First proper harvest of the year

We've been harvesting lettuce from the greenhouse for a while, but this weekend we harvested our first  'proper' veg - a courgette! It was delicious, they are so much firmer when freshly picked than the ones you get from the supermarket. Big Girl and I had it sliced and grilled with sliced red pepper and halloumi in a burger bun, with chips and salad. 

I'm not new to veg growing, we had a 30m x 30m veg garden in New Zealand and grew everything from carrots to giant water melons. The problem is it was so big an area we spent more time keeping on top of the weeds than actual planting. So it's quite nice now to have a little garden big enough to have some spare space to grow a few fruit/veg but also small enough to maintain. 

Lots of perfect shiny red cherries, unfortunately it is an ornamental cherry tree, so the fruits are tiny, about a fifth of the size of a normal cherry....

A raspberry bush, bought for a few pounds from Morrisons. It struggled in the first year, but seems to be improving with time. Okay, it wouldn't win any beauty contests but they taste good so that's all that matters. I won't be making raspberry jam any time soon but I get one or two fruits when I pass by. 

A dwarf apple tree, Fiesta (Red Pippin) bought recently from a plant nursery sale. I didn't know until I got home though that it needed a pollinating partner. It had about six small apples on it when I got it, now there is only one left....

I have several planters with strawberries in them. I decided to inter plant the strawberries in this one with lobelia, with the idea it may confuse the birds and they won't notice the strawberries. Seems to be working so far, as it isn't netted and we don't seem to be losing any. 

Another Morrisons buy, this time a blueberry bush. There's quite a decent crop this year, let's hope we beat the birds to these too...

I like a cottage garden planting style, intermingling flowers with veg. In this spot I have put in some courgettes, lettuce and a Brussels sprout plant amongst the sunflowers and achilleas....

Update - it's been a few weeks since I wrote this blog post, and with the bit of rain we have had lately the plants have shot up...

The courgette plants are exploding, I think if you stood still and watched you would actually see the courgettes growing! I picked these on the weekend...

Now just five days later I popped outside to take some photos and spotted this...

In New Zealand we had pigs and chickens who would happily polish off the surplus courgettes, over here I just have to donate them to any passing friends/family/neighbours. If I get desperate I even hand them over to any visiting workmen, meter readers... I think I need to buy a spiralizer, like this one. Courgette noodles sound quite tasty, and apparently only need boiling for 20 seconds!

The tomatoes are ripening nicely in the greenhouse, though the plants don't seem as full of fruits as recent years, and on some of the trusses the fruit seems quite spaced out.

More strawberries...

And finally, pumpkins! Big Girl planted these, and they are shooting up. She planted them near a pile of rocks, as we thought the pumpkins might like the heat from the rocks to help them grow. Now they are growing though I am beginning to think it may have been a mistake - will the pumpkins just grow to fit the space, and have rock shaped dents in them? I think I may sit them on a bit of foam or something similar to give their bottoms a bit of protection. 

So that's what is growing in the garden at the moment. Plenty to keep me busy in the kitchen. 

Speak soon, lots to tell you!

XxXx

What's in the box?

A knock on the door the other day  - a parcel for me! It was quite large so I couldn't think what it could possibly be. The delivery driver read out the name of the sender, nope that doesn't ring a bell. Then he read out the customs slip which describes the contents of the parcel - two mugs. Nope, still not remembering. I explained I enter a lot of competitions, so maybe I had won something. 

So what was inside this big box with all the packaging? Three little bags of buttons!

I ordered them online a few weeks ago for Big Girl for a Christmas stocking. Coming from China I was dubious of the quality as they were quite cheap, but I was really pleased with them. They were a good quality and a great range of colours and styles. I'd love to get some more for myself, but I'm very anti excessive packaging, and this was taking it to extremes. I guess they were making sure there were no damages, but I think a decent Jiffy bag would be fine for a bag of buttons. 

Well at least the box was put to good use - a lounge full of comfy armchairs and a sofa, and Little Boy decided to sit in the box to watch telly!

A scary skeleton surprise

When we were living in New Zealand I missed going to the local auctions. I have only recently got back into viewing them. Unfortunately I couldn't make the latest one in person, so had to leave bids. One thing I bid on was a rather large box of Halloween bits and pieces, which I won for the grand sum of £15. I was sure the children would like all of it, but the main thing I was interested in were the two large metal pumpkins, with a little door in the back so you put a candle inside. I do like the fun of carving a real pumpkin, but they do end up a soggy, smelly mess on your doorstep after about a week. This way I get all the fun and none of the mess! They are brand new, still had a label on, and will look handsome either side of the door come October time....

The rest of the stuff was packed into a large cardboard box. I had rooted through a bit of the top layer, but it was so tangled up I couldn't get to the bottom of it. I couldn't wait to pick Little Boy up from nursery so he could help unpack our box of goodies....

Here's what was inside - 

Three large, scary skeletons, who's eyes glow red and they scream and moan when you press a button. Little Boy was rather scared of them at first, but now we can't get him to leave them alone. He liked pressing the button to scare visitors. I think come Halloween we need to stack up on spare batteries!

Five black cloaked skeletons, and a blonde (?) skeleton....

Five big broomsticks, and five child size ones. One of the big ones still had a £6.99 price tag on it....

Two 'Happy Halloween' banners....

Two large cardboard skeletons....

A rather smiley glow in the dark skeleton, wearing some of the pumpkin and glow in the dark skull tinsel (there was a box full of this)....

Five spiders, three of which wiggle around when you pull the cord....

Eight witches hats (two adult and six child size), and two trick or treat bowls guarded by a rather cross skeleton, who leaps forward and tells you 'hands off my sweets' and other sayings when you go to take a sweet from the bowl....

And finally, two cauldrons full of Halloween garlands and tinsel, three tea light holders and a box of tea lights....

So we are well stocked up for Halloween, maybe a Halloween party is called for?! I think maybe I might sell some at a car boot and recoup my outlay, then we can enjoy the rest for free!

XxXx

Rubble to the tip trips

Now the outside of the house is virtually finished, we can concentrate on the inside. Next job on the list was to knock down the wall that was the front of the house, but is now taking up room in our lounge. We could have had another grab hire but that would have meant weeks of rubble piled on our drive until we had enough to justify the cost, so we decided to take it to the tip ourselves. Seeing as OH has a van, and we don't have a permit for it for the tip, it was down to my poor car to be the workhorse. 

It doesn't look like there is much in the boot, but it was sure heavy, and so it took many, many, many trips to get rid of a whole wall. Good job the tip is just a few minutes down the road. 

OH stayed at home, knocking down the wall brick by brick, then passing them through the window to me. We had to take our time and do it carefully as we still had all our stuff in the lounge and didn't want it covered in dust! I had the job of heaving it all into the car then heaving it all out the other end. I was worn out by the end of the day. 

The photo below shows OH in the extension part. It looks tiny, but once the inside wall was taken down it made a huge difference to the sense of space in the lounge. 

My reward for all the lifting and sweating was a freebie! On one of trips I pulled up to the rubble skip and saw this perched on top. As long as you don't actually get in the skip they turn a blind eye if something decides to 'fall into your car'. So this beauty came home with me. Absolutely nothing wrong with it, just needed a bit of a clean. 

Planted up with a grass and some huecheras it now stands guard at the front door with my other blue pot (which incidentally also came from the tip, but that one was a different tip where they sell stuff, cost me £2 if I remember). I just have to set up the self watering system then they will all look after themselves. 

It's Fathers Day this weekend, supposed to be the hottest day of the year! Hope all you fathers out there have a fab day. 

XxXx