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Catching time

March 22, 2016 by

spring flowers

Last week apparently it was the beginning of spring, and although we had one day of glorious blue skies and sunshine, it still feels very much like we’re stuck in the mud and droll greyness of winter. The only clue that spring may be on its way are the vivid yellow daffodils bravely poking their heads above the rain-soaked soil under the fruit trees, and a few slightly gnarled tulip leaves that have also begun to emerge.

My life has been so work and pregnancy-centric for the last few weeks that I feel like I’ve been living in a bubble. I just get through each day and I long for a bit of quiet time at the weekends. Our time as just “me and Rich” (and a small mengarie of fluffy companions) is getting shorter and shorter each week. Don’t get me wrong, I am so excited about what the future holds but I also want to make sure that Rich and I make the most of being able to just take off whenever we feel like it, without the need to coordinate this and that. OK, so the reality is we still need to make sure everyone is fed and watered and OK here, but before our world is turned upside down I want to enjoy it.

I’m not quite there at the moment.

I think we need to book some time out for ourselves. Everything feels so relentless and it’s becoming harder and harder to ignore all the things that need doing. I wish so much that I could just afford to stop now and take a big rest, catch my breath and have the time to work through this huge long list of house renovations, garden jobs, baby prep and everything else in between that needs sorting out.

I’ve been so focused on work and trying to get prepped financially that I feel like I’ve neglected the most important thing right now; staying happy, staying positive and being healthy. To do that, I need time and I need head space. I don’t know if it’s the hormones but sometimes I feel like bursting out crying because I feel like I’m so unprepared and overwhelmed. It quickly passes because I know deep down that I can do it. I just feel like I’m running out of steam and I just want some quiet time, just for us, to do what we need to do and at the pace we need to do it. So I can bring this baby into the world and make sure I don’t lose myself.

Wishful thinking?

Filed Under: family, plans Tagged With: , , , ,

Seedlings aplenty

April 10, 2015 by

purple tulip

Spring has well and truly sprung and the days are so much longer, meaning we’ve been spending more and more time outside and getting ahead before everything explodes into life. The recent bout of unseasonably warm weather has accelerated us out of the arctic-tinged days of early spring and right into the belly of the season that kick starts the growing year.

In the past few years I’ve been making a concerted effort to fill our borders with plants for every season, and this year we’ve enjoyed even more daffodils, hellebores and the most sumptuously jewel-coloured tulips in the borders. It’s a kind of therapy that has lifted me out of my winter-induced slump – the colour, the scents and the warmth gradually weaving threads of joy through my veins.  Already the alliums are shooting up and in a month or so we’ll be getting ready for the stunning display of purple sensation that should complement the bees’ favourite, Himalayan crane’s bill along with the round-headed allium sphaerocephalon.

Cristo garlic

Usually at this time of year I’m lamenting about how far behind I am with the planting, but even despite Spring’s early surge, I’m keeping up. I have really high hopes for this year. Really high hopes. The onions are already in and looking strong and healthy, the shallots are in and looking promising. We’ve got parsnips on the go, and in the greenhouse – which was completely out of commission last year – is crammed with seed trays and pots.

Each morning, as the sun swings round from the east, higher into the sky and bathing the garden in a watery light, I take a trip down to the greenhouse to see what’s unfolding. The day to day progress of my little seedlings is astounding. In the course of one day I’ve seen squash and courgette plants almost literally burst into life, casting aside the hard cases of the seeds as the thick, sturdy seedling leaves push through the soil. They’re now growing and growing into strong plants and I’m actually where I should be in the growing season.

Rondo peas

Seeing my greenhouse and veg plots come to life after a quiet winter… well, there’s a certain special kind of satisfaction in that, isn’t there? The next job is to get the polytunnel up this summer. We will get there!

Filed Under: flowers, foodie, garden, seeds, sustainability, veg Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Greenhouse of shame

March 16, 2015 by

Ah, spring. What a temptress… one minute, it’s all bright sunshine, blue skies and a burst of colour, the next it’s grey-clouded drudgery, and north-easterly arctic winds blowing a gale through your house. I have just come to the end of a week off work, and for the most part the weather was crap. So as always I didn’t get out nearly as much as needed, and didn’t get as many jobs done as I wanted to.

The greys, browns and sludge-greens of late winter are depressing enough, but my greenhouse had been left to rack and ruin for the past year, and seeing it looking like an overgrown mini bombsite every time I walked outside just added to the feelings of despondency! It wasn’t even charmingly rambly like something out of the Lost Garden of Heligan. It just resembled a cesspit of shame:

greenhouse of shame

Greenhouse cleaning is one of those jobs (like digging) that I really really really don’t like doing. But I couldn’t take it anymore. It just had to be done.

So I spent four hours clearing out dead bindweed, removing the old straw bale (fab compost material) that I’d previously grown squashes on, and dug up two barrow loads of bindweed roots, all just to find some semblance of restored order. As you can see from the pictures below, my greenhouse fell victim to a storm about a year ago, where we lost a number of glass panels. Those will have to be replaced at some point but for now we’re just enjoying some “ventilation”. The greenhouse is in a pretty sheltered corner, so there’s still a decent amount of heat and protection from frost in there.

before and after

Typically, it’s still a half-finished job, but at least it’s looking a little less neglected. Around the outside, I’ll also be chipping our pruned apple tree branches to make homemade mulch which will be going over some weed suppressing mat, and then there’s the even more brain-numbingly boring job of cleaning pots and trays before I even put the greenhouse into action. But once it’s done, it’s done and I should be able to reap the rewards. It’ll be a thing of beauty, a corner of my Smallest Smallholding that I’ll be proud to photograph in all its glory.

For now, I’ve only got a couple of trays of Red Baron onion sets on the go, but with the arctic winds giving way to a bit more spring cheer, the (well ventilated) shelves should be filling up with seed trays very soon. Watch this space…

Filed Under: garden, polytunnel, veg Tagged With: , , , , ,
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