something on our property, I realized I was finally free from wheelbarrows and digging that had been so much of it lately. I cut down willows that sprouted around our water pond. If I don't do that, it will be taken over by willows, and that is not our intention.

When I worked on the willows, I chatted with a neighbor. When that happened, a newly arrived neighbor came along the street. We greeted him, and soon after, his wife and two sons also appeared. Great with new, enthusiastic neighbors. The new neighbor is restoring oldtimers; she is the gardener of the two.

I cut the willows around the pond. I came halfway through when the chainsaw batteries were empty. The willows go to the sheep, and they absolutely love willows. They eat the leaves and rip off the bark, consuming it as a delicacy.

When the batteries were depleted, I started on a new task: putting on the car's summer tires. I am using winter tires without spikes. Spiked winter tires are not allowed in the Netherlands. Essentially, I can use these as long as I wish, but I like to spare the rubber, so I take them off. Actually, the winter tires are in better shape than the summer tires. When it is time for the annual MOT test (APK, as it is called here), I usually put on the better set.

I recall changing the car's tires and how it has reflected the various stages of the house project. The first time I changed the tires on the dirt road with no driveway at all. I do hope that next time I can drive the car into the barn and change the tires indoors. That would be cool.

After changing the tires, I planted the second set of potatoes. This is six alouette potatoes. It is just the leftovers of the potatoes we had at hand. I put the potatoes on the plate on 12 April. But hang on a moment? What happened to the first set of potatoes? I also put these in the ground on 12 April. It was twelve Frieslander potatoes. Back then, I did not blog about this, and I have no idea why. I think I was too tired to blog about the potatoes. There are two of those potatoes that sprouted a tiny bit above ground.

Last week, I talked about how rewarding it was to harvest the asparagus. Well, a new batch of asparagus has sprouted, and now it is much more! It is the second time we have harvested these, but it is still just as fun. We boiled them in water for four minutes. Then the asparagus were placed on a plate, parmesan cheese was grated over them, and fresh lemon juice was squeezed over the top. The combination of fresh asparagus, Parmesan cheese, and lemon juice was delightful.

Thursday 23 April

Today, both DW and I worked from our respective offices. It was chilly, but the weather was generally good for biking; we did not bike; we commuted by car. There were not that many in the office. Gwen, Rita, Nicole, and I. Others were working from home or at other branch offices.

Friday 24 April

Today I had a day off, and DW worked from home. In the morning, I experimented with generating images from our home modified by Nano Banana.

First out is an impression of our kitchen according to the style of Henri Matisse. I even got the drawing signed! It is a fake signature.

I liked this image very much. It had taken me several hours to reach the same result if I had painted this by hand. I had also left my slippers by the chair, which makes the scene even more of an impression of the moment. Had I painted the scene, I would have probably left out the slippers.

The next image is in the style of Carl Larsson. It worked out well. It is funny to see how the double window was invented, and how the swing outside the window came about. My painting of the four loops was reproduced nicely. The brown chair we got from FIL's study in PIL's house.

This is in the style of Pierre-Auguste Renoir. These are MIL's chairs that we also made room for in our house. We use these in the morning when we drink coffee and admire the garden's growth. I like it that the gray floor is provided with colorful splotches.

Finally, I took a photo of Bea and made a modern version of that photo.

This is the brutalist concrete style of our Sheep Bea. DD has finished the first part of becoming an architect, so I made this to see if she liked it. No reply so far.

The first task for today, outside at the property, was to remove the remaining willows around the pond. The portion I made on Wednesday of Willow trees, that portion I fed the sheep with, that portion I moved to the tree rack. The new batch of willows moved to the sheep to eat off.

I figured out that the battery-driven chainsaw needs to be kept really sharp to conserve battery power. My new file tool is doing a great job, and I like it. I’m even considering buying the bigger brother for real chainsaws ’cause I have a couple of those.

While I was dragging the willows to the tree rack, I contemplated the drought. Last year, after I tilled the large southeast field, we experienced a prolonged drought. That field is great now, but it took a really long time before the grass and the chicory were growing sufficiently to be grazed by the sheep. We are hesitant to do the same again, and we see a new drought right now. We discussed different methods to sow more seeds without extensive ground preparation. Just putting seeds on the surface and hoping they will sprout during a drought might be expecting too much.

When I was dragging the willows, I noticed cracks in the soil, and I got an idea (and I call it a brilliant idea myself): how about sewing chicory and grass into the cracks? The benefit of this method is that at the bottom of the crack, the soil is not dry. That means that the seeds could be in perfect condition for sprouting. The drawback is that the crack might be really deep; you don't know. Another advantage is that we can let the sheep continue to graze the sown area, which is a big improvement compared to last year, when they couldn't use it for half a year.

We will see how the seeds go. I will keep you updated.

The next task for the day was to bring this small trailer with the blue hood to the recycling center because it was full of garbage. That should be easy, right? Well, I hooked up the trailer, and none of the lights worked. I have a general understanding of electrical circuits, but it is not my strongest area. At first, it feels overwhelming to fix an issue like this.

The most probable cause would be the seven-pole contact. This was frustrating! I used our bike carrier, which also has a seven-pole contact, and it worked. Then the issue would be the trailer. It turned out to be several of the cables that had gone bad. I cut them off and reconnected without losing track of where they belonged. That worked! I was so glad when I got it to work. Releaved!

So I drove off to the recycling center, emptied the trailer, and that went fine. Then I went into the city to get a new 7-pole contact for the trailer. I went to two car parts stores, and neither had it. New trailer contacts have many more pins, and our car has a new contact, but none of our three trailers have a new contact so that I won't add one. I am getting old, my trailers are getting old. At one point, this is just outdated stuff.

Today, our northern neighbor got two-thirds of the west wall of his barn bricked up. It has been a long project. His project started well before we started working on our barn. He is a brick-and-mortar type of person. We prefer wood. It's quicker to work with wood. He had tarps fluttering in the wind all winter. The sheep were initially scared by this, but they eventually figured out it was just the neighbor's fluttering.

Saturday 25 April

Last night it was three degrees Celsius. That is three degrees above the freezing point. It looks like there will be no nightly frost for the coming fourteen days. The likelihood of getting frost is now declining. I am hopeful that our apple blossom will give fruit.

We had a slow morning with tea in bed. I blogged as I usually do. Then we had a smoothie that I made. I made the smoothie with black currant, banana, pear, apple, and orange juice. How can one convey the wonderful feeling of a beautiful morning, enjoying the garden? The birds were chirping, and crows were cawing. These are European crows with a little less wide vocabulary. I know American crows have over 20 distinct vocalizations, but that is not here. At our old house, the blackbirds were more musical. They could even present little snippets of Swedish folk music. That was funny during the day, but less so when it was too early in the morning.

	Purple dead nettle.
	Apple blossom.
	Rosemary flower!

You can press the pause button and then walk through the slideshow manually. If there is a photo you like, you can click on it to download the high-resolution version. If you have a desktop computer, you can set that image as your desktop background to enjoy spring in the Netherlands.

We finally planted the strawberries in the raised bed at I5. It is just one plant. I like strawberries, but I do think they are better in the raised bed because the berries can hang over the edge and not lie on the ground. We bought it at the garden market a couple of weeks ago. This is also the place where we will plant the fennel. The fennel still has to sprout in the barn, though.

The place for edible flower plants will be in H2, where DW is also running a garlic experiment. I had anticipated having more beautiful flowers in the garden, but DW is not a flower person. This combination of edible flowers is just perfect; it ticks all boxes. I get my need for colors, and it fits DW in that it is possible to eat. The garlic and the flowers can grow side by side. I sowed a bag of these seeds, but the package did not tell what kind of flowers I could expect. It will be a surprise!

It was lovely weather. Merida followed us around to see what we were up to in the garden.

I sowed carrots, bottle gourd, and beetroot directly in the beds. With that, all things that should be started are started. Either directly in the ground or in pots in the barn.

Then I reworked the scheme to match our garden as it stands. I think this is how it will be this season, but you never know. It was such a lovely day. This time, I translated the plan into English with CoPilot.

What could end a lovely day, a lovely evening, obviously. We had decided to go to a restaurant called the Cracht Centrale in a nearby town, Huizen. It was a lovely experience. The sky was still blue when we arrived at the restaurant at 6:30 PM.

The Cracht Centrale means power plant. It originally may have produced district heating; I am not certain, but that is likely. It was now repurposed as a contemporary restaurant.

	I was impressed by the giant nut. It was surely 4 inches in diameter. Can you spot it?

We decided on the Chef's Menu. It was in the asparagus theme. Since we were also in that theme, it was interesting how a chef would handle this vegetable. DW had a vegetarian version, and I had the regular version. The starter was an asparagus soup with filling. Little dots with carrot paste, green leaves. DW had two grilled asparagus, and I had grilled lamb. I was so enthusiastic about eating the starter that I forgot to take a photo. The soup was entirely smooth. It was so smooth it had to be filtered through a napkin.

The main course was more grilled asparagus with lamb: a fluffy yellow cream and another brown sauce. There were pucks with crust and a nice filling. It was lovely. Everything was lying on a bed of conola. The lamb was tender. They had also added two crispy crackers. I left some of the asparagus as the last item on the plate and used it to scoop up as much of the sauce as possible. My creativity amused DW.

The restaurant's guests wore high heels, shiny evening dresses, and dinner jackets, but there were also people like us who were just moderately dressed up. Next to us was a family with two kids. Must say, the kids were well-behaved. They had LEGO to play with. I saw a mother and her daughter. At least that is how I imagined them to be related. They did armwrestling. The mother won.

The dessert looked really nice. It had a strawberry, ice cream, and a pudding. It was delicious. This time, I could use the bottom of the pudding to scoop up all the sauce.

After the dessert, we had coffee. I had a regular cappuccino, and DW had a regular decaf coffee. The coffee was hot, and I liked that. At many places, the cappuccino is lukewarm, and that is not how I like it.

In the adjacent room, there was going to be a concert this evening with a live band. We were not going to that event. We decided to have a walk in the nearby harbor.

 

I left a review of Restaurant and Café Crachtcentrale in Huizen on Google Maps. The restaurant got 5 stars from us. It was a culinary experience. We got more ideas for using our asparagus. It was a lovely evening. Apparently, there are theaters, exhibitions, and other activities at this place. Interesting!

Sunday 26 April

When I woke up this morning, the first thing I noticed on my smartwatch was a thank-you message from the restaurant owner. That was nice.

The scratch on my leg has healed, but I can still feel the contusion around it. The right shoulder is better. I can work normally in the garden, but some movements hurt a little.

I had a few moments over in the morning, when I covered the beds where I sowed beetroot and carrots with plastic. That way, the moisture is trapped, and the seeds will germinate better. It is important to find the right moment to take away the plastic. You don't want to be too late, but also not too early. There are much better chances of the seeds sprouting when kept consistently moist.

The next thing on today's agenda was a bike tour in Geldermalsen. We had planned to meet with friends and bike around the picturesque area around the river Linge.

It was beautiful weather. Our friends had e-bikes, so tempo was just right for me. It was a little challenging for DW. We stopped at a restaurant for lunch and had a good lunch. It was a really pleasant day. One cannot carry on gardening and moving wheelbarrows nonstop forever; one has to do fun stuff as well. We biked 24 kilometers. The bike held up, no ticking! The bike carrier's electrical 7-pole contact also worked!

Here ends this week's blog. I wrote 3521 words this week. All seeds and things we planned are sown or planted; that is a milestone for this season. Some seeds are still about to sprout in the barn. When I said last week that the garden preparations were finished, I knew there were a couple of small things still to do.