PAY IT FORWARD......

Today I thought I would offer a couple of items for the "Pay it Forward". Remember, the deal is you get to watch them and then pass them on free of charge to others, its about the spirit of sharing, and the joys of looking after each other..

I loved the Victorian Farm, simplistic lifestyles, hard work and pleasure found in the most basic of activities. The farm is at the Acton Scott estate in Shropshire; a breath-takingly beautiful area which provides a glorious (and frequently very cold) backdrop to the agricultural action.

The Acton Scott working farm has preserved antique tools, buildings and machinery collected by the Acton family who have lived on the estate since the 12th century. The filming follows the team as they move into a Victorian smallholding which hasn't been used for 50 years, and turn it back into a working farm complete with rare breed pigs and sheep, a shire horse, dairy cows and free range fowl.

Throughout the year the team tackle the regular tasks of rural life - all without electricity or tractors, of course! They restore the cottage, thresh the wheat crop, sow a new crop, install a range for heat and cooking in the kitchen, fuel up with coal, make cider and preserves, learn how to shepherd livestock, build pigsties, tackles the four-day job that is hand-washed laundry, guides their ewes through pregnancy to lambing, fell wood to build fencing, catch rabbits for the pot, revel in the delights of ginger pigs, look after a lame horse, experience steam power, try beekeeping and bring in the harvest.

 

Not everything goes smoothly for the Victorian farmers and we learn alongside them - how to check if a ewe is pregnant, or making lip balm from mutton fat. All of it is fascinating!
 

Tales from the Green Valley follows five as they labour for a full agricultural year, getting to grips with period tools, skills, and technology from the age of the Stuarts, the reign of James I. Everything must be done by hand, from ploughing with a team of oxen using a replica period plough and thatching a cowshed using only authentic materials, to making their own washing liquid for laundry and harvesting the hay & wheat with scythes and sickles.

Each of the 12 half-hour programmes, made by Lion TV for BBC Wales, follows a month in the life of the farm situated on the Welsh borders. Far from being a reality series, these beautifully filmed programmes revel instead in the period’s rich history, the British countryside as it changes through the seasons, and of course food. Every episode features a dinner cooked up using period breeds and varieties of animals, fruits, and vegetables, according to 400 year old recipes extracted from housewives’ diaries, farming manuals etc.
The five specialists wear period clothing - because they’re practical, real working garments, with the men in breeches so the bottoms don’t get muddy and wet, and the women wearing long thick skirts which protect from brambles and keep them warm.
And when historian Stuart Peachey, costume and social customs specialist Ruth Goodman, and archaeologists Alex Langlands, Peter “Fonz” Ginn and Chloe Spencer don’t have the answers, they call in outside experts: a host of traditional British artisans - charcoal burner, butcher, hedge-layer, candlemaker, dry-stone waller, thatcher ... all working with period tools.

Because of the exhorbitant costs of postage in Aussie I am limiting this to Aussie entries only sorry.........Just leave your name and which DVD you would like and we will draw the names from the hat next Saturday.
 
You and yours have a super week-end:)