🫛🍅🥕Very happy me ! 🌿🫛🥕🥒🍅🥕

 

                                           🌿Very happy me 🌿

Supersweet 100 F1 have given us plenty of tomatoes for breakfast , but now seem to be dwindling , actually they are bigger than the two in this picture  and they are sweet to the taste . 

No idea why those two are so minute ! I'll keep feeding and watering them , I think I will be pulling these out soon ....but the Alicante toms are now beginning to producing a lot more .

Alicante tomatoes  or "normal sized tomatoes as my other half calls them . Very reliable  .We will use some now and hopefully lots to  halve , open freeze , bag up and into the freezer to enjoy later on .

Roma tomatoes  are going to follow on from Alicante , as I decided not to grow anymore than two reliable varieties....but then changed my mind and thought I'd try something new and I love plum or egg shaped tomatoes ....they look so beautiful for a start and I am told these taste good .

I took off a select few of the lower leaves to allow more light in to the tomato fruits . Roma is a very strong growing variety , that's for sure !

The cucumbers had a bit of a break it seemed , but are now producing again , thank goodness because Cucumbers are now very expensive to buy in the shops . Home grown ones have much more of a refreshing taste . 

 Sweet Pepper "Corno di Toro Rosso" Organic- I took off a good pile of them yesterday .

  Some red , some green and some in-between .

More are coming ,which makes my husband very happy . He really enjoys them . However I will be processing many of them to go into the freezer .  

Sweet Pepper "Corno di Toro Rosso" - they have done really well for me  this year . Especially as I have been really mean with the size of pot and amount of compost allotted to each . I tried to get away with using as little compost as I could get away with . It is so expensive ....actually it has reached the point of being too expensive now for me .

Also I have been very disappointed with the quality of all the bags of compost that we bought in .

I will be trying to make more of my own compost in future . 

🌿 The poor farmer makes weeds 🌿The mediocre farmer makes crops 🌿The skilled farmer makes soil 🌿   Kosho Uchiyama  from  Opening the Hand of Thought  🌿

So what else did I do ?

                                                     That wretched bramble ! 

Kneeling on a foam kneeling mat ......

I had to pull out all the slates and flat slabs of stone that I had put all around the base of the now huge Agave salmiana ferox ....and nothing is ever as simple a job as I think it is going to be ..because now I can see several off shoots/pups that need to be taken off ....and really should have been taken off back in the early Spring . They would have come away far more easily back then . 

The wretched bramble came out fairly easily with me wearing protective gloves .... but the pups are always so much easier with bare hands to feel for the roots ....

So there I am now lying down on the unforgiving sharp gravel , feeling around like a midwife for as many roots as I could get for each off-shoot .

                            While there , I pulled off the dead leaves  .

Shark teeth and sharp spikes like daggers .

I managed to take three little monsters .....and one little one which might not make it ...the runt of the litter .

Off up to the shed . I got them potted up , with not as much grit as I would have liked , but it will do for now .

 Then back to tend to the mother Agave . To put back all the slates and flat stones around her bottom to both warm her and help shed away the rain  .

 I just wanted to wack those slabs back in place and go and nurse my injured arms and enjoy a nice cuppa tea .

Only there was now another little problem ......

                           Face down in the gravel , view - looking under the Agave .

 So I spend another half an hour lying down on the gravel again trying to coax out Mr Toad   ....and another ten minutes trying to get up again ..  knees ! 

                  Hope you are all having a nice weekend  🌿☀️

🌿A Happy Little Harvest 🌿🦋🐝

                    A happy little harvest gathered from my garden this morning .

           A nice quiet hour tending to the cucumber and tomato plants in the greenhouse  .

                               The sun is shining here this morning 🌤️

                                    A peaceful start to the day  🌿🕊️

Onion harvest 🧅🧅🧅

 

                                Hover-fly and the Great Mullein 

Yesterday was very warm and sunny . ☀️I can't work in the garden when it is this hot  .☀️

I did get a huge load of washing dry on the line , which really pleased me . I don't have a tumble drying machine . 

I also don't have a dishwasher and quite enjoy washing up the old fashioned 🎶"for hands that do dishes"🎶way in my cheerful lime-green washing up bowl full of lemon scented bubbles with my yellow rubber gloves . And through the kitchen window I enjoy watching the blue tits, goldfinches , robins and squirrels on the bird feeders .....and  the occasional woodpecker . The blackbirds come in for grapes here ....then fly over to my friend's garden where they dine on apples and fat-balls ! 

Washing up time , is time to quieten my mind . 

However I do appreciate someone else grabbing a tea-towel and giving me a helping hand .

Sorry - that was a bit of my waffling on  .....

Back out into the garden , I'm enjoying all the wild herbs and this is one of my favourites .

  I love the stately Great Mullein  with it's velvety soft leaves . 

   It pops up wherever it will and the bees love it . 🐝

                     It is my flower of the week !

                        🤍  Looking deeply meditation time 🕊️

Then work to be done .  The weather is changing ...rain coming tomorrow ...may be heavy rain with some rumbles of thunder thrown in......as they say !

I decided to take up the pathetic onions and get them on a rack to dry in the shed . 

If I do a close up photo ....I could pretend they were lovely big onions ! 🤣

   But the truth is ,  they are all just a pathetic bunch of tiddlers !

                                                     lol !

                             The log pile is growing !   We are so grateful !  🙏🏻🤍🌿

While I was taking up my onions , I noticed a couple of parsnips coming up ! 

Very surprised to see them . Of course that little sprunch of leaves might just be only one parsnip !

Made me chuckle ! 

I threw down a whole packet of seeds back at the beginning of March or thereabouts .

I had given up on them ! But now .....well .....  🌧️⛈️🌧️....hmmm ......

Hopefully , if we get the forecasted rain tonight/tomorrow , it might help to germinate a few more !

         ⛈️   Hoping for rain again ...sorry everyone !  ⛈️🌧️⛈️🤣 lol !

                                        Have a great weekend ! xxx 

                                        

 

🌿Meanwhile up in the Vegetable Garden 🌿

 

All is going well ! The slightly cooler weather than normal over the last month or so , has meant I have  been able to be outside in the garden doing things .  I have a feeling that the hot weather will be with us soon .

Time to take up the onions . 

I knew it was a waste of money buying those onion sets and I wish I'd grown even more leeks . 

Leeks are just so much more reliable for me and can stand out to be pulled as and when I need them all through the Winter months .  (note to self - the leek bed needs hoeing again ! )

French beans are beginning to wind themselves up the canes and the Dwarf Beans are flowering .

The Runnerbeans have reached the top of the frame and are blooming like crazy .

The Bees are happy .It is so nice to hear them humming and buzzing around and about the flowers.

I planted out six nice healthy looking Lavender plants to replace the big old bush that was withering and dwindling away and not coming to much anymore . I want lots and lots of Lavender . I want to make Lavender bags .

I think they will look pretty growing all around this pink Rose .

 You can't see them but at the back I have also planted a Curry plant and a hardy Fuchsia , can't remember the name of it  .

I have been so busy with getting the vegetable garden up to speed , it is nice to be able to relax a bit with my herbs . My Herb garden up near the greenhouse needs sorting out . Maybe tomorrow morning, while it's cool , I'll get stuck in to tackling that .

I need to gather the seeds and deadhead the Marigolds/Calendulas . I sowed lots of seeds this Spring and they are all coming up . I think I'll save these seeds for next year .

Other news -

 

I have been waiting over two weeks for a Schlumbergera cutting to arrive in the post . I have been so worried about it  ! 🌿Poor little segment cutting in the post system for over a week and in hot weather too .Anyway , the nice lady sent me a message to say that it had been returned to her address because of a damaged address label and that she would send out another one to me .

It arrived ! Yesterday !  So happy me !

I only ordered one and she has generously sent me two double segments of the one I ordered which is a bit of a special variety that has orange flowers ...and ..another one...I have no idea what colour that one is going to be . I have sent her a message to ask , but not sure if she will get back to me . It is red tinged around the edge . These segments are not really true leaves as such but Phylloclads .

So away we go up to the shed .

Where I get them gently potted up in a mix of multi-purpose compost and perlite .I don't water them in , but just leave them with only the slight moisture that is in the multipurpose compost as it comes really .

 I will leave them until they show some signs of growth before I give them any water . 

 They are now up on my bathroom windowsill , the plants intensive care unit , where I will be watching them like a hawk ! 

 

p.s So there are labels on them S. Aclea which I know is a gorgeous large orange flowering one and S. Agatha which I don't know and can't find anything on the internet about it . 

The Courgettes are coming big time now !

My lovely botanical brother sent me a packet of Geranium maderense seeds ..(.which I didn't think was in my ability to even germinate ! ) I think I now have enough plants to give one each to everyone in the village !! 

Geranium maderense has amazing flowers !

 I think I will plant them out tomorrow .....see if my next door neighbours would like some too .

                                        All fer now !  🌿💚🌿

❄️Preparing for Winter ⛄❄️

                                          My amazing Son-In-Law ....

                              .....  he turned this  .....

                                     ...... into this !    😱🤩💚