I'm Back

Well it was a great week away visiting a friend the kids played to exhaustion and a good time was had by all, I even got to do some gardening for my friend, so didn't have to experience any withdrawal symptoms.

Came back to my own garden with a little trepidation because the weather away and back at home was great lots of sun and warmth and my hubby informed me on Wednesday night that as I didn't give direct orders to water plants he didn't. So all he was doing was opening and closing the greenhouse he didn't even venture inside once to check if all was ok! The greenhouse on inspection had three casualties, my emerging cabbage and brussel sprouts went to the great garden in the sky along with one echinacia seedling. Everything else looked well though.

We arrived home with the sun still shining and the garden looking great, everything have grown so much in a short space of time, new flowers are blooming or in bud such as the violas and the cowslips which were planted last year. The tulips at the back and the wild/alpine strawberries are also blooming and the flower beds are beginning to fill out. The mini meadow area is full of all types of seedlings along with a few differing grass seedlings.

Other developments to greet me was a newly cut and fertilised lawn (thanks mum) it looks really lush and green but there are a few bare patches to resow. The tadpoles were now all over the pond's surface with no signs of spawn jelly anywhere. today on further inspection I found a few of them gobbling up a small patch of algae bloom which must have grown due to all the increased sunshine and warm temperatures of the last week. I'm hoping that their ferocious appetite will halt the algae from overtaking the pond and turning it into green soup (blech!).

The carrots and the parsnips are also up and growing well. Another asparagus plant has produced a spear and this is from one the plants that was dug up this winter. The chillie plants that were pruned and cleaned up have also shown they are still alive with new leaves sprouting on the cut stems, the second early potaoes are up and the first earlies are growing away and will soon need earthing up ie adding more soil.

So today's tasks was to water everything inside the greenhouse and outside as well as the newly transplanted veges in the beds which were all doing very well with no signs of slug damage (yah!!!).

Resowing of the killed off seedlings were also done along with some new sowings of romensco, cauliflower and kale two varieties red Russian and Nero De Tuscany.

Germination of the cornflower seeds and the onions have been observed and new shoots of the autumn sown jerusalem artichokes are beginning to come up.

The vege mini pond finally got cleaned out there were eight pond skater on its surface. I also got the opportunity to remove all the leaves from last autumn from the unpaved area of the vege area, so hopefully if there is any wind tonight none should end up in the pond.

Anyway the rain finally came as was forecasted and I called it a day, not sure if I'll get anything done tomorrow as heavy rainfall if expected, so I'll probably check back in on Monday.

The Best Laid Plans

Well with the great weather that was looming for this weekend just ended I planned to gets lots done in the garden, well eh! eh!

I went to bed Friday night with a slight sore throat which was niggling me all day and woke up Saturday feeling like someone had shoved a red hot poker down my throat. I got Nathifa off to drama classes went back to bed as I was feeling really sleepy at about 10.00am and didn't get back out of bed till 7.00pm when hunger and general aches and pains from lying so long drove me out into the living :).

So a quick update on what little I got done from Friday till today and any other updates.

Friday

• Resowed my cabbage seeds today as after two Weeks there was no germination which is a bit odd for members of the brassicus family I sowed lots more than what i need with the hope I'll get exactly what I need.

The lentil sprouts were also ready to eat and we all enjoyed them in their raw state. crucnhy with a slady flavour.

Saturday

• Woke up and found in the fruit section pond frog spawn yippee!! I was so excited I almost forgot my sore throat. There was also lots of very little snails in the pond, not sure where they came from???
• The kids freebie seeds from the BBC arrived.

Sunday

Woke up feeling much better although a bit weak probably due to some dehydration from lack of fluids on Saturday's lay in.

• Made a mixture of wildflower seeds along with the kids freebie seeds and some grass seeds thrown in with some compost and with their help we prepared the mini meadow area first by raking the surface to a fine tilth and the sifted the compost with the seed mixture onto the area. We then watered the area and netted it against the birds eating the seeds and cats using the area as a toilet.
• The mangtoute peas I sowed a few days earlier have started to germinate and the beetroot and spinach beet seeds are almost all up now.
• I then decide to potter around the garden and did some tidying of leaves from the autumn leaf drop from around the vege pond boggy area and at the back by the compost bins. The were all added to the green compost/ leaf litter bins. When they finally rot down I'll lots of great leaf mold to use in the garden as mulch and light plant feed.
• The daddy of the frog spawn was also seen and heard calling to other females so may be we would get even more spawn.
• We also saw our first peacock butterfly enjoying the warm sun rays.

I also spotted some scat/ animal droppings which I got help in identifying from me A4A forum as hedgehog droppings which is nice to know. It means they are still about and are waking up from there long winter's sleep :)

A Symbiotic Relationship

Well I tell you if it wasn't for this blog I would not have done any gardening today (it doesn't help when the weather is gloomy) but the blog and the garden seems to have developed a symbiotic relationship, with both of them encouraging the progress of the other.

So on that note the tasks that I accomplished today were;

1. The planting out of my 1st early seed potatoes. 3 seed potatoes of the variety Foremost went into a large pot and 5 seed potatoes of the variety Colleen went into a grow sack. In tidying up the pots I found a dead potato plant, so I recycled the soil into a bag for later use and unearthed a small growing tuber of a main crop variety called Fir Apple. Normally the main crop spuds won't be planted till late march but since it was trying to grow already I stuck it in a medium size pot of fresh soil and we'll see if I get anything from it (maybe we'll get a meals worth). All the containers I used were left outside the greenhouse but once the leaves begin to show I would bring them under cover if late frosts are forecasted.

2. I also got some more seeds sown, a spring onions variety I grew last year called 'Deep Purple' (it produced spring onions that thought themselves to be actual onions with huge bulbs produced that stored well in situ where they were planted) and a red cabbage variety 'Kalibos' called were sown and left in the greenhouse. Some ochro was also sown and kept in the warm conservatory.


I have been scaling back the household's diet to a less processed one, not that we eat a large amount of process foods to begin with but a few months ago I started phasing out the tinned Beans that made up a large part of our diet and started to re-add to our diet dry peas which I have to prepare from scratch with a pressure cooker etc. Now this is how I preferred to cook anyway but picked up this bad habit of buying beans in tins a few years ago. Thankfully that is now under better control with only bake beans (I once found a baked bean recipe on-line, so watch this space if I find it again it will be bye bye) and the odd tin of corn (will be swapping to frozen very soon) being part of grocery list.

Another task today concerning our diet was to restart growing sprouts to add to our sandwiches and salads. Again I use to do this a lot about four years ago and dropped the habit out of laziness no doubt, well I have been promising to restart since last autumn when I unearthed the sprouting trays. So after washing them in the dishwasher this morning I sowed three types of seed - red cabbage, mustard and alphalfa.

Well that all I got up to today, the weather is forecasted to be bright and sunny tomorrow so I plan to get some more sowing done along with other things. I will fill you in on my progress when its all done.