washout weekend

Well the bank holiday weekend was a total washout! It is still raining and is a bit like a winters night rather than a summer evening. The garage sale did not happen, the plants are now nestled back into the ever so slightly over crowded greenhouse. We will try again this coming weekend.

So as you can imagine there has not been a lot of gardening going on these past few days. I had a few hours out there today. I planted up the ten various tomato plants, three are staying in the greenhouse and five are by the decking and two are on the patio. I planted up one of the chili plants but have run out of large pots and so I need to purchase a few more. I planted the tomatoes up to the first lot of leaves so they will get deep roots and hopefully be more stable and produce plenty of tomatoes.

With this changeable weather the garden does not know what it is supposed to be doing! The over wintering onions have started to go to seed. I pulled the earth away from one today and they are not ready to be harvested yet they have plenty more swelling to do as yet. I have nipped off the seed buds in the hope that this will resolve them going totally to seed.

Some of the broad beans are ready and I shall be picking those tomorrow for dinner. I like mine small and tender, they are about six to seven inches long and will be perfect. The peas are starting to grow up the wigwams and some have flowers on already.

The strawberry plants have tiny little green strawberries on them but we need the sun for these now. They are also growing plenty of runners but I have snipped these off so the growth will go back into the plant and hopefully produce bigger and more strawberries.

The dwarf french beans have germinated and so have the courgette seeds, squash seeds and low and behold so have the melon seeds! However I do have a bit of a problem I only labeled the courgette seeds and as they all look very similar I am unsure of what is the squash and what is the pumpkin and which are the melon! I'm sure once they get a little bigger I will know for sure which is which.

Today I sowed some White lady runner beans, these are the same that I grew last year and we had so many that we have only finished eating lasts years crop from the freezer. I have sown fifteen seeds which is rather more than I need but as things have not been going so well I thought I'd sow a few extra just to be on the safe side.

The cabbages are growing really well and in a couple of weeks I should be harvesting the first spring cabbage of the year. I have two types of spring cabbages, the conical shaped and the rounded, however yet again I cannot remember the varieties. I must learn to write these things down.

I have also sown some mixed salad leaves in a trough that I have placed just outside the back door. The ones I sowed earlier in a large tub down on the vegetable plot failed to emerge due to the heavy showers we had just after sowing them. Fingers crossed this batch shall be more successful. I was hoping to sow some spring onions today but the weather had different ideas. By the time I had finished in the greenhouse the rain was coming thick and fast so I had to come inside. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day.

As it has been so wet today the girls have not been out, however they have been out over the weekend. The fruit border and the empty raised bed seems to be their favorite digging spot with soil flying in all directions. Bell's limp is not so noticeable it is now just a slight hobble. I'm hoping for a warm sunny day this week as I have only been able to change the bedding and scoop out the poop all week and I want to give it a wash down. I have lost count of all the eggs we have had but there has been a fair few, we all enjoyed poached eggs on toast yesterday and there was nine of us in total. It often feels like we have a small hotel with the boys, their partners and various friends here most weekends. I will have to get a couple of goats at this rate to keep us in milk!

I forgot to have my camera handy earlier so I shall take some photos and post them for you all to see tomorrow.

And finally.....I hope you all had a great weekend and enjoyed all the various festivities relating to the Queens Diamond Jubilee. Until next time x