• Ice Ice Baby

    Lately us residents of Northern Europe have been reminded that it can still get cold. Even if the days of frozen rivers and glaciers are long gone for England, after two weeks of sub zero temperatures there is a heck…

  • Christmas Cake!

    Ira made an enormous Traditional Christmas Cake this year to give to Rob’s family as a present. We spent Christmas with Rob and his family up in Derby. Funnily enough the recipe Ira used came from ‘The Complete Asian Cookbook’…

  • More Birds

    There was a bit of excitement at our bird feeder this morning. We got a brief visit from some long-tailed tits and coal tits. We’d never seen these birds before and one day they arrived, and were gone by the…

  • Octopus Christmas

    Our kitchen table was turned into a frenzy of scientific activity over the Christmas break as resident molecular biology super-guru Jan and her able assistant (me) prepared nearly 700 pieces of octopus for DNA extraction. Here we are hard at…