June 5 2011, Garden no 9

First of all I have to say one of the kids was messing about with my camera at yesterdays BBQ and I haven’t figured out what they did, but somehow, they have changed the settings and my photos are all a bit out of focus. That applies to the ones I have just posted of yesterdays BBQ and my granddaughters greenhouse.
Anyway, the garden, today I have actually spent the whole day out there, apart from little breaks when I came indoors to catch up here . It wasn’t too hot, it wasn’t too cold and it didn’t rain. Well that’s not strictly true, it did rain but only as I was packing away to come indoors. The fence building project that has become a fiasco looks like it may be completed on Thursday, weather permitting. It has been impossible to do, either it was raining, or we had howling wind, or both, or on the nice days, when it was almost too hot to do any thing, the people supposed to be building the fence were all working or otherwise occupied. We did make one attempt last week, it was a beautiful hot day, the holes for fence posts were dug, the concrete mixed………….and then big black clouds appeared as if from no where and it poured and poured with rain. The newly dug holes filled with water and mud and every thing stopped for the day. The only good thing about that day was the fact that the rain came down quite literally as the water was about to be poured into the concrete mix. We managed to keep the concrete mix dry and water free. So now I have a huge container of concrete and sand, sitting in my shed waiting for the right moment, which hopefully will be Thursday. 
In anticipation of getting the fence built, I’ve been clearing away the wood and general rubbish that will not be needed. I’ve dug over my vegetable garden once more, I don’t think I will be in time to plant vegetables this year, maybe some late root veg or something but mostly it will be something to look forward to next year.
I checked out all my containers while I was out there today. At least the plants seem to have benefited from the rain; I’ve never seen them looking so good.







The chocolate mint and lemon balm are perfect, just right for picking and freezing, a job for tomorrow after work I think.

The lovage is in bud. This is the first time it has flowered for me. Tomorrow I think I will harvest as many leaves as I can to use in soups over the winter and then wait for the flowers and harvest the seeds. Earlier this year I planted new herbs, I planted Dill and Thyme, they both seem to be doing well although they took ages to germinate.











 It looks as if I will be enjoying my first batch of new potatoes very soon and the onions and garlic will not be far behind.                    
                                    


The small corner flower bed looks wonderful, its full of colour and plants are popping up all over the place.





I'm not too sure how the strawberries are going to do, at the moment they look ok but I think they really need a green house. The strawberries in my granddaughters green house already have fruit on them.

My Parsley is almost in flower and the chives are full of flowers, I think its too late to salvage any thing except seeds from the chives, but i will harvest some of the parsley tomorrow and freeze it

As I left the garden tonight, I could see the improvements beginning to take shape. I have a pretty little flower bed, lush herbs, a pot full of potatoes, several containers of onions, a vegetable garden ready for planting, a tub of lillies about ready to flower and a stock of old wooden roots stored in a wheel barrow all ready for burning, ( to make wood ash for the garden), plus the old garden burner to burn it in. I even have some smaller bits of wood ready to burn one evening in the little chimera. And along the side I have a very narrow strip of garden where I’m planting all the bulbs salvaged from my daughters’ garden.




AND…………..maybe, just maybe, on Thursday I’ll have a finished
fence.

Tags: garden, plants, herbs, fence, vegetables

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delete reply veroniquemariquita wrote on Jun 8, '11 What an enchanting garden! A little of everything. I'm sure it brings you hours of pleasure. Hopefully all this weird nasty weather will pass and things will get closer to normal. (whatever normal is) lol

delete reply djdx wrote on Jun 6, '11 You can eat the chive flowers. Just twist the bloom between your fingers to separate the individual blossoms. Same taste as the leaves. Cutting off the flowers may stimulate the plant to produce more leaf growth.

delete reply artprevails wrote on Jun 6, '11 I adore the photos of this post...revisits are nice!

delete reply wendyj59 wrote on Jun 6, '11 Hope the weather stays ok so you can get the fence finished.

edit delete reply forgetmenot525 wrote on Jun 6, '11 artprevails said No outside fires allowed here Think I should add that I only burn wood, paper & card that can't be used for any thing else, they don't recycle card where I live and i keep back a little paper to get the fire going. AND, the important thing is; as well as producing wood ash for the garden, burning wood is carbon neutral because what ever you burn has already done enough for the atmosphere to cancel out all harmful emissions...............Its less damaging than many other methods of waste disposal. thought I should add that just in case any one thought I was burning any thing and every thing.........:-)

delete reply lrrpslady wrote on Jun 6, '11 Your garden is as lovely as ever Loretta. I know you will be pleased when the fence is done. Free Bowe Bergdahl

edit delete reply forgetmenot525 wrote on Jun 6, '11 artprevails said I am jealous that you can burn and use the ash to be honest, I don't think I'm supposed to, but my neighbours are quite easy going, we tend to 'live and let live' around here. So long as i don't do it all the time and make a nuisance of myself I think its ok

delete reply artprevails wrote on Jun 6, '11 You accomplished much and took stock of more! I love the shot of the wheelbarrow! I am jealous that you can burn and use the ash...I haven't burned trash since my Grandmother and Grandfather were alive together. No outside fires allowed here unless you have a private home for a firepit or barbecue.

delete reply skeezicks1957 wrote on Jun 5, '11 Beautiful!

delete reply acousticeagle wrote on Jun 5, '11 yay! It's all growing and looking healthy. Very encouraging.

delete reply rabbitfriendhere wrote on Jun 5, '11 Actually, I can't find an out of focus pic on the green house blog now either! :)

delete reply kathyinozarks wrote on Jun 5, '11 your gardens look great Loretta, I love my lemon balm and chocolate mint too

delete reply rabbitfriendhere wrote on Jun 5, '11 Your pictures look great! There was only 1 out of focus pic on your greenhouse blog! Good luck with the fence! :)

delete reply brendainmad wrote on Jun 5, '11 Hope you get your fence on Thursday.

delete reply bennett1 wrote on Jun 5, '11 I had chocolate mint one year (several years actually) and I really enjoyed it. Makes wonderful sun tea. Your picture of it is not at all out of focus.

delete reply mitchylr wrote on Jun 5, '11 With the exception of the fence, everything seems to be coming along splendidly. I hope the weather relents enough for you to get that finished this week. Great collection of herbs, I love the smells of all the different types.

delete reply nemo4sun wrote on Jun 5, '11 your garden is coming along very nicely :)

May 30 2011, Garden no 8

 

Garden 2011 no 8
A family Weekend.

The saga of the fence goes on. Most of that enormous pile of branches and roots was taken away to the tip by a friends partner in his van. In between rain and wind my eldest daughter found time, with the help of her partner, a friend, a digger and a jeep, to remove the remaining roots of the hedge in preparation for completing the fence. Those roots were massive and turned out to be incredibly deep. Trying to get any thing done in the garden at the moment is difficult, I can’t remember the last time we had a whole day with no rain or wind or both. Sometimes the weather is really nice, but never for the whole day.
I have had a very busy weekend. On Friday I had most of my family here, my eldest daughter and grandson dug a patch in the turf ready for my vegetable plot.
Once the turf was lifted and the land roughly dug over they burned the last of the rubbish from the hedge in an old bin burner.
I had asked for some of the wood to be left because I wanted wood ash to dig into the vegetable patch. A pile of the dug out turf is now drying out and hopefully rotting down and will eventually become a small decorative corner garden.
Once this work was finished I went with my middle daughter to spend the weekend at her house.
She is not a gardener; she doesn’t like gardening, hates getting ‘dirty’, she calls all plants ‘weeds’ and thinks any thing that you can’t paint or trim is ‘messy’. Yes….. I know what you are thinking………….how on earth did I have a daughter like that, but I did. 
She has recently moved and the first thing I noticed about her new house was the abundance of bluebells growing all around her front garden.
She told me they were ‘messy’, that she was going to get the whole lot dug over and grass seed put down so that her front garden looked ‘tidy’  and all she would have to do would be mow the lawn. I asked her not to do any thing until I had the chance to lift as many bulbs and plants as I could, which is what I have spent the weekend doing. I dug and dug and dug.
Whoever had the garden before was obviously a keen gardener; the ground was well dug and soft. I managed to dig my way around all the borders over the weekend and salvaged THREE huge bags of assorted plants and bulbs, mostly but not exclusively bluebells. My eldest and I shared the goodies, we will be lucky to find space for all those plants but we will do our best.
And that brings me back to the fence. We came back here today ( Monday) with the intention of getting the fence finished, but just as our helper was about to put the water into the cement mix, a black cloud appeared from no where and the rain came down in bucket loads…………….and I still have no finished fence. I suppose I was lucky it rained BEFORE he added the water to the mix, at least the cement and sand mix should stay dry until next time

Tags: garden, plants, vegetables

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delete reply acousticeagle wrote on Jun 2, '11 wow, you did get busy.

delete reply forelithe wrote on May 31, '11 A garden is a work of passion.

delete reply esoterika713 wrote on May 31, '11 Yes, that would have been not a good mix. Water and cement. My sister tried to make our own containers for flowers with a mixture of cement,peat moss, and perlite. We only had shovels and we weren't quite strong enough to mix it properly so they aren't perfect but I still have one but it sheds bits because it wasn't mixed properly. But, the mint likes it. That is what I have growing in it at the moment. :) Your garden sounds marvelous and it will be great once the fence gets built. What a lucky score getting those blue bells. They remind me a bit of grape hyacinths.

delete reply brendainmad wrote on May 31, '11 Believe it or not, we've had the same weather. At present the sky is black. How I'd love to have a nice garden, just grass is boring!

edit delete reply forgetmenot525 wrote on May 31, '11 djdx said I thought bluebells were a protected species. so did I, but apparently that doesn't apply if they are in your garden, it only applies if they are growing wild. At least thats they way I think it works

delete reply bennett1 wrote on May 31, '11 And I think bluebells spread on their own. Lovely for you.

delete reply reneenay wrote on May 31, '11 Looks like you got a lot accomplished & the bluebells are so pretty

delete reply djdx wrote on May 31, '11 So nice to have help with this project. I'm glad you were able to save the plants from your daughter's garden. I thought bluebells were a protected species.

delete reply mitchylr wrote on May 31, '11 Quite a productive weekend, all told. Shame about not getting the fence done, but rain on a Bank Holiday Monday is something of an inevitability.

delete reply veryfrank wrote on May 30, '11 Pleased for you that there is progress with the fence. Bluebells are always such a nice addition.

edit delete reply forgetmenot525 wrote on May 30, '11 greenwytch said 'free' plants! YAY! congrats on the good progress, thanks to help from the whole clan. ; D Hi Deb......'YAY indeed..................... look at the bag in that last picture, I filled three bags like that, they were so full the bulbs were spilling over the top. It was a good weekend thanks. I couldn't manage to dig up turf, it was very hard which is why my daughter helped. But digging the plants up from those borders was OK because someone had maintained the garden and the ground was nice and soft. Think we all had a good weekend, it was a combined effort.

delete reply greenwytch wrote on May 30, '11 'free' plants! YAY! congrats on the good progress, thanks to help from the whole clan. ; D

delete reply nemo4sun wrote on May 30, '11 what a lot you got done once again we seem to be having the same weather patterns :)