Well Summer is well and truly over now and Autumn has set in. The evenings are much shorter & it  is getting darker much quicker. This Summer I spent a lot of time in my garden and set a lot of flowers. This weekend I hope to set some bulbs for Spring time.

This year we visited the Tullamore Show and the National Ploughing Championships, both of which were great days out. I took note of all the home grown produce at both events. Tullamore Show is Ireland's largest one day agricultural show and country lifestyle event with approximately 60,000 visitors and over 1,000 competitions taking place. This year the weather was great on the day and I really enjoyed all of the show marquees- there was one for home baking, flowers, poultry, photography and craft. There are all types of animals- cattle, sheep, pigs, horses and rare breeds along with exhibitions and trade stands.

This week myself and my husband visited the annual National Ploughing Championships which is a three day event. We went for the first day of the event. It is Europe's largest outdoor exhibition and agricultural trade show. Different types of ploughing takes place and judging takes place each day. This year 283,000 people visited the event over the three days. It was extremely well organised and there is so much to see and do. For anyone interested in agriculture it is a great day out... Below are just some photographs I took of vegetables and flowers from the two events.

How is your Summer going? Already the evenings are getting shorter and there is a coolness in the air at night. I haven't taken much holidays off work yet but I have had a few days enjoying the good things in life... spending time with friends and family, nice food and enjoyable times...

Friday I took the day off work and met up with some old friends in Dundrum which is on the south side of Dublin for those of you who may not be familiar with the area. As you may have noticed I am not a city person and only go to the city an odd time to meet with friends or shopping. So off I went in my little red car to have a catch up with my friends. We decided to have lunch in Jamie's Italian. I didn't realize that Jamie Oliver has over 30 restaurants worldwide. I ordered a plank pizza and it was really delicious, followed by cheesecake which I didn't finish as I was so full. Overall it was really tasty. It was quiet enough for a Friday which was nice as we could spend a bit longer chatting to each other. The decor is industrial style with lots of fruit,vegetable and meat hanging from the counter which we were not keen on as it looked almost fake. The food was lovely though and I would recommend it. Have you visited any of Jamie's restaurants?

Last weekend , I was more in my comfort zone when we visited the Tullamore Show with my sister in law and her partner. The Tullamore Show is the largest Agricultural Show in the Country. It is located a few miles outside Tullamore town in County Offaly. The weather wasn't great but we made the most of it, wellies, hats, umbrellas and raincoats were out. There was an array of home craft and goods on display from the competitions which we spent a long time looking at, followed by lots of pedigree cattle, sheep, pigs, hens, etc. I enjoyed the sheep shearing competition, but we missed the sheep dog trials. There were a lot of market stalls and food stalls. Overall it was an enjoyable experience and is worth a visit, even if you are not a farmer, a farmers wife or even from the countryside. I didn't have a proper map of the show so found it a bit difficult to navigate my way around. Next time I will keep the map that came in the Farmer's Journal. Agricultural Shows are very popular here in Ireland celebrating and showcasing all things agricultural, the livestock, the way of life, food, craft, our traditions, heritage and customs.