Kiah Garvey - our young smallholder is extra busy

It's a lovely spring day here and at last inspection it was 20 C. May is one of the best times of year in my opinion. All the lambs are bounding around and at long last life is visible in the ground. The grass is now a thick emerald carpet and wild flowers are everywhere. People's gardens are looking healthy and my own patch isn't looking too bad either.

My vegetable patch had a makeover in April and now has two raised beds, which allow me to grow much more. They are deep enough to accomodate carrots, parsnips etc. so this years the harvest should be a good one. The beds were generously made by my mum's partner for me and now have their first residents, beetroot, carrots, cabbage and lettuce. The porch is an absolute bombsite, seed trays everywhere! I received a bumper order from a seed company. I ordered too many packets of veg. seeds to mention, that are now busy germinating in the porch and some are outside in the beds. I have finally got my broad beans hardened off and they are enjoying the sun. The early potatoes will be ready in three weeks as will some early onions. The leeks should be ready in another month or so. It is all go at this time of year!

Exam Fever

Another matter is my exams. As I write, I have just eight days until they begin. I have spent three years watching the years above me sit them and never imagined that it would come round so fast. Revision seems never ending and I try and squeeze as much as I can into each day. It suddenly seems very hard trying to balance looking after two horses, tending a veg patch AND revising. Not to mention all the other animals (hens, ducks, sheep). I know the night before the exams start I will be ridiculously nervous, but as my mum says, you can only do your best.

The horses came through the winter well. Treacle needs quite a bit of help keeping the weight on, but Fury remains the size of a house! I have started riding Fury a bit more, as well as Treacle. I went down to Hampshire at Easter to visit my god-parents. While I was there, I went to look around Sparsholt Agricultural College. I was blown away by it, the sheer size of the place and the facilities they have. I seem to be settled on doing Equine Management, but I didn't know where. Obviously there are no guarantees, but I would love to study there. Hopefully the exams will go well, and then I am going on to do Highers (A-levels). An advantage of going to Sparsholt would be that you can take your own horse. I am hoping to take my gap year when I would be doing 6th year, and go fruit picking in France or something! Before going to college, I might look for another, bigger pony.

Fury is a great deal bigger than Treacle, possibly a bit too big for me, but I do enjoy riding something bigger than Treacle. It's just a nice change now and again, and I think it's also good experience to ride different horses.

As Treacle is not at retiring age yet, I am hoping to take him as well and teach him to pull a trap. I feel quite privileged that my height allows me to still be small enough to ride Treacle, and also ride Fury.

My 16th birthday came and went through a haze of revision. I bought my first lottery ticket, but unfortunately didn't win, so I can't buy my dream smallholding just yet! I went to Hampshire a couple of days after and spent most of my time in tack shops and saddlers. I spoilt Treacle rotten, buying such things like numnahs and packets of treats that of course he won't appreciate! He is none the wiser!

Flying Raspberry

I came home from my trip with no less than 20 raspberry canes. My god-parent's next door neighbour was moving house and had this amazing garden that he was leaving behind. As they were going somewhere with less land, I was given these canes. They were all wrapped up, but trying to explain to a British Airways check-in what they were was another matter. I eventually got a fragile sticker on them and they were off into the hold. I wasn't allowed to take them in the cabin just in case I became threatening with them ie poking the pilot or something, Oh dear...what is the world coming to?

Another craft I have discovered is making my own bread. I delved into Delia's books and found a basic white loaf recipe. The first attempt came out a little burnt on the top, but the flavour was amazing. The second attempt proved more fruitful, and I was presented with two honey coloured loaves from the oven. We do have a breadmaker but the bread always has that hole in the bottom from the mixer and it is also a bit sweet, not to mention an odd shape! I didn't mind making the bread manually. Kneading is actually quite theraputic and the end result is most satisfying.

The hens are fine, laying well and the eggs are selling well. Kurt still has odd crowing times, and many threats of roasting, becoming Sunday lunch etc. have been made. He struts around the place in a very superior manor, and lets rip with the loudest crow I have ever heard!

Better close, revision to do, hens to feed, horses to ride!