late afternoon sun.

Yes Summer has been disappointing this year. This weekend brought yet more rain, wind and cold enough temperatures to light the fire. I might add that we have lit the fire about half a dozen times so far this year.

Yes, ridiculous.

So when the sun finally came out on Sunday afternoon we piled outside.

As I have mentioned before Ruby is all about drama and role play. Yesterday she wanted to play "Laura," as in "The Little House" series, so she looked around the garden to find some chores to do, collected her props and got into costume.

She cleared out the chicken run and swept the path at the back of the house and the whole time she smiled. Caroline always smiles while she works apparently.

Excellent.

I was keen to pass her a list of other jobs to be done - as you can imagine I was keen to extend her play - but I got busy putting the chicken-run compost onto the empty garden beds and missed my chance.

Even the bees could get back to work, which of course is what they had been waiting for.

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In other news, I posted over at our community-based blog, lyttel-town yesterday with a post on making sauerkraut. We're pulling out loads of Summer cabbages from our garden right now and loving the tangy additions to our meals, not to mention the wildness.