Not that I’m really complaining because the sunshine has been great and we’ve already managed to have a bbq, but isn’t it supposed to be wet in April?

My tune for this update has no real reference to anything in the post – seeing as April has been sunny, but I’ve had it in my head for about a week.

It reminds me of a good friend and makes me smile. We worked out a whole dance routine to it in my garden when we were kids. Thank god that web-cams and phone cameras weren’t around then, otherwise there would be a really cringe-y video floating around somewhere!

The unexpected sunshine has been great for the garden. Things are doing really well for the most part.

Runner beans and mange tout are shooting up nicely. 

The first of my herbs are appearing too. Coriander, Borage, Thyme, Oregano, Dill and Chives are all emerging.

Herbage appearing

Strawberries work great in hanging baskets - ideal for avoiding slugs too!

I’ve planted up most of my hanging baskets and troughs with strawberries and flowers. The Borage will be added in when it’s bigger.

Got my lack-lustre broadbeans into the plot and discovered my chive has revived, along with the wild garlic I planted down last year, which died back so quickly I thought it’d had it.

Chive and wild garlic (right). The flowers and leaves are great in salads

I’ve still got loads to do, got to get top soil for the other veg plots, I’ve got seed potatoes to plant, beans and peas to plant, more salads to sow, and endless watering, but I can see the horizon now …

April has to be the busiest month in the garden, I am so exhausted!

I’m up to date for the time being but I feel like the Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland, “You have to run as fast as you can, just to catch up.”

As well as everything else, I’ve been thinking about the Herb Garden this morning and I’ve got my herbs in (Got some fab herb seeds from vegetableseeds.net).

The plan is to plant up some young herb plants on the kitchen windowsill so they’re handy for cooking.

There’s only so many photos of compost in pots with seed labels that I can take without becoming very bored, so I’ve spared the camera today.

I’ve planted:

Parsley – As well as inspiring me to search out Parsley the Lion on Youtube, Parsley is very versatile and I add it to loads of different dishes. Also good for freshening breath supposedly, although not as easy to carry in your handbag as chewing gum.

Sage – Apparently very easy to grow. Can be used fresh or dry and is supposed to be quite good in salads. Yummy with onions. A slow grower so not expecting to see much from it for a while yet.

Dill – One of my favourite herbs, (not just because I liked Dill the Dog!) It has a lovely cool almost lemony flavour I think, which works fantastically with fish dishes. It reminds me of the sauce you get on a Big Mac a little bit too!

Chives – I have always had chives in the garden until I went away last month. My OH kindly dug over the veg plot and assumed my lovely big chive plant was a weed! This plant will probably go outside in a pot as it likes to spread out, the purple globe flowers look lovely and attract the bees.

Oregano – I use a lot of Oregano in cooking so it’ll be interesting if using it fresh makes any difference to the taste of pasta/pizza/stews. Again, this herb has lovely flowers so any extra plants will go into the garden.

Rosemary – Another herb I use loads in cooking, love it in focaccia bread with garlic. I’ve left it quite late really, as it can take months to germinate so I will probably get impatient and take a cutting of my mom’s plant in the meantime.

Borage – I have no idea what this tastes like but it’s very pretty, the blue flowers are prolific and long lasting. I’m growing it to companion my strawberries, apparently it makes the strawberries taste better. I’ll also probably twin it with tomatoes to draw the bees in.

Chamomile - I grow this purely for the garden and the bees. It covers all the gaps in the flowerbeds that draw in the dandelions. Might plant some up with the Borage with strawberries and tomatoes – red, white and blue – how Patriotic!

Think you can probably guess whichsongI’m referencing here! Just felt appropriate.

I love this time of year, the garden is colourful and lively again and I come over all ‘Mother Earth-y’. Flowers seem to have just appeared from nowhere. There’s loads of butterflies and bees about already, it almost feels like summer.

Loads of my seeds have sprouted in the last couple of days and I’m dead chuffed! Spinach, loads of my lettuces and the much maligned broad beans have all started coming up. It’s probably down to the fab warm weather.

First spinach sprouting, ahh

I took a picture of my first broad bean sprout too but it looks like a fuzzy alien in the photo and so hasn’t made the final grade.

I’m hoping to have a lot more plants coming up by the time I get back and loads of lush growth to show off – if OH remembers to water things!

I meant to do some weeding once I’d packed everything, but i ended up watching Murphy play in the garden, then climb his first tree, then get stuck in his first tree.

Even though he was crying pathetically (I know it’s cruel to laugh but I can’t help it, it’s the funniest little noise ever), he kept going higher and higher until OH had to climb up to rescue him  hilariously funny! I almost had to change!

I’m all packed now I think. There’s always something I forget because I’m so dizzy, but as long as I’ve got my passport I’m fine.

If I don’t post again for more than 2 weeks, it’s because I’ve left my laptop on the ferry.

Byeee!

Well… I should explain my slightly odd last post!

I may have an overwhelming admiration for my Apache Chilli plant (see Adrianne!! Adrianne!! for details), but I was also on Tramadol.

Tramadol is a relative of morphine and is an excellent pain medication for arthritis, but unfortunately due to its capacity to down a horse in a cloud of pink elephants, is not ideally suited to writing on. Moving on…

I’ve finally got myself into gear and planted up some seeds.  OH has kindly dug over my small plot for me. I’ve put in some lovely ‘matured’ chicken manure so it’s ready for growing in.

Small plot ready to go

I bought some John Innes seed compost to see if I can improve my success rate with germinating seeds. Last year I just used multi-purpose compost which isn’t as fine, so it’ll be interesting to see any difference.

I’ve planted my first round of spinach and lettuce varieties as mentioned previously, sweet pepper and chilli seeds.

You can’t really see from the picture but the mixed spicy salad leaves have been the first to come up.

My broad beans are on their last chance this year, I’ve had really poor harvests for two years running and if it happens again, I won’t grow them next year.

I’ve got a bit Blue Peter with the sweetcorn. I’ve planted them up in toilet roll holders because arthritis has made me a bit ‘kaggy handed’ and they really don’t like being touched. Last year I damaged one and it never really recovered.

Sweetcorn Blue Peter Stylie!

Planting this way I can just put the whole seedling, complete with cardboard container into the ground when it’s big enough to go out.

Also, Rocky is about to flower! She lives again! Hallelujah!

Flower bud forming and loads of new leaf growth

I’m off on holiday on Friday so my lovely OH is looking after the plants while I’m away.

I’m going to really miss him and the cats but (and I feel guilty about mentioning this in the same sentence) I’m also going to miss watching loads of my seeds come up.

Murphy's too tired to attack right now

Still, think I’d rather be in Spain at the moment, might do my bones some good! I hope to get some writing done for my course and take some awesome pictures with my new camera.

I’ll try to bring some warmer sunshine back with me, x

I was intending just to post an update about the garden but I feel I should make an honourable mention to Rocky.

Sadly I couldn’t upload the audio I wanted directly but thankfully Youtube provided an awesome alternative! Go here for some ambient music while reading on… I’ll pause for a second while you turn it up

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If I had a Plant of the Year award, Rocky would definitely win.

My plucky little Rocky has had a difficult but long and productive life and just when I thought it was finally goodbye, she’s rejuvenated herself again.

Murphy poised mid-strike on Rocky

Rocky is an Apache Chilli plant which I bought last April at a discount from a garden centre. She was straggly, her leaves were yellowing and her pot was far too small. Her roots were showing and she was clearly upset.

I’ve never grown a chilli plant before but I thought if I repotted her, gave her some TLC and put her on the window sill she might perk up.

It’s now nearly a year later and Rocky has supplied over 100 chilli peppers!

I’ve saved loads of seeds which I’m putting in today (So I can do Rocky II, Rocky III, yes, the joke’s wearing thin admittedly!) and I’ve got more little dried peppers and homemade hot salsa than I can eat.

My Rocky’s ‘Apollo Creed’ is my kitten Murphy. Both my cats seem to like nibbling plants but Murphy really has abused poor Rocky. There’s nowhere I can put the plant where Murphy can’t reach now either.

I keep finding bits of Rocky’s leaves and twigs  all around the kitchen. The plant was a stick with a couple of chilli peppers left on. (Murphy had a shock with a pepper once and hasn’t touched one since They are tiny but very hot!)

However, I had another look at my poor plant this morning and although she’s still fairly bald, she’s put out some new leaves and looks about to flower again.

New leaves and healthy chilli.

Hence the name, she takes a real pounding from the deceptively cute little b****** and looks beaten for a couple of days, but when I think it’s all over she comes back fighting!

Quite an inspiring little plant, the little plant that could.

Why have I decided she’s a female? Do you really think a bloke could put up with that and still do All That Work??!!

If you’ve never grown it either I would definitely recommend trying. Chilli is very easy and rewarding to grow as it’s so productive, all it wants is watering, light and occasional feed when fruits start to form.

I’m going to try a few more chilli strains as well this year, I was thinking about Jalapeno or Cayenne. I may have to start giving away salsa to strangers on the train though…

I’ll post an actual proper garden update (hopefully one less self indulgent!) later in the week!

Sadly I have to report that all of our chickens were a casualty of the harsh winter. Rest in peace, little clucking recyclers, I’m sure you’d be happy to know you made my garden a more fertile place, and my cakes much nicer too.

However, the run wasn’t empty for too long! We bought ten ex-battery hens  about three weeks ago and the new girls are all settling in nicely now as you can see. They were very sorry looking at first but they’ve gained more feathers in the last couple of weeks, probably due to all the grass they’ve cleared from the mud patch you see below!

Meet the New Girls!

It’s coming to that time of year where I’m itching to get going in the garden again. I think crocuses and snowdrops were made to tempt gardeners back outdoors.

I’ve got the seeds out the cupboard and organised when to plant what, given the limited space I have. As you can see, there’s quite a bit to do with the plots too. I think anything I do to my smaller plot at the moment would be an improvement! I’m digging the fertiliser we’ve had from the chickens into this plot in the week so by the time I get planting out it’ll be well rotted into the soil. I’m sure they’ll enjoy my weeds as a reward for their efforts!

This year I’m going to be growing a wider selection of salad crops, mixed spicy leaves, all year round lettuce, mixed babyleaf, salad bowl red , and which has a lovely deep red colour,  iceburg lettuce.I’m going to put some on the window ledge so it’s easy pick and have the rest in large pots outside.

My favourite veg last year were spinach (Medina) and Mangetout, both of which I was just picking at whenever I passed them, not many made it to the actual dinner table! I’ve tried to grow more spinach indoors over the winter this year but sadly it was nowhere near as good as my summer crop. This year I’m going to stage plant both to try to increase my picking (and furtive garden – snacking!) season.

I bought the Tomato Seed Collection from vegetableseeds.net which has 15 varieties of tomato, including Big Boy, which are big beefy tomatoes (which I’m looking forward to stuffing with mozzerella and veg, yum!) Golden Sunrise which is a pretty and sweet yellow variety and many others I’ve never tried before. After my failed pots and baskets experiment last year, I’m sticking to big grow bags and planting the rest out into the ground. This year I am determined I am going to have a bumper tomato crop!

Yep, the rain is here and the strawberries are loving it, shooting up as I speak practically!

Since my last post I’ve planted out my broad beans and peas in my little original plot with canes to support them. I’ve used homemade canes, we get hundreds of tall saplings shooting up everywhere =ere, I don’t know what the plant is but it’s such a weed and grows so quickly by the time I’ve got round to getting rid of them the saplings are 6-7 ft high! The wood is nice and bendy too so I’ve made some of them into pea supports for the mange tout peas. I’ve planted additional broad bean and pea seeds between the rows to try and extend the harvest. In the same plot space I’ve also put out carrots, radishes, beetroot, spring onions, chives and wild garlic. I’ve been reading up a bit on companion planting and thought it’s worth a go – plus it looks a lot prettier than planted blocks of vegetables.

I’ve planted my sweet corn (My Grandad suggested planting the corn much closer together as he did last year with great yields, so this year I’ve got 11 plants in a 2 x 3 foot space, not really sure if it’ll work yet but we’ll see) next to the broad beans and put a couple of nasturtiums for easy ground cover and to attract the lovely bees. I =ought some coriander and lavender seeds as I’ve been told that they’re really good for attracting bees but the lavender’s done nothing and the coriander is a bit small to go out so the nasturtiums are a stand in and I’ll fill the spaces later with the coriander and lavender – if I ever get any.

I’ve finally finished my ambitious new plot although I’ve had to make a lot of changes to work with the soil. I haven’t even been able to manage forking the soil, arthritis aside the soil has been left for over a decade and is full of rocks, roots and grit. The soil is so poor that I was better off making some raised beds. My partner’s made me three raised bed areas but this year I’m only using the one as they’ve been expensive and time consuming to fill up with soil and compost. I’ll get the other two prepped in time for next year.

In my new plot I’ve planted out my Runner beans, French beans, courgettes and spinach, as well as a couple of nasturtiums. Have to confess a fair few spinach seedlings didn’t quite make the soil, I broke a seedling and thought I might as well eat it and it was so nice I kept accidentally breaking more!

Back and better than ever now, meds working great (see my about page =or details) and got an ambitious garden plan this year. I’ve got =oads more seeds than last year and I’m trying loads of new things. I’ve =ug up a wild scrubby patch next to the drive which is massive and I’m using that and =y original patch this year now I’ve got the energy to do it all! On top of =hat we’re re-landscaping the front garden into a courtyard garden with pots and =anging baskets and creating more flowerbeds in the back, I might be sick of =ardening before summer’s out! At the moment everywhere I look is bare =uddy space, so much so that plants I have put out look overwhelmed by the empty space =round them! More info on what I’ve done on my page if you’re =nterested.

In my seed trays I’ve got peas and m.t peas, broad beans, =unner beans, sweet corn, courgettes, radishes, carrots, beetroot, yellow and cherry =omatoes, spring onions, welsh onions, a few types of lettuce, caraway, lavender, =urple sprouting broccoli and garlic as well as loads of flowers and bulbs so =lenty to be getting on with there! Most of it is still too small to risk going =ut but plan on planting a few things out this weekend.

I’m determined to post my first picture this weekend, just in =ase anyone underestimates the devastation that is our garden at the =oment!

Well the growing season may be nearly over but there’s still =lenty to do out there. My tomatoes are still going surprisingly well, despite the colder =eather they still keep flowering! I’m pinching off the flowers so the =lants’ energy goes to growing the tomatoes instead. I don’t think you can beat =ome grown toms, this year I’ve had that many the chickens are having quite = few of them. If anyone has any ideas for storing them or any recipes that store well =’m all ears! I’m keen to get them ripening now it’s suddenly =ropped in temperature so any tips on this would be greatly appreciated!

My pumpkins are =attling on, staying stubbornly green but growing rapidly. The plan was to hollow =hem out for halloween (Personally I think pumpkin tastes unpleasant) but =lthough they’re big enough there’s not even a hint of orange on =ither of them sadly so I might have to do a November pumpkin instead.
I’m waiting =or more space to free up before covering the plot with chicken manure (freely available =ound here!) to enrich the soil for next year. I’ve got myself a light =eight wheelbarrow for the job, which takes the pressure off me lugging things =round everywhere, my joints are very thankful! Unfortunately this is the time =f year where my joints tend to ache more and seize up so anything I can do to =ake it easier in the garden is very helpful. As well as the wheelbarrow, =’ve got a gardening stool, so when weeding it’s easier to get back on my =eet! Highly recommended to anyone with knee, hip or back problems and it has a =olster so you don’t have to carry garden tools separately, brilliant! If =nyone’s interested I’ll dig out a link. Last tip for aching hands, if =our hands are cold after working in the garden, don some marigolds and soak your hands =nto some very warm (but not too hot) water and you’ll feel the life =nter the fingers again! A drop of olive oil in the gloves is nice too if your =ands are dry like mine.

This year has been quite a learning curve, =’ve learned to plant pumpkins out earlier, improved my tomato crop 100% (last year they =ll got blight due to the wet weather so this year I grew them inside in large =ots) I discovered that peas get sulky if they’re not fed little and =ften, that broad beans are irresistible to every garden pest and that even the weediest =ooking courgette plant can surprise you and take over half the veg plot in =ecord time. Most importantly I’ve learned that you should never =nderestimate the humble garden slug!