"And thou shall eat the fruit of thy labor..."

Mom, you wanted to see pictures of the garden, so here you go!

A gooseberry! It's like a hairy grape that tastes like a pear.

Black currants!

Beautiful Lizzie

The garden is probably an acre in area!

We actually GROW compost....this is our comfrey farm. :P 

Quick tour of the veggies: corn and sprouting broccoli...

...potatoes on the left, peas and beans on the right...

...and, oh, gosh, what's all in here...I don't even know the name of some of this stuff: sea kale, onions, beets, carrots, lettuce, etc.

Picking strawberries

Harvesting carrots

Monica's prince

So THIS is why people garden! After the winter months of pelting, icy rain, and digging in hard ground, and the tackling of jungles - now this feeling of accomplishment, celebration, and the juice of warm berries in one's mouth!

Song for Michael

Singing for my little brother!

The Adventures of Begonia, Henrietta, and Jade Velvet

(The only thing to do when you find authentic clothing from over a century ago.)

Goodbye, Alex! You will always be in Anaverna's heart.

Sparklers and Button Cakes

And then a summer spirit descended upon us named...

Alex!

Cadbury Buttons cake (his favorite!) for Daniel's birthday!

And then...

The Fourth of July!

Kate hung a flag out of a window for us, which warmed the cockles of my heart. 

Leo, a new WWOOFer and Kate's nephew, grilled us a barbeque!! We even got a bag of "American style" marshmallows.

I couldn't have been more satisfied.

I will cough dust for weeks...

....but it was worth it. Here are some of the nooks and crannies of Anaverna House, a Georgian-style manor home which has fifty rooms:

I could imagine Whistler's mother wearing this.

A tablecloth (probably from India) that has BEETLE wings sewn into the fabric!!! That's what the glossy green is.

Lizzie, an American actress, at Anaverna to do a one-woman show about Charlotte Bronte, trying on authentic 19th century clothing.

We had so much fun, prowling around in the third floor storage rooms! Lizzie found undeveloped photographs.

19th century riding boots caked with dust

Can't you just see me trailing around a Dublin park?

Military cap

A poem scrawled on the attic wall in pencil, probably by a schoolboy:

Gaily sang the monks of Ely

When Cnut the king was passing by

"Row to the shore knights" said the king

And let us hear there churchmen sing

An alligator-skin wallet

I can't describe my glee in discovering Anaverna's book collection.

It is a jewel of a library, many of the books out of print now.

A lexicon of Hebrew

African tribal mask!

Asian parasol! How well-traveled they were...

A REAL HOOP SKIRT!

Reading letters from Cambridge during frolicking college days...this one said, "The debauchery to which one can sink is shocking."

Vere's mother?

Vere's grandmother had a seventeen-inch waist!

A diary from 1882 that we found called "Red Letter Days"...but we suspect it was fabricated, due to the high-filutin' language and overly dramatic love story in it.

Vere's father, a tea plantation manager in Sri Lanka

Elephant!

Yes, that is a real crocodile skin and elephant hoof. 

I love the top hat.