Grinnie all Grown

This must be the proudest moment of the gardening life to date! Remember when we planted that baby grinadella plant (pic below)? Well, look at her now (pic below)... And how amazing it was to see her first blooms... I've never seen such an extraordinary flower in my life! What a miraculous marvel! And here you can see our very first fruit from the vine. One thing I must say to those of you out there that are struggling to grow food in your garden is, never give up. Even if you have impossible soil or weather conditions, keep trying... you might just find a plant that is perfectly happy in your yard! This will make up for everything else that's not! :)

My Mulch

It was not until the dead heat of summer truly arrived when I put aside my stubbornness and really started listening to everyone's advice about mulching. I however was determined not to go on a spending spree. Instead, I just did some trimming in my garden and turned the result of that trimming into mulch. A combination of dead leaves, half alive succulents and other plant offcuts, pine needles, little twigs, etc... and voila!...mulch! And it paid off because where nothing was growing before, life started sprouting up everywhere. Believe it... listen to the professionals and mulch... just use whatever organic material you can find in your own garden and have fun with it!

So many uses for my palm leaves

From making placards for use in a procession doubling up as 'umbrellas' for shade, to 'mulch' in my tree beds, to camouflage for my latest experiment (a 'boxed' compost heap), I never thought palm leaves would serve me so well! And let's not forget the shade they create while still attached to the tree.

Old faithful

This is one of only two plants we uprooted from our old house to bring with us here. We planted it in a pot and hoped for the best. For months it struggled and looked half dead. Finally there were signs of improvement, however the chillies produced were small in comparison to the 'old days' and also often had no heat. Well, I can say that it looks like our beloved chilli plant has finally accepted the move. Look at these gleaming big red and green chillies pa

cked with flavour and punch! :)

Our first leak

Okay, so it is a bit of a shorty... but who am I to talk?

Mint

As I learned from my attempt to grow mint at our previous house, I can say that if you are not a very confident gardener, start by growing some mint... it will boost your ego! ;) Be warned, it grows out of control so keep it contained. I previously grew a chocolate mint variety, but have decided that I like the ordinary mint better (it has more uses). There is nothing like a fresh glass of water (or homemade ice tea) flavoured by adding some fresh mint leaves from the garden. Oh, and another thing... just make sure you keep it near a water source... it likes regular watering.

p.s. You will see our first "Christmas" stawberry plant in the background and our first Iceberg lettuce (bought as a seedling).

Our first olive

The olive trees are growing and seem to be happy where they are... yipee!