The first orange juice.

And the answer was,  no it didn't rain, not that day anyway.  The following day was glorious with blue skies,  and we spent most of the day outside pruning,  trimming,  logging,  stacking wood for next winter's fires - and it was so nice that we were working in summer t-shirts.

A complete change yesterday both in the weather and clothing,  grey skies, low cloud,  and winter woollies.   It managed a bit of drizzle late afternoon, just enough to dampen the ground but not enough to make puddles anywhere.

Today,  a mix.  I've got the washing out - put it in really early because the sky was blue but by the time it was out on the line the clouds had gathered, hopefully it'll dry ok though.

I picked the first bag of oranges this morning,  26 of the biggest I could reach,  but they were so cold!   It was only 4° overnight and there was frost on the ground up the road,  by the time I'd filled the bag I couldn't feel my fingers.   I've just finished sorting them out - first  I grated the zest from them,  then squeezed almost 3 litres of juice,  plus there were a dozen or so mandarinas left that we'd not got around to eating so I cut them in half and squeezed them too.

                                                               before....

                                                              and after.

Thank  heavens for  the juicing attachment on the food processor,   it makes it such an easy job,  we also have a hand juicer but it doesn't get the oranges so.......clean?  de-juiced?  empty?   squeezed?   What's the right word for it?