Allotment and Garden Update

After a very busy couple of months, two fabulous family weddings, (one being in Italy), I am finally back to my normal routine. Well almost !!  The allotment was so overgrown when we got back from Italy and finally managed to get up there.  I set about pulling up the onions and drying them off to store.  The mangetout were almost over and the next later sown three rows ready to be staked and netted.  I am still picking runner and french beans. There has been so many that my neighbours have benefited too.  The flower beds on the allotment are amazing, especially the 'Asters' the colours are beautiful.  Just look at this bouquet I cut last week and I have more dotted around the house too.

Aster 'Duchess Mixed'  from 'Wilko's'

The Globe Artichokes are a good size, but I really only love the hearts and they were a little disappointing when I cooked some of them  as the hearts weren't worth all the effort that the cooking took, maybe next year when the plants are a year old !!

The garlic has been brilliant this year as have the onions, so they should all last me until next year.

Courgettes, not too bad but nowhere near as prolific as in recent years, and tomatoes not as good as I usually get either. In fact last year I couldn't keep up with either and had to make pasta sauce and freeze in batches, Oh well !!

As for my garden this year it has been fantastic. I grew more flowers from seed than I have ever done in the past and the Asters and Zinnia's have been so beautiful. I will grow them every year from now on. The 'Cerinthe' is a lovely and prolific as ever, the spikey marigolds unusual and lovely as long lasting cut flowers. The Dahlias never cease to amaze me for their longevity and the most precious one for me is my very first which is 'Pink Giraffe'  have a look at this selection of photo's to see what I mean.

The Garden in Bloom

                                                                      

Calendula 'Porcupine' 

Sutton seeds

Zinnia - Sutton seeds

Zinnia (pastel shades)  'Faberge Mix' Sutton seeds

'Cerinthe'   seeds collected from previous years plants

'Cosmos' Millennium, Unwins seeds, these are bright beautiful shades of yellows through to oranges and the foliage is less feathery than the pink and white shades, it's more ferny, well worth growing they are lovely. ( sorry photo a bit blurry)

  Dahlia  'Pink Giraffe'

 I have been visiting and catching up with the blogs I usually read but apologise that I haven't had time to leave comments.  Sometimes I long for the autumn and winter months so that I can get back to some reading and my crafts.  I love the allotment and garden, but between visiting my family and spending days at my son's enjoying the grandchildren life gets hectic and I never seem to have time to fit everything in.

Have a lovely week-end and let's hope the sun shines !!!

I have my oomph back ! but perhaps you never knew I lost it ?

Here I am back in action after a horrible stomach bug. Why is it that simple viruses can leave us (or me anyway) mentally down and lacking in oomph, so much so that when I did finally have the energy to go up to the allotment, I took one look at the weeds, masses of growth on the veg, everything looked huge ! giant cabbages, giant sweetcorn, (could that really have happened in 3 days ??) and I almost gave it all up. Thank goodness I don't act on the spur of the moment, ever the cautious Cancerian that's me ! and anyway the council offices were closed for the day.

I should be rejoicing as the council have actually kept their word for a change (without the extra phone call ) and have strimmed and cut down all the weeds on the three plots around my own plot. It looks so good and spacious too. They just need to get on and give out the vacant plots to someone on the bulging list they have.

I think I slept more in the two days I had the bug than I would usually sleep in half a week, consequently I woke at around 4am this morning and found it hard to get back to sleep, so I got out my allotment notebook and made notes on all the crops I have grown this year (what an exciting life I lead !!!) I do have other interests honest !! and made comments as to which ones were successful and which ones I wouldn't grow again.

I also made notes to myself as to how many plants I should grow next year, as I grew far too many this year. There is only so much two people can eat and now my daughter has her own plot she doesn't need anything from mine.

I love giving to the neighbours, and would always have some over for that, but it's the time involved in the raising and caring first for the seedlings then the plants. So next year I have to be strict with myself and compost any extra plant's that nobody else wants.

A harvest from last Friday, runner beans, french beans (Fasold) I will be definitely grow these again, they are delicious, a yummy yellow courgette and my first cucumber from the lottie greenhouse.

Last evening's harvest, 5 courgettes, the round ones are delicious roasted. Runner beans, french beans and Cabbage 'wheelers imperial' I would really recommend this variety the hearts are solid and very light green. We had to compost the darker outer leaves as they had been munched by caterpillars. Oh I feel better just looking at that photo, how could I have even thought for a fleeting second about giving up the lottie patch.

Vegetables also have 'siamese twins' !

This is a photo of my harvest on Friday and I have been watching with interest the growth of a 'Siamese' courgette. It had two flowers but grew on one stem and never separated, it looks very odd, has anyone else grown a Siamese veg ? I have yet to eat it so hopefully it will taste twice as nice !! speaking of courgettes ! they are coming fast and furious and I have three kinds- round Italian ones, yellow ones and normal green ones and now a Siamese one, quite what I will do with them all I have yet to figure out. We love them roasted, in soups and raw in salads, any other ideas anyone ??

Fridays harvest, Siamese courgette.

It's been far too hot for me to get much done on the lottie, I have gone up and pottered about and of course watered most days, especially the plants in the greenhouse, which are Aubergines, cucumbers, chillies (three types) tomatoes and peppers. It's hard work and a week ago I really had a moment where i felt like moving to an apartment with No garden and giving up the lottie, but the moment passed and thank goodness common sense prevailed and I love it all again.

The problem is we love to visit the grand-children every week and because of the distance it means staying over, so 2 days out of the week we are away and in this weather it's a worry for me about the watering. I now have a dear neighbour who will come over to my garden and water the plants and shrubs in tubs, and in return I gave him strawberries, broad beans and a bunch of sweet-peas, so we were both happy with this arrangement. The allotment is another issue, so I ask whoever is around to water for me and I do the same in return.

I haven't had time to visit all of the blogs I follow or the ones on my blog list, so I apologise to anyone who thinks Ive lost interest in their blog, but I'm sure everyone is so busy this time of year that they are in the same situation what with gardening and veg growing.


Below are a few photo's of the garden taken on Saturday, my lilies have flowered at last, I love them and wait in anticipation for the first flower every year.

Tea for two in the garden

Lemon grass growing bigger at last

I love these colours together

The cutting flower bed.

Lillies at last !!

Double nasturtion 'Darjeeling gold'

Inside the summerhouse.

Seaside mania.

My favourite colour Dahlia, grown from seed.

A very full mixed border.

Where did the week go ?

I can't believe that it's a week since I last posted. I have been very busy tending the garden this week, which got neglected a bit last year. Luckily I have mostly perennials which appear each year as if by magic after a dormant bare winter, and suddenly the garden looks lush and full with hardly any effort. However this year I have made a few changes to some of the beds, , so I needed to spend more time this week doing just that and fitting the lottie in whenever I could.

I went to the lottie after 4pm today and didn't get back until 7.45. I dug the bed for the sweetcorn, and it was so hot! I managed to get them all planted, but I still have to plant the broccoli ( green & purple sprouting), brussel sprouts, pumpkins and squashes, so lots to do yet.

The runner beans and french beans are growing well and have started climbing up the poles. The cucumber is growing like crazy in the greenhouse and the Aubergines are now ready to be put into very large pots for the greenhouse ones and to be planted out for the ones going in the bed where the wallflowers were outside the greenhouse. It was sad to pull up the wallflowers today, but they had all really gone past their best and had to go to make way for the aubergines and outside tomatoes. Below are some views of the plot taken yesterday and today.

The Herb and flower bed. More sweet-peas behind.

The Sunflower hedge, with the 3 varieties of Courgettes in front.

The first sweet-peas, 'Cupani ' lots of others are just coming out too.

The Sweetcorn went in today, at last.

Looking up the plot towards the shed

Looking down the plot from the shed area.

Cock a doodle doo

No I haven't got myself some hens and a rooster! that's me crowing as I am rather pleased with myself. Yes I know pride comes before a fall and don't count your chickens etc, BUT -- and this is the first time I have tried this - OK! I'm going to tell you ! I bought some very tasty tomatoes from M & S a couple of weeks ago, so tasty that I decided to scoop out the seeds from the one I was eating. I dried them on some kitchen paper for a few days.

And now look at them, I am so pleased with myself, I know it doesn't take much to amuse me.

Well that was a little experiment for me in what people have been doing for centuries, which is just as well or where would we be today without men and woman saving precious seeds for us to grow ?

Here's an update on other things growing.

Do you remember my post about chitting sweetcorn seeds ?

Here they are now (below) I potted them on when they looked like little tadpoles. It has been successful so far they need to grow a bit more then they can get planted out in a few weeks. I sowed 2 types : Lark F1 and Ovation F1

The Munchkin squashes and the courgette plants are growing well and if the weather stays this good I will be planting them all out soon.

The Cabbages have been planted, 2 types : Wheelers Imperial & Greyhound and the green curly kale. They have been netted against the pigeons using blue water piping for the tunnel and the pond netting was from "Wilko's" (best price)Two last photo's. The first is of the beautiful Cerinthe that I have been growing since planting the seeds way back in the autumn they are just beginning to flower. The other photo is of a tree Peony that I took a photo of in my local nursery and now i am lusting after it, I have to buy it ! if they still have it.

Cerinthe

Tree Peony

That's the end of this post, until the next one Happy sowing and growing to all.

Sweetcorn and Monsters

Well it's Friday once again and I am looking forward to getting my big shed put up at the allotment over the weekend. ( the little one will go to my daughters plot ) I'm not sure if we can manage it on our own without all out warfare, so we may have to rope some kind friends into helping us put it up and prevent a divorce. I will post a photo when it's up.

We went away to visit the grandchildren on Thursday and got back today (fri) and was surprised to see the Sweetcorn that I put on damp kitchen paper on Wednesday morning had already started to sprout, so that's the sweetcorn and now for the monsters - the courgette plants are HUGE they were diving out of the pots when we returned home, they are truly monstrous, what are the plants going to be like I wonder ?

The red Basil seedlings are getting big enough to pot on, the Lemongrass is taking ages to grow, perhaps it will suddenly surprise me and shoot up really fast one day. Talking of surprises ! I have a naughty habit of taking seed heads off plants that I like the look of (does anyone else do this ? I bet they do !) and so I have a little plant growing that I call "surprise", as I have no idea what it is, but it looks a bit like a Calendula type plant, I will just have to wait and see. I will keep you updated as it grows and flowers. I had about 5 seeds, but this is the only one that grew.

The red basil seedlings

The slow growing Lemongrass

The courgettes on Tuesday

Courgette seedling Friday, Monsters !

Potted on, but they will soon outgrow these pots ! I didn't have bigger ones.

Chitted Sweetcorn, ready to pot up.(above)

The Surprise plant.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend and that the weather is nice.