Bingham's

Not far over the windy gap lies a glorious vignette of the past: 


Bingham's garage and shop


Just like you remembered it, welcoming and homely - what a place!

everything you could wish for

and more!

garage and shop...

petrol station

house

perfection!

I fancy a Bingham-style makeover for our our old garage

Flight UPS 235 Creates a Spectacle

What a glorious Day! Sunshine all day, breezy but warm. 
Plenty of work done in the garden. A treat.


Towards sunset a plane passes by, and the vapour trail causes the setting sun to cast a shadow on the clouds above.


Not sure I've seen this before; very beautiful.


Thanks to Flightradar24.com I can tell you that this was a UPS flight from New York, Newark (EWR) Via  London, Stansted (STN)
to: Cologne, Cologne Bonn (CGN) 
and the aircraft was a Boeing 767-34AF (B763)!

the vapour trail casts a shadow from the setting sun

flight UPS 235 en route to Cologne

strangely beautiful

sunset: Slievenaboley

UPS 235: the route as shown on flightradar24.com

And given time, I could give you a picture of the plane as well!

Solstice Follies

Now that we've determined the Gallery as the point of entry for visitors, our plans for landscaping have been drastically modified. Instead of coming in at the lower gate, into the Turnip House Courtyard, visitors will be using the upper gate and car park, and coming round to the upper gallery entrance.

Turnip House Courtyard

 It makes more sense. However this means that all the tidying up of the old fallen down garage, and it's environs have to be done now rather than later!

Upper Courtyard

The area inside and around what was once a fine garage will have to be cleared and our ideas for a Zen garden and infinity pool carried forward.

This bit of fun & folly came out of a brainstorming afternoon whilst walking our acres, planning what on earth to do with it all.

Now we'll have to do it for real!

infinity pool in the making

 The infinity pool consists of 3 shallow raised pools, each dropping into the next. It's alignment, determined relative to the walls around it, points up to Slievenaboley, where the sun sets in Summer.

the new entrance via the Gallery

this is the angle the sun makes at the moment

Wouldn't it be great if the sun sets right at the end of the pool on the longest day? 

Fantasy indeed!

sunset 28th April -  7 weeks to solstice

Frank's Cattle catch the last rays

Felting at Down Arts

Today Elaine was at Down Arts Centre with 11 felters! A great time was had by all and fantastic articles made.

At our lunch break we had sample pieces and felt pens under our belt!

Exquisite delicacies, felt flowers for a corsage.

striking fabric ready to be made into a bag.

2 of the felters making seamless bags!

Shocking pink and aubergine bag in the making.

Large felt flowers in beautiful colours.

The newly refurbished Down Arts Centre is a wonderful venue, thank you! 

Raspberry Pi - a first look

I've been following with interest the development of the Raspberry Pi a very small, very cheap computer from Cambridge university:

It holds out great prospects for the resurrection of computer science in schools, the young in general, and for oldies like myself.


The initial interest has been phenomenal, with hundreds of thousands of people wanting one.


I've not got one myself yet, but there's a good first look on this BBC clip:

A Year Ago

An occasional look at what things were like a year ago.


A different task today. The weather was good, if a cold start, so decided to strim and mow the acres. The outside of the garden at the roadside has not been touched and looks a mess.


This set me to thinking about what lawn we had a year ago. 
We certainly had no green in the Turnip house Courtyard.


The sub floor diggings from the Turnip House are in place, as are some of the magnificent stones that were just 'lying around' (from the sad demolition of the Threshing Barn - before our time), and the top of the wall has been cut and rebuilt as the barbecue table. 
Still very much a work in progress!

April 2011 - see we had the seats out anyway!

 By today, things are much more as we want them, Grass, the barbecue 'laying out' slab, and a nice little border at the back to give colour and disguise the wall.

April 2012

looking down to the picnic lawn this evening

Flight Radar 24: a Great Website

Had old friends up for a chat today, and was shown this website that I'd like to share with you.


A fine example of the voluntary collaborative ventures that you see springing up online - only made possible by the internet - great fun and really useful if you're planning to pick someone up.


And of course, a gift for the hidden Geek in all of us!

this is a screenshot: real time aircraft information

hours of fun - check it out!

A Most Satisfying Weekend!

Despite my moaning at the end of last week, a little application has gone a long way this weekend. Most absorbing, creative in a different way, and very satisfying to look back on.


The fruits of my labour:

All the boards down. The gap is for a concrete plinth for the cooking area

it's 10 metres from end to end

floored to the door

collateral damage - marker pen on my watch - no wonder I was having trouble telling what time it was!

News about our 'plough'

Many thanks to all those who know their agricultural implements much better than us for the information about the implement that we unearthed earlier this month.


It seems likely that it is a potato ridger or grubber. Our dear neighbour Frank thinks so.


Thank you Sandra from Horsepower in Ireland for your comments:

Hi John,
What a beautiful place you have, the views are stunning!
It is fairly common to find old pieces of horse-drawn equipment in ditches, behind barns, under dung heaps etc., often covered in nettles like yours. But it is always thrilling to find these things on your own land! We found our first piece of horse-drawn equipment - a spring tooth harrow - behind our barn, and we still use it with our two horses.
Common ploughs usually have two wheels at the front, a smaller and a bigger one (one to run in the furrow, and one running on the un-turned ground). So it looks like yours, given it has only one wheel, used to be a potato ridger or possibly a scuffler (which is a horse drawn hoe of some sort). But because the acutal piece running through the soil is gone, it is hard to tell. You may find it hepful to look up the equipment we use: http://www.horsepowerinireland.com/about-our-equipment.html. There is a picture of a potato ridger and a plough, and I've just put up a picture of a scuffler as well.
There is a fantastic museum in Johnstown Castle in Co. Wexford (http://www.irishagrimuseum.ie/collection/index.htm)If you ever go that way, it is worthwhile visiting, and you might find some useful information.
Best wishes,
Sandra

Her site is brilliant, lovely pictures and lots of fascinating facts - good luck with your great venture

lovely site - and lovely logo!

Here's some pictures of our one:

Paul on unearthing day!

a beautiful thing

generally ploughs have two front wheels (so I'm told!)

you can see the indentations where they screwed in the height adjuster

hand wrought - lovely

there would have been two blades fixed here

and one here

This is a picture of part of a horse shoe that we found last July.
Could it have shod the horse that pulled our grubber?

found when we were making a flowerbed

Saturday

A day at The Turnip House
Yesterday our replacement vacuum cleaner came, so it was again possible to do the housework - Oh joy!
After cleaning the mobile set to on the Turnip House, getting ready to open today.
Then made celery soup and wheaten bread ready for visitors.

soup (celery) and wheaten bread ready to go

sun shines on the wet slabs of Slievenaglogh

The Turnip House is OPEN!

view form the table - although the mountains could well 'disappear' in the next rain shower

a lovely little place

if only the weather had been like this all day

AND, after work, managed to lay the insulation and first run of boards in the gallery:

We're Open again tomorrow, Sunday 11-5 come along, 

get some real soup, 

and check out the work in progress!