Floral distraction

Do you ever get distracted in the garden? I went out after tea last night, to check on the seedlings growing in the greenhouse. As I stepped in I noticed the secateurs on the side, so decided whilst I was out there to cut some flowers for the house. About 45 minutes later, after picking and deadheading, I had this...

You have to excuse the awful photo quality, it was nearly 9pm and I took this in the utility. The vase on the right is full of amaranthus. I've called it the Sideshow Bob arrangement 😄 (if you've ever watched the Simpsons you'll get it). The vase of flowers at the back just has an assortment of flowers in it, including cosmos, crocosmia, rudbeckia, antirrhinum, and nicotiana. It just goes to show you don't need a huge garden to have a constant supply of fresh flowers for the house. It's not very clear in picture but there are a few bits of greenery sticking out of the top - they are actually bird seed which the birds have spilt when feeding, and I left it to grow! I knew it would come in useful one day. 

The two small arrangements were a last minute add on, one for Big Girl's room, one for Little Boy's room. 

And after all that, when I finally came in and sat down, I realised I had forgotten to do what I actually went out for - check on the seedlings! I must do that today, and maybe some weeding whilst I'm out there...

XxXx

Weekend washout

What a surprise - last weekend was a Bank Holiday weekend and it was raining!

Overcast, miserable, the odd rumble of thunder now and again. 

And to make matters worse, Monday was the first day of winter :-(

Bang went our idea of returning to the cycle trail with OH and a picnic.

Looking at this photo below, I really must take more care when I am spraying. I could do with a weed killer that comes out a different colour so I can see how much I've sprayed. That's it, I will design a Cath Kidston colour weed killer! You can get paint that goes on a different colour can't you, so you can tell where you have painted, or am I just dreaming that one?

We have a lot of kikuyu grass here, which I believe originated in East Africa, and it is a pain in the behind as it spreads it's long green tentacles everywhere you don't want it. I call it the cancer of the grasses. Mind you it is good to have some in the paddocks for stock, as it carries on growing in the colder weather when other grasses slow down. 

The picture above shows one of our water tanks (we have two 20,000 litre tanks). We were quite appalled when we first moved over here, that we would be drinking rain water from the roof! There is a filter it goes through before it gets to the tap, but still, it's not quite as refined a system as we are used to! Being newbies to it, we also didn't realise we had to replace the filter sponge regularly, and it was a few years before we undid it to take a look. If you have ever kept fish in a tank, you'll know what a dirty sponge looks like - a brown, slimy mess. At least our house is quite open, so we don't get the bird poo, possum poo, leaves etc that lots of people have to cope with ending up on their roof. 

This banana plant takes a bit of a beating in the bad weather too. Shame as the huge paddle like leaves are amazing when they are intact. We planted this behind the water tank to try and protect it, but it hasn't worked. I was quite excited when I stepped out of the back door the other day and noticed it had produced what looks like a flower (if you zoom in you can see it in the middle of the leaves). I was told this was an ornamental banana, so would it flower if it doesn't produce fruit?

Our 'proper' banana is around the other side of the house. It still amazes me that I now live somewhere where I can grow my own bananas! See the tiny bananas above the flower? It gradually grows more and more until there is a whole bunch hanging there. They aren't like the bananas we get from the supermarket, I think these are called Ladies Fingers, much smaller. 

The chickens don't seemed bothered by the bad weather. They are quite happy bimbling around, tidying up any windfall fruit. There are still loads of unpicked fruit on this tree. It is supposed to be an 'eater' (as opposed to a 'cooker'), but it seems quite sharp. I'll have to dig the name of it out, and see if anyone knows anything about it. 

I had to pop into town to do some shopping, and caught some fab rainbows on camera. The child in me is still amazed by rainbows, it's fascinating isn't it that a bit of rain and sun mixed together creates such a beautiful sight!

Well after all those gloomy, dull photos I'll end on a brighter note - a lovely sunflower in the veg garden, snapped last summer!

Take care, whatever the weather!

Xxxxxxxx