Good things come in small packages.

This year I have grown some beetroot in modules. I've not yet planted it out, but when I do, I'm not going to thin it out. I'm growing it in little clusters. I think small beetroot is more tasty (gold ball size), so I'm happy for it to grow together.


Beetroot packed tightly together



 

I think its lovely how you can already see the redness of the beetroot through the leaves, even though its still only v small.

I also like to grow onions close together - in clusters of five or six. Again, when you eat them small, they are lovely.

In the next two weeks (when all danger of frost has passed), I am going to plant out my veggies that are all safely tucked up in the greenhouse at the moment. These are:

• Beetroot
• Leeks
• Courgettes
• Red Cabbage
• Sprouts
• Runner Beans

I can't wait!

Thanks for reading x

Dracula is not welcome here!

The potatoes are coming up well. I have earthed them up a few times & it seems there's no stopping them!

I have also planted marigolds (shown on last post) in with the potatoes . Marigolds smell strongly & so deter pests. Also, I have heard that their roots help to kill eelworm & other baddies in the soil. Potatoes are a brillinant crop to grow, because they are so easy. You just stick them in the ground, earth them up a bit, water them & then reap the benefit in round about 12 weeks. New potatoes (about the size of a golf ball) taste wonderful. You just rinse them under the tap & boil / steam for a few mins. Add a bit of butter & mint to them when cooked and mmm mmm yummy!

If you don't have room, think again - you can plant these in containers very easily - large plant pots, buckets, bags you name it. You can then just pick them as & when you need them. They grow in just about any soil & will actualy help to break up & improve the soil, so you can't go wrong!

Another favourite of mine to grow is garlic. I planted mine in October last year into the raised beds. It's great when they suddenly appear (you can easily forget you planted them). This is how they are looking now:

I can't wait till Summertime to pick these. They store ever so well; I still have some from last year. To store them I get old pairs of tights and put the garlic in then make a knot in between each one. I then hang all the tights up in the garage. When I want a garlic, I just go cut off the one at the bottom of the tights. I also store onions in this way.

Garlic is also good to use on companion planting. It smells strong & so deters the pests. An old wives tale used to be to plant a row of garlic as a border, so that rabbits would not pass the border. It deters Dracula, so who knows?

If you boil the leaves of garlic you can use it as a spray to deter aphids & I have also heard it can help to prevent tomato blight & mildew in cucumbers. It is so good for us humans, no wonder it's good for the plants too!

Still no rain here, so the watering is a major priority. I am also getting desperate to plant more things outside, but know from experience it's still too early. Only a couple of weeks to go & then I can start filling the outside garden up, rather then just the greenhouse.

Thanks for reading x

What a difference a bit of sun makes!

Due to the warm weather we've been having, some of my seeds are sprouting in no time. The picture below shows some of the faster ones at a week old.

From left to right they are - courgettes, watermelon and cucumber. I have since potted the courgettes on & they are even bigger now. The cucumbers are going in raised beds in the greenhouse, so I have put a couple of those in there already. I now need to build a frame for them to grow up. Last year I used chicken wire, but it wasn't very good, so it's back to the drawing board this year. If anyone has any good tips, I would love to hear them.

I have also planted marigolds out in my outdoor raised beds as companion plants. I have planted them all around the border.The smell should deter pests. Anyway, I think they look lovely anyway, no matter what job they are put there to do. Here's one looking all pleased with himself in the sun!

Whilst I've been out in the garden enjoying the sunny weather I've also had a nice surprise. This is my strawberries a month ago:

Whilst I was watering them at the weekend, I just noticed that they have flowers appearing! I am so excited, as I actually bought some strawberries from the supermarket last week and they were rubbish. They were all white inside and tasteless. The ones I grew last year were red inside and almost melted in your mouth.

I am counting the days till I get get some cream on these!

Thanks for reading my blog xxx

Trying new things

This year I'm growing a few new things in the garden. One of them is kiwi - it looks to be growing pretty well so far.

It seems to have come on very quickly. I am growing it in one of the raised beds in my greenhouse. When I first got my greenhouse (my huband built it for me), I opted for having raised beds in there & it was the best thing I ever did. It is so much easier. Here's the greenhouse a few weeks ago, when there was not much in there.

I'll post another photo of it later this year, when everything is in full bloom.

I'm also growing watermelon this year for the first time - I sowed some seeds about a week ago and they are just starting to sprout. I think they like humid places, so I may cover with some plastic to increase the humidity.

One of my successes already has been the rhubarb - here's a reminder of what it looked like:

And let me tell you it tasted wonderful in a crumble I made a few days ago! It was wonderfully tender!

To stew the rhubarb I cut up, then added a little honey (not too much to overpower the rhubarb though), sugar and orange juice - very nice! When I make crumble I always add a little ginger to the crumble mixture and I think it goes really well with rhubarb too. I need to start looking at more rhubarb recipes now, as I've got quite a lot to harvest. Any good ones, let me know.

Thanks for reading.

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rhubarb's coming up trumps

If you've been following me on twitter, you might have read that I have been running out of pots to cover my rhubarb with. I have used 4 plantpots, each one increasing in size and gradually they all became too small.

Someone then kindly recommended I place a dustbin over it - so I have. Before I did so, I took a new photo:

I think some of it looks about ready now, so I'm going to be using some this week for certain. I last put a picture of the rhubarb on here about two weeks ago, so it is amazing how quick it grows, as it was only just coming out of the ground before.

I also spent some time this week getting new compost out of the compost bin. Here it is tumbling out at the bottom:

And here's my dog Mischief having a good old sniff of it:

The only thing that didn't seem to have composted properly was mango - don't know why?

Anyway, I've got lots of work to be getting on with this week, I expect the compost won't last me long!

The start of something good.

Now that Spring is officially here and the clocks have changed (so lighter nights), it feels like the start of something good. Lots of seeds have been planted and are now starting to appear and it feels really exciting. I've tried some leeks this year (first time) and I am so happy to see the little mites growing.

I can't believe that these tiny things are going to grow into leeks. I've got a section all ready for them in the raised bed. One of my friends also grew them in piping, as that encouraged them to be "whiter", so I think I'll have a go at that too. They used plastic piping. I've also heard that you can store them in sand afterwards (although I think I'm jumping ahead a little there!)

I've sown lots of flowers too, to use as companions, so that the pests will not be attracted to my veg. My favourite ones are marigolds, as they are such sunny characters. They are popping up a little too:

I like to plant them as a boarder on the edge of all my raised beds. 

I really must take another picture of my rhubarb for the blog too, as it's doing tremendously well. I had put 4 different pots on there (each larger than the other) and it still keeps growing. Yesterday, I put a massive bag type thing over it that I usually use when weeding - it was the only thing I could think of that was big enough. I'll upload a photo in the next couple of days.

Thanks to everyone who has commented on the blog - it's brilliant to get ideas / thoughts from others.

Sprout Tops

I spent some time yesterday clearing out some 'old' plants to make way for some new ones. I had a bed of brussel sprouts that I had eaten all the sprouts from but left the plants in the bed.

                                   

I was then able to use all the leaves from the sprouts tops in a similar way to cabbage. I've now cut it all up & frozen it in bags. Each bag has four portions in it, so will do us for a meal. I managed to fill 20 bags up yesterday, so that should keep us going for a while. Last night we had some cooked with leeks at tea-time. It's also good stir fried with some garlic.

Here's what it looked like on the chopping board -

It's good to use up parts of a vegetable that might otherwise be thrown away! I also composted the stalks of the sprouts, so it's all been put to good use.

All I need to do now is get on with planting the potatoes in the bed I took the sprouts from!