The First Ripe Fruit from Grinny

Have you ever seen such a beauty!

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!

Veggie beds update

So, remember how over winter I prepared those two veggie beds? Well, after about 3 failed attempts things finally started growing. I've learned (as a 'green pinky') to rather start off with planting seedlings rather than seeds. When I become more of a professional I will try the seeds. I have had success with seeds in the past, but the 'organic' ones I bought failed (not sure if it was a bad batch or something I maybe did or didn't do!). Something else I learned is to have patience! I planted way too early this year and that also contributed to the failures. So, although my crops were not as great as anticipated, I have been blessed with a hugely successful baby marrow crop, the cucumbers are taking off and the leaks did not do too badly. I've recently also planted yellow pepper, brocolli, beetroot and a new cherry tomato plant so we will see how those go. :) Check out these pics of the 'before' and 'after'...Not too bad for our first summer of planting hey?

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My first cucumber

Check out how this baby has grown just over a few weeks! We've harvested it and it tastes amazing! Crunchy and full of flavour.. and it seems this is only the beginning because many new babies are popping up on the two plants which I have!

Tomatoes

So far my tomato crop has not been overly productive. Although the tomatoes are incredibly sweet and fragrant, they are rather hard and lack seeds, although they seem to be getting better with the progression of summer. The tomato plant looks terrible but it is producing fruit. I've been growing another plant which is starting to produce fruit now...(in one of my veggie beds) perfect timing to take over from the old one which is now on its last leg. I think I have discovered why I had such a problem with the first tomato plant. The pot it is in is like a sieve (water just drains out!) and I also did not apply mulch. I am going to empty the pot and replant after I have lined it and next time will mulch and put peat moss around the root ball (a new discovery I made at the nursery)

Pink lady with her prize

As I brought in some lavender from the garden I discovered this little pink spider toating around a bee nearly double her size. I managed to take some snapshots.. here is one of the best.

My first baby (marrows)!

Would you like some plastic in your tea?

I couldn't figure out what all these sheets of plastic were that I kept finding in my vermicompost. Turns out it is tea bags!! We wrote to our local tea company and I will post their response when I get a chance!

Little Grinnie

Thank you to my brother who helped me source this little grinadella. I finally collected little Grinnie from Marty last weekend and planted her behind the baby clementine. I'm going to find something to use as a lattice so that the grinadella can grow alongside the clementine (street facing side, along side the drain) to also help create a natural screening for privacy. Now to wait for these babies to grow!!! What is also great is that when the grinadella sheds its leaves, it will provide a nice mulch for the tree beds!

The Incredible Tomato Seed

This little surprise tomato seed popped up in my window box one day. It grew into a strong little seedling. In the first month of winter I took the very bold step of transplanting the seedling into a pot on my back patio. I sheltered it from wind by placing a board behind it and two bottles along side it. A basil bush sheltered it from the front but still gave it enough light and room to grow. From time to time I pruned the lower branches and gave it some love and worm tea. Look at her now! She made it through winter and I'm looking forward to my first crop soon this spring!

Impatience

Okay, so I simply couldn't wait. In early August I planted some seeds into trays to see if any would come up. Needless to say, most didn't however, the mange tout peas and leeks did! Once they were big enough I planted them into the veggie beds and covered them each with an upside down milk bottle to create a little 'greenhouse' effect to protect each seedling. It looks like it is working! I also added grass clippings as mulch and lots of egg shells to help keep the snails at bay. Although I am using plastic bottles, it is just for a short period during the cooler months to protect the seedlings until they grow strong enough, so I do not believe it is harmful.

Backyard Free range Eggs

Have a look at these beautiful free range eggs my neighbour gave to me today! They have four beautiful laying hens and they have inspired me to get my own. I'm still in the research phase, but plan on getting two hens soon... can't wait (check out this informative website on this topic)! After visiting my local grocery shop today I asked the store manager why they have been out of stock of free range eggs for two weeks in a row. He said that the demand for them is so low that when he buys a batch most of it ends up being thrown out because no one buys them! :( Well, yet another good reason for me to get my own!

Monkey Puzzle Mulch

After all my pining over lack of pine needles in my area (from what I have read, I need pine needles to help condition my soil type), I discovered that I have my own take on pine needles here in my very own back yard!... The big monkey puzzle tree in the corner of our back yard has been shedding. I managed to collect enough to distribute it over the fruit tree beds as mulch. Okay, so yea, maybe not pine needles but hey, bet it will do the trick! :)

My Women's Day Clementine

The hubby planted this Clementine tree for me on Women's day... what a gift!