Blog
Sofia vs Plovdiv: Which is better for a city break?
I’m back! If you follow my adventures on Instagram, you’ll know that we’ve been away in Plovdiv, Bulgaria’s second city, and Sofia, the capital. After 15 months of pandemic life, I was in desperate need of some city action – and with both of us being fully...
We built a (very twee) garden shed
I say ‘we’. Our friend built it for us, as Rob has his hands full with the never-ending rustic greenhouse project, and I don't do manual labour. Anyway, didn't he do a great job? It’s based on the metal shed in Monty Don’s veg garden, which has always given...
Vaccinated
We had our second COVID-19 vaccines last week and, boy, are we pleased with ourselves. We’re so grateful to have been vaccinated for free in Bulgaria – we would have gladly paid for the privilege – and to have both doses done so soon. (For the folks back home,...
Be more Blanche
We went back to the fabulous plant shop in Sofia last week. I mean, we were supposed to be in Sofia looking at ovens. (Our electric oven hasn’t worked for years and every time spring rolls around, when we no longer want to put the woodburner on just to cook...
Dumpster-diving window beggars
This is our life now. Every time we go out, we’re on high alert for abandoned wooden windows to finish off the rustic greenhouse. We eyeball people’s gardens as we drive by. We scour municipal bins. We tell anyone who’ll listen, ‘We’re looking for old windows. DO...
Springwerk, greenhouse progress and wild garlic
We finally had a warm, sunny, spring-like weekend, so we spent all of last Saturday and Sunday in the veg garden, attempting to impose some order on the chaos. It was hard work (werk schmerk). The first gardening weekend of the year is always murder on my back and...
Return of the Gardening Bore (again)
In a list-writing mood today (quelle surprise), so I thought I’d present you with an update on our Gardening Bore 2021 antics. If you’re new here, when we bought our Bulgarian village house it came with a large-ish (1/4 acre) garden – complete with some grass,...
April, is that really you?
My calendar, filthy liar that it is, is trying to convince me that it’s April. But that can’t be right, can it? How are we already a quarter of the way through 2021? How can time fly when none of us are having any fun? It doesn’t seem fair. As it’s April Fool’s...
A trip to Troyan Monastery (but mainly, Bulgarian pottery)
I have never seen Troyan Monastery as quiet as it was last Friday. True, the main chapel is currently undergoing restoration, but I was still surprised to see the rest of the complex so empty and, well, monastic. There were more people browsing the wooden bowls and...
13 squash recipes everyone should have up their sleeve
I realise this post would have been more timely back in the autumn, when squash and pumpkin were everywhere in the shops. But if you grow your own squash, as we do, you’ll still have loads left from the autumn (cured properly in a sunny, warm spot squash will keep...
Wanted: An unsociable person’s guide to making friends
It’s hard to make friends later in life, isn’t it? I often wonder how people do it. So many of my longstanding friendships started in the workplace or stretch all the way back to my college and university days, so now that I work from home and am about as likely to...
Gratitude (I’m not a robot)
Seems a lot of people back home are grateful that there’s now a roadmap for bringing the UK out of lockdown. I’m not really one for strong ‘feelings’ (she says, in air quotes, like feelings are something marketers made up to sell ice cream), so I’ve always felt,...