Showing posts with label flowers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label flowers. Show all posts

Sunday 10 March 2024

Woman

I’m not sure how it’s the 10th of March already, but that’s what life is like these days!

A frosted daffodil

So far March has brought frost, fog and rain, but thank goodness a bit of sunshine too!

I’ve enjoyed seeing the various poems in shop windows up the High Street for the Hungerford Poetry Festival - what a good idea! I haven’t had an opportunity to pop into the library yet to see all the locally written ones but here’s my offering - a Marsh Lane one, obviously 😊

We had a very pleasant allotment day yesterday, doing various bits of tidying and clearing - mostly not on our plots, but Jamie did finish the potato patch with a sprinkling of sulphur and a final dig through.

I dug and planted up some of Ivan’s irises - it’s a lucky dip for what colours we may get. There are 4 different plants there so hopefully a good mix - lots of plotholders have been taking them before the plots are re-leased to newcomers. 
Lots of us studying last year’s photos to try and work out which plants to go for ☺️ Here’s a reminder of last year’s fabulous display; we will miss it, but it’ll be nice seeing the colours spread around the site. And we’ve bought ‘Ivan’s Bench’ with donations that plotholders have given for the plants - for Ivan and others to sit and rest awhile.
Last weekend it was very wet but I managed to dig three holes and planted our mini-orchard - very mini! One Conference pear, one cherry and one golden apple. The pear and cherry are in bud but the apple is still dormant. I don’t know anything about fruit trees so it’ll be a bit of a learning experience.
After a nice plot day yesterday it has returned to grey skies today and overnight rain, so I’ve been mostly cooking. A curried parsnip soup made with three decent parsnips from the plot and plenty of delicious spices - that will cover a few lunchtimes this week.
Last week I used some of my dried Yin Yang beans with leeks and parsnip for a very tasty stew, made with passata. We also used a few leeks with a cheesy pasta, leek and Quorn lardons bake - so more-ish but we did manage to make it cover two meals.
As well as the soup today, I’ve been making a focaccia, using Waitrose garlic focaccia mix. It’s been very time-consuming with so much resting and turning but it certainly bubbled and expanded!
I thought I’d gone wrong a few times - the dough was so sloppy, but it looks ok now it’s out of the oven. As you can see, I decorated it with chives, peppers, tomatoes and onion - Some of those pre-roasted peppers look a bit too charred ☺️ And, it isn’t meant to be a Union Jack!!
The song is a reference to International Women’s Day last week and, well, it’s a great song by Neneh Cherry - enjoy (though the video is rather depressing)!

Sunday 11 February 2024

Cool for Cats

Ginger cat
We’ve had a huge amount of rain again, the rivers are fit to bust again but yesterday we had some extremely welcome sunshine. We were surprised there weren’t more plotholders on site, but the ground is a bit too wet to dig.
We’ve been clearing weeds, edging and pulling the carrots which had been left in the ground way too long. And there were some proper monsters in there, most had severe slug damage so have gone into the green bin at home - our 3 compost bins are already full.
This is Jamie’s extremely neat handiwork last weekend - making way for brassicas. He added lime and chicken manure pellets after clearing all the weeds; the heavy bags of compost will help to firm the soil before the plants go in (well, they aren’t sown yet!). We hope to have Brussels sprouts, purple sprouting broccoli and Cavolo Nero.
Oh, and this is the area I’m prepping for our three mini fruit trees. Jamie and I have rather different clearing techniques as you can see! Well, my bit of ground is much more weedy and I’ve had to dig a new straight-ish edge. Jamie moved on to hand-weeding the potato plot yesterday. We’ve only bought a handful of spuds: Wilja, Rocket and Desiree. They’re chitting under a grow light at home now.
I saw one tiny crocus flower on our plot, but no other flowers yet. This is a macro photo of the hellebore flowers at home. They’re so pretty aren’t they and don’t mind the shade - perfect.
I found a perfect little frog yesterday whilst digging. It was only about 10cm long and golden. I didn’t get a photo because I had to move it out of harm’s way. I see people have started reporting UK spawn sightings - nothing at Marsh Lane yet. I did see a ladybird yesterday and a digger bee last weekend, but it’s too early for them to come out really, we’re still expecting a cold snap. I cleared the old growth from the perennials but have left them on an empty spot for the insects to stay cosy. It means I can now see the weeds on the flower plot and see a few bulbs are emerging, though the slugs have already spotted that fresh new growth 🙄
Talking of which, look at these clumps of growth along the grass path.
They’re wild onion and have really spread over the last couple of years. They have a lovely onion scent - a bit stronger than chives, and can be used in the same way. You can apparently eat the bulbs too, but they must be very tiny. I’ve never seen a flower on these plants, but I’ll try to remember to check this year.
It’s great to see the longer hours of daylight and some dramatic skies like this yesterday. There’s definitely been some overnight rain, but we’re hoping to get a bit of plot-time in later. 
Enjoy the song provided by Squeeze. Look at the handsome cat! He’s such a friendly fellow, but the magpies are very unhappy when he’s around. The active hedgerow was keeping him entertained yesterday. What a life - he’s got the whole site to monitor 😺

Saturday 13 January 2024

Bridge over Troubled Water

It can be difficult getting into the swing of things after Christmas and 2024 started with such rotten weather that it hasn’t been very motivating.

The rain, brought by Storm Henk, was so torrential that there has been serious flooding in nearby towns and Hungerford’s rivers and canal have all overflowed with some houses needing to be pumped out - not us I’m pleased to say. What a truly horrible way to start the new year 😞

Here's the River Dun by the war memorial, at least 1 metre higher than it should be, with water gushing through from flooded areas upstream. Thank goodness for the marshland around Hungerford to capture most of that excess water. Nearby Marlborough didn’t fair so well…
Photo credit SWNS
We’ve had a few visits to the plot, mostly just to plod around thinking how nasty it looks, but our leeks have survived the drenching and continue to grow. This photo shows that there has been some very welcome sunshine this year - makes a nice change to see it on a weekend!
And the broad beans have grown quite tall under their protection as the weather has been mostly mild so far this Winter. We’ll leave them protected for now as the weather has turned frosty and snow is threatening over the next week…
The spindly garlic is the only other sign of good things to come on the allotment.
At home I’m so pleased to see that our hellebore is coming back to life. It’s such a pretty and long-lived flower - perfect for these dull months.
Apart from soggy plot visits, I have regular morning walks up the High Street, just to move a bit! I really like to visit the fruit and veg stall at our market - when we don’t have our home-grown this is the next best thing I reckon.
I’ve bought a few seeds which look interesting including some flowers (Zinnia, penstemon (from one of my mum’s flower lists) and echinacea) and veg (purple dragon carrots, piccolo courgette and biquinho red pepper). We haven’t really started our planting plan yet, but will do soon. 
I haven’t done any interesting cooking yet this year, but after Christmas I made this lovely chestnut & sprout puff pastry ‘thing’ and a delicious parsnip and chestnut soup. I probably should pull another parsnip for soup this weekend actually. I shouldn’t waste them as they’ve grown so well for a change!
Look at that horrible brown water which is usually calm, clean and has trout in. Aah well, it’ll soon be Spring 🫣 But it gave me an excuse to use this beautiful song, of course, provided by the great Simon & Garfunkel. Sit back, relax and sing along. Beautiful.

Thursday 28 December 2023

Looking Back

I hope you’ve had an enjoyable Christmas and that 2024 brings you plenty of good times as well as an extra day in February. I’m hoping that 2024 runs a bit slower than recent years, but we’ll see. Thankyou for dropping by occasionally and I hope you enjoy the music, here’s a brief look back over last year, with some fave photos and my book list at the end. Happy to receive any book or music suggestions of course!

January 

The first planting of the year was some Egyptian walking onions. Unfortunately, along with all my spring onions, the slugs enjoyed them. I’ll try again though!

It was a wet start to 2023 (we couldn’t know how wet the year was going to continue!). We had at least one super frost, although no snow. The cold nights gave us some beautiful sunrises and sunsets.

The allotment was providing us with carrots, Cavolo Nero and parsnips.

February 

Clearing and digging began in earnest as the ground dried up. We actually felt we were ahead of the game for a change.

And the Cavolo Nero kept providing - I think I’ll plant it again this year - and purple sprouting broccoli finally started producing the delicious flowerheads. A month later than 2022, but worth the wait.

March

Early March was when we got some snow. We had to get up in the wee hours to enjoy it; it (and we) didn’t hang around long.

Last year’s dried beans made for some tasty meals including these bean burgers, served with steamed purple sprouting broccoli - delish.

April

Finally time to start sowing most of the seeds that we’d ordered. Lots of different flowers for the flower plot were protected in the polytunnel. The chitted potatoes were also planted in the ground and a few in bags.
There was a mix of some warm weather among the wet and chillier days. April is a great allotment month, with lots of busy/chatty plotholders and plenty to catch up on, but thank goodness we have the polytunnel.
Along with the PSB, rhubarb and fresh chive flowers joined the meal plans.

May

Aah May! Still more to sow (including pre-germinated parsnips which were direct-sown) and so much growth with proper colour on the plots. The hedge full of flower and birds infuses a keen-ness to get tiny plants into the ground, but we hold off unless we have back-ups on hand.
It was a mostly sunny month so perfect for growing and working. OK, there was some rain but not altogether unwelcome.
We even started an early courgette in the polytunnel. It kept producing for months; we moved it outside in the Summer.
Delicious leeks were on the menu along with a few early strawberries.

June

It really was a flaming June - it was so sunny and beautiful, we thought it was a sign of a sweltering Summer, like last year, but that didn’t quite work out.
We saw bullfinches, a rosemary beetle and a previously unseen red and black froghopper, but even better were the plotholder gatherings!
And we enjoyed a sunny site Open Day.
Salads were getting more interesting with delicious broad beans, mangetout and radish.

July

Nia provided us with the sweetcorn plants as most of ours had failed to germinate and the watering regime was hard work …initially…
And then the rain came and everyone cheered, but the polytunnel still needed watering…
And the rain carried on for a bit too long, but we all agreed that the plants were certainly enjoying it.

And you can’t have lovely trugfuls and platefuls of veggies without some help with the watering!

August

There was more rain, more sun and more allotment events.
Sadly we said happy 95th birthday to my mum and later in the month said goodbye to her for the last time.
“Cheers!”
Remembering happy times on holiday and her love of gardening through our own flower patch now.
A bumper bed of leeks were planted as our seedlings had grown well this year.
Harvests continued to include asparagus pea, courgettes, salad, potatoes and beets.

September 

Extreme temperatures arrived along with our late beans. We had to buy runner bean plants as ours refused to germinate, but the borlotti and French beans grew well on the tunnel frame.
Super-harvest month! Most of the borlotti beans and yin-Yang beans were left to dry on the plants and then finished their drying in the polytunnel. The weather was perfect for it.
The Scabiosa Stellata produced their pretty seedheads and other flowers were putting on a fine show of late Summer colour.
Apart from beans, potatoes, salad we had sweetcorn, aubergine and peppers on the menu.

October

A few sunny days encouraged the last of the flowers to bloom ahead of the first frosts and we even had a barbecue! And we managed to sow our broad beans as intended.
As well as frost there was a lot more rain as the first Winter storms arrived. We got off lightly compared to other areas, but still completely drenching. 
Luckily our pumpkins were stored in the polytunnel by then and all the sweetcorn and beans had been harvested.
Sweetcorn, tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, leeks and pumpkin were on the menu.

November

Yet another rainy month, so a very soggy plot for occasional visits and manure deliveries. 
Surprisingly we’ grown good parsnips this year; all the rain hasn’t caused canker and although some are multi-legged ones they’re tasty and some are very big. Much better than our attempts in recent years.
Squash, beetroot, parsnips and carrots provided meal ingredients.

December 

So here we are another year has flown by with happy and sad times to reflect on. 
Plans are in progress, with fruit trees waiting in the polytunnel and seed catalogues on hand. The weather is wet but warm so weeds are taking over, but we’ll get to them one dry day quite soon…
The nights are shortening and there are signs of Spring bulbs to look forward to. In the meantime we’ll continue enjoying our Christmas and new year celebrations. 
I have two new ‘My Favourite Books’ as a result of this year’s reading list: 
I realise I’m late to reading ‘The Grapes of Wrath’, after all it’s 85 years old, but it is amazing and sadly poignant in today’s world. Definitely worth a re-read in my opinion. 
And the ‘The Murmur of Bees’ is so beautifully translated from the original Spanish. With a touch of magic I found it totally absorbing and delightful.





Happy new year and thankyou for popping by 🙂

Song title provided by Keane.