Showing posts with label Gardening; Growing your own. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gardening; Growing your own. Show all posts

Thursday, 3 May 2012

Mary Mary Quite Contrary....

.... how does your garden grow?  Well the first green shoot has appeared in my veggie beds (how exciting) it’s the start of my onions growing and I’m savouring the thought in a few months I will have a glut of fresh, organic, fabulous veg..... you can't beat it J

My fruit is coming on as well, the rhubarb is looking good, ruby red, I think I will cut some this weekend and make a crumble and it also looks like I will have a bumper crop of strawberries come June / July – ahh life is grand.

Saturday, 17 March 2012

Its a Good Life

Despite the rain we did manage to get out in the garden this morning to remove the covers from the veg beds, dig over the soil and generally tidy up in preparation for the year ahead.  Over the next two weeks the soil will get some needed air and sun on it and by the end of this month will be perfect for sowing. 
Beds just built by hubby 3 years ago - photo taken just before the top soil went in

Our first year as novice farmers J we just threw a load of seeds at the soil and waited to see what would grow.  We found very quickly that root vegetables did fabulously well  – the plumpness and taste is just out of this world – tastes like real food. Some veggies don’t do too well in our soil, courgettes, peppers, chilli’s, corn to name but a few.  So over the last few years we have hopefully honed the perfect crop, both in what grows well and what we like to eat. 
We also stagger the sowing – it makes sense really, but our first year just throwing seeds at the soil meant our crop harvested all at once and whilst we ate and froze and gave away as much as possible, a lot did have to be added to the compost bin (particularly salad) and as such we are now much more organized, staggering the sowing and as such get a staggered harvest, resulting in having fresh veg straight from the garden to the kitchen throughout Summer and Autumn J
Veg Plan
We have 4 Beds and we plan to grow this year
Bed 1     Potatoes
Bed 2     This bed has a small area sectioned off with Strawberries and Rhubarb (which is currently growing) – rest of the bed will have carrots, parsnips and leeks
Bed 3     White Onions; Red Onions; Cabbage; Brussel Sprouts
Bed 4     This bed is narrower than the rest and Rocket, variety of other salad leaves and spring onions will be grown
We also have a Damson tree and apple tree and a raspberry shrub planted in amongst the flower beds around the garden.  Don't you just love Spring - Happy Days J 

Thursday, 15 March 2012

The Weekend Starts Here !!!!!

I have three days holiday to take before year end so have elected to have the next 3 consecutive Fridays off, a 4 day week bliss – Not to do the grueling commute tomorrow fills my heart it really does J
Tomorrow I am going to blitz the house, clean like a demon, laundry and ironing and do some shopping (for the weekend and Mother’s Day, mummy bear is coming for lunch J).  This then frees up my real weekend for me J
Saturday I plan to be out in the garden and prepare the veggie beds.  As you know I am an advocate for frozen veg as I do believe apart from the veg you grow yourself it is (dependent upon the veg) the best.  But there is nothing like growing your own, harvesting just when you need it, the taste is amazing :) - Below is a photo from my archives, hubby built the beds and this was last years early growing 
We've bought the seed potatoes a couple of weeks ago which are currently chitting in the garage and we will start sowing out the root veggies, lots of seeds left from last year.  The great thing with living near the sea is your soil is very sandy and is great for root veg (and also strawberries).  Just drilling seeds into the soil provides a fabulous crop of carrots and parsnips.  However there is still a distinct chill in the air so I’m going to just prepare the beds this weekend and draw up my planting plan (I'll share that on Saturday) perhaps leave it until next weekend to do the sowing, we’ll see how I or should I say the weather feels on Saturday J 

Simple Days and Simple Pleasures

I am sure that you, like myself, have been very reflective during this period of enforced lockdown and isolation and the varying degrees in ...