Cute coat hangers and a bird crisis

The wonderful K has solved the problem of garden pegs (to hold netting down) – the ones we get in garden centres just seem to get tangled in the netting and cause lots of cursing (me) and sighing (him) so he’s made his own by just cutting wire coat hangers in half. They work brilliantly, but we now need more hangers for our clothes, LOL!

This week we’ve planted another bed of Brussels sprouts (using those pegs for the netting) as in my view you can never have too many sprouts.

Speaking of netting, we had a bit of a crisis earlier in the week as a female blackbird found its way into our fruit cage and I couldn’t sort the netting out on my own to let it escape, as the net is laced together at the top. I had to get K to come down and help me get the bird out – which we did in the end – and then we have refitted the net and added lots of soil as a barrier at the bottom to prevent birds getting in again.

The autumn raspberries are doing okay too, and I’m still managing to keep the weeds down in the area, which is good news.

The courgette we planted a couple of weeks ago is also doing well, though rather overshadowing the marrow I have probably planted too close to it, oh well. Meanwhile the runner beans are growing apace, and there’s another flush of rhubarb, so I’m making rhubarb and strawberry (from home) crumble today.

In the wonderful world of flowers, we now have astilbes, a dahlia, lilies, taller sunflowers and more sweet peas.

As a result the vases are looking good, though I have to say the red lilies do NOT travel well and start wilting the absolute second I pick them – which is a shame as they’re very beautiful.

So here’s this week’s harvest in total, which also includes a geum, sweet williams and our first small potato crop!

Have a great Sunday.

Anne Brooke

Each Of Our Paths Are Unique – Embrace The Journey

Brassica Plans and an Onion Mistake

This week, we’re getting nearer to planting out two new beds of Brussels sprouts, so I have taken out the last of the tulips to clear a second bed and stored them for next year. In the meantime, K has prepared the first bed – cleared last weekend – for the incoming sprouts.

We’re also pleased to see that the potatoes are starting to have flowers – which I think means that the actual crop might be ready soon – we live in hope!

On the flower front, I’ve pruned the chrysanthemums and dahlias (dahlia pruning being a tip from Monty Don on last night’s Gardeners’ World) in order to make them bushier rather than too straggly, but I’ve left the ones with buds already on them. Will wait and see results … The cleome are now in bloom too, which is nice.

K has also given the sweetpeas more string to climb up and woven them through so they’re not flopping about quite so much. We’ve also added a lot more to our compost bin, which looks to be coming on nicely now. But I think we have moles next to the raspberry patch – oh the horror! I found three mole hills, which I have kicked away and will hope they get the hint …

Our harvest today was two lettuces, garlic, one onion (mea culpa – I thought it was garlic so had already dug it up by the time K stopped me! Well, they all look similar to me, you know …!), beetroot, lilies, sweet williams and sweetpeas:

So, it should be enough to keep us going for a while. Here are the flowers in vases, which I’ve put throughout the house:

And tomorrow is my birthday (hurrah!) so I’m planning a day of celebration. Happy weekend to all!

Anne Brooke

Would love some feedback on garden irrigation.

A Garden Is Where The Soul Feels At Home

A Bigger, Better Tomato Plant

Queen of the compost

We’re deep in compost-making this week, in those two new compost bins we now have. K has taken out the everlasting spinach and we’ve used this for compost, alongside lots of spare or dead raspberry canes which I have cut up into manageable pieces. Here’s the now empty bed (we plan to use it for Brussels sprouts, along with one of the other beds which currently has old tulips in it):

Spinach is a strange thing – the roots look like they’re weeds, to my mind:

And here’s our lovely compost bin. I suspect all this will be half the volume next week though as you can never fill up a compost bin, so they say!

Our asparagus bed is now enormous and looks like a fairy forest. It’s blocking one of the paths too, but that’s not really an issue – there are plenty of other ways round the plot.

In terms of flowers, we have a blue allium, and the sweet peas are starting to blossom too:

Back home, the supply of cut flowers, including lilies, sweet williams and the sweet peas continues apace:

Finally, we’ve managed three different harvests this week, which is great news! The first is lilies, sweet williams, and foxgloves (which don’t really last that well in vases, so I’m not sure I’ll plant them next year …):

The second is rhubarb (for another crumble), beetroot, sweet williams, lilies and foxgloves:

And the third is sweet peas, sweet williams and lilies:

How I do love all these cut flowers – it really cheers the house up.

Happy Sunday to you all!

Anne Brooke

Spring Is For Strawberries

Sometimes You Just Need A Break, In A Beautiful Place!