It’s our end of season party tomorrow so we’ve invited local French suppliers to help us celebrate the failure of the gunpowder plot in traditional English style. I doubt our Frenchie friends will understand the goings on, given that they celebrate the opposite outcome every July 14th. Vivre la difference!

Hayley’s up to her ears in pumpkin soup, made exclusively with chateau grown produce (small Potimarron pumpkins are great for soup, carrots, celery, onions, garlic and a chilli for that bit of a kick)

Eric is building an enormous bonfire, starting with the sofa that was trashed by guests earlier in the year and moving on through many empty wine boxes and broken umbrellas to deckchairs and hammocks which have seen better days.

Steve, our fabulous chef, is mooching about taking arty pictures of mushrooms while Marcelle is packing up for their trip to the mountains. He’s responsible for the mulled wine tomorrow.

The Badger continues bravely with development of the new chateau database.

I wonder in and out of everyone’s way making useful comments about how they could improve their performance, in a motivational sort of way which of course they love.

And there’s an eerie effigy hanging from the rafters of the barn, dressed in the Badgers’s oldest work clothes, looking spookily like my husband swinging from a gallows…..