Bank Holiday Weekend Work.

Good morning.

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I'm going to start off by saying that I absolutely love living in such a rural place but it can be challenging at times regarding the circle of life. We all need to make sure we are keeping to rules and regulations and respect everything around us.

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Hi everybody, how did you get on over the Bank Holiday? Obviously another strange one but didn't stop a lot of us getting outside I am sure. However, I started off the weekend on Saturday by catching up with Gardener's World - lovely start to the day but still a little sad not seeing Nigel. I decided to do a bit of planning for work in the garden so I knew what needed doing for the next few weeks. Love doing that, makes it very exciting knowing what it coming up, in more than one sense of the word!

Sunday was a great day outside. I planted kale in the poly tunnel and broccoli outside. 

The broccoli are the plants in the middle of the bed (radishes at the far end and courgettes closest in the photo). They will have a frame to protect them as I've never managed to grow it without getting eaten by something other than us! We're utilising this which was over the bed behind the poly house and our eldest and I made a good start but just needs the netting putting on it now.

I did some potting on outside the poly tunnel in the sunshine.

This involved cabbages Greyhound, a Black Beauty aubergine (always have trouble germinating those but keep trying) and a sunflower to hopefully have outside the tunnel if the lambs don't eat it!! Oh and what I think is the last tomato plant.

The eldest also helped me put up my bunting in the tunnel, need a little girly-ness in there.

I have now moved the Brown Turkey fig tree into the poly tunnel and it is going great guns already. 

A couple of other jobs included earthing up the first early spuds; these look to be recovering from the frost damage with plenty of new growth showing.

I've been saving woodash from the Rayburn and read somewhere that it is good for onions when they start bulbing so I'm giving it a go - can't do any harm.

Finally I cut back the oregano in the herb sink and it is now drying nicely in the conservatory and will be added to our box of herbs in the kitchen; 

this is something I really want to keep doing when I can this year. It was the last job of a really satisfying day and the best thing was we had another day to do it all again!

Yesterday morning, after a lovely brekky of scrammbled eggs, I set to deciding on the jobs for the day. These were partly helped by watching the latest YouTube video by Kev here at An English Homestead; he gave us a great tour of his garden and poly tunnel and I took a few hints and tips along the way. 

I got outside and sowed the following:

Dwarf Bean Speedy in a tray of 15 cells

Dwarf Pea Hurst Green Shaft the same

Beetroot Bolthardy, again in a tray of cells 

These have gone, along with a pot of Sweet Basil, into the poly tunnel so I can pick them at the same time as salad leaves.

The bed shown here is from where we took the old frame to use for the broccoli protection. It was going to be for parsnips but I've changed my mind. I found a number of weeds that seemed to have something like rizehomes but it wasn't the dreaded ground elder as far as I could tell. Anyhow, it is all prepared as I covered it over with cardboard, which I luckily still had, and then covered in fresh compost no dig style. I'll add some more when I get it but this bed is now going to be for cabbage or cauli, not decided which yet. 

I'd already started putting down cardboard around it so hopefully nothing nasty will get in.

My tunnel is coming along well but there are still has a few spaces as, obviously, I'm starting from nothing so don't have a full year of sowing and growing happening. 

Here is a butternut squash Spaghetti given to me by a friend. Funny, she says mine is doing better than hers!

However, I'm chuffed how things are working out but we did have a little visit from a mole the other day - I check today and all seems well, fingers crossed.

This year I am sooo late with my sweet peas but have a few called Bright and Breezy that germinated. I planted up three in a fairly big pot plus wigwam then in the top of the herb loo I've put a couple to brighten up the poly house area. The only other things I potted on yesterday were half a dozen All The Year Round cauli.

We're still feeding the youngest of the lambs who is really taking time to bulk up but I fed him a good 400ml of Lamlac this morning which is great.

After we came in from the garden I did some of my papercrafting. I've just started on my second junk journal. I think you can tell I love the vintage look and feel of things when I'm in a creative mode. I love finding anything from old sheet music and magazines, old adverts, books, paper, letters, labels, stickers, you get the idea. So... should you come across anything like this you know to give me a shout.😀

Ok, time to get on, after one more cup of tea. Not a lot on the agenda today but maybe a little bit of baking later on and deciding what will be on the menu for today and the rest of the week.

Hope you enjoyed the Bank Holiday and that you are just keeping on keeping on and managing mentally. With restrictions starting to change here as well as things in the news I've been feeling rather anxious. I've had to delete my Facebook feed since the weekend as too much negativity going on that is affecting my anxiety, plus I've muted some things from Twitter for the same reasons. Here, we are just concentrating on simply staying home and staying safe so I hope you are doing what ever you need to do wherever you are.

Bye for now,

Lou.xx

Steadily Sowing And Gradually Growing.

Good morning.

I do hope you have some good weather you can be grateful for and enjoy if you are able to get outside. We have been very lucky recently and the forecast is good for the rest of the week so much so that our boys are camping out in the garden tonight.

How is everybody? Well I hope and staying safe under the circumstances; we're ok with the odd wobble here and there. We were back in home-school mode yesterday so at times I needed to help the youngest with the writing of a theoretical business plan and then an imaginary diary of a sheep drover from the 1880's - in Welsh, suffice to say I was helping before translation. Today it is French, Science and Maths but the last one is Jon's domain if help's needed!

The chooks are laying well at the moment. We gave a box of eggs to each of our neighbours at the weekend and yesterday made use of a few more. It was a bit of a kitchen day so I managed to make chicken and tops-of-the-leeks soup, over-ripe fruit crumble, apple and cinnamon oat cookies with some shamefully slightly past best eating apples and two cakes - almond pound cake and chocolate.

In other kitchen news I was able to get some yeast from the catering company my sister uses so I am good to go with the bread making now!

I took a turn around the garden after tea last night and did the watering; some of the chickens were free ranging and quite happily shared the garden with the lambs. 

The red and green lettuce in the shallow sink is doing really well; hope it results in as good a crop as last year!

Arran Pilot first early spuds are coming along in all three of the tyres.

Even the lilac, which only flowers once every couple of years, made me smile.

The strawberry pots outside are looking very healthy after over wintering...

and they will, along with those from the large crate, VERY soon be transferred to the poly tunnel (PT) because I'm expecting it to be delivered TODAY or tomorrow.👏👏 Soooo excited. The plan is to get the frame up at the weekend and Jon is going to build beds each side with a middle walkway. We hope to have compost delivered at the end of the month when we share a big order with our neighbours so the supplier makes just one journey. We'll be looking at putting a good eight inches or so over the manure we have already laid on the area and then let the planting commence!

One slight nuisance I have in the large bed are the rogue spuds left over from last year; they have popped up here and there so I think I'll have to take them out so they don't bother the new planting out I'll be doing.

I checked the conservatory last night, too; things have been coming on gradually in there over the last few days, too. I did my first potting on the other day and that was the squash, Butterbush variety, which are suggested as a container plant but I'm actually putting them in the ground.

I've sown aubergine Black Beauty this year, again, and they are showing, not huge yet but...; really want to be able to have these in the PT.

This is the first year I have tried multi-sowing,  a la Charles Dowding, and these are my leeks!

Tomatoes are not very big yet but looking healthy.

One crop which will be ready to plant out soon, allowing for the last frost, are my dwarf beans; it should be safe to put these out by the end of the month.

Well, I'd better get a brew so I'm ready to start with the boys. 

I hope you are all managing, coping and maybe enjoying or at least making the best of this forced situation we've found ourselves in; we need to stick to the rules to protect everybody. I know it seems like it will never end but it will and when we come out the other side life will be different for sure, but we'll be able to reconnect with people again without the use of a screen and hopefully appreciate so much more who and what we are lucky enough to have in our lives.

Take care and stay safe.

Lou.xx

Here Comes The Sun!

The weather the last couple of days, as in most places, has been glorious, absolutely gorgeous. My boys' had a school football tournament yesterday so were pleased with the weather and I put out some washing to dry and got into the garden. Today my youngest is taking part in a cross country event in Aberaeron so he has gone with a hat and strict instructions to stay in the shade where possible. 

I'm just going to share a few photos; this is so I can see where things are progressing and to let you see how things are coming along.

In the fruit patch the blackcurrants and raspberries are leafing up really well. as are my baby blueberry bushes. A couple of the fruit trees are starting to blossom especially this one.

I've been sowing turnip and beetroot - a cylindrical variety - in the cold frame bed. In the lettuce sink I've added American Cress; I like that this one could be ready in as little as five weeks - saw Monty sowing it this week and happened to have some so spurred me on.

I was going to plant the three Charlotte tubers I have but only put in two, using the growing bags provided, as one hadn't chitted as much as I'd like; I'll leave it a little while yet.

Talking of spuds, I've the beginnings of my first earlies peeping through already!

The onions are progressing nicely but the garlic is doing really well.

Since moving the strawberry plants to the conservatory they are thriving, but no flowers yet.

The first lot of climbing peas I sowed 10 days ago are already sprouting; have moved them from the propagator into the conservatory to make room for other things getting a head start.

I sowed another lot yesterday; I hoped to get the frame for these put in place as I thought I had enough tall bamboo canes... and I did! Woop woop! A before and after of course.

Need netting at the weekend but chuffed with it, even though a little wonky at the top but very pleased with myself. Its one of those things I always dreamt of having when I thought about ever having a proper veg plot.

Today, before I put up the frame, I skimmed off the remainder of the chicken poo I laid on top of the patch before covering over for winter. Although the poo had, the straw/hay had not rotted down completely and I didn't want to leave it all on the patch. 

I came up with a great idea, I think. I'm definitely leaving the fruit area to go a bit wild, it does IN the wild so why not, but I thought to keep the weeds down from around the blackcurrants and raspberries I would take up a few of them then mulch with what came off the main plot. 

Very happy with the result but I didn't let it touch directly to the bushes as not sure that it a good thing to do - whatever!

Right, I've eaten my lunch whilst doing this in between the work outside, making bread, checking on the lambs (we are not bottle feeding anymore but just keeping an eye on now and then) and putting the washing out. Need to go move the last of the bought compost out of my car boot then I'll see what else I can do.

Looking forward to seeing what everybody is getting up to in the good weather and how your sowing and growing is coming on.

Bye for now.

Lou.xx