It wasn’t much. In no way enough to solve the drought, but it got me a nice picture yesterday morning.
Busy, busy…
22 May 2011 at 12:46 (Vegetable garden)
Lots of things to do in the garden. Planting out lettuce seedlings, sowing new beetroot, tying in the peas, putting up cucumber plants, tying up tomatoes, spreading compost and whatnot. The weather was lovely and we got plenty done. I do have sore muscles now, though.
Black gold
15 May 2011 at 21:45 (House and garden)
We hope that this black gold (a.k.a. compost) will do much to improve our sandy, dry soil. It’s not only for the vegetable garden, but also for the ornamental garden, which is now shaping up nicely. The pond is mostly finished (it has water, plants and a few tiny fish) and DH is now laying a 10 cm layer of compost on the soil around the pond. After that, we can start planting. Oh dear… we need a plan…
In the greenhouse
12 May 2011 at 20:58 (Greenhouse)
As our greenhouse is placed upon a concrete slab, I grow my tomato plants in pots. I quickly took this photo, before they really grow on and get out of control – the always do, no matter how hard I try to keep pinching out side shoots.
Pond
9 May 2011 at 9:46 (Miscellaneous, House and garden)
After months of preparation and shuffling around paving stones and cubic yards of sand by DH, we now have a flower garden layout. That means that the crater where we wanted to create a pond, could also actually be made into a pond. Lovely. A well deserved icecream was consumed to celebrate!
Hand salve
3 May 2011 at 14:53 (Miscellaneous)
Today I made a salve with almond oil, extra virgin olive oil, dried calendula, bees wax and a few drops of essential oil of tangerine and lavender. I hope it turns out nice. Last time I made a salve I put in too much bees wax and the salve was a bit too hard. I’ve now put in 5 grams for 75 grams of oil. We’ll see how that works out
I’ve cleaned some old cream pots and used those for containers. I usually use vodka to cleanse the utensils and pots.
Protecting tomatoes
2 May 2011 at 21:19 (Vegetables)
My tomato plants have permanently moved to the greenhouse some time ago. The’re now too big to be moved inside the house at night. The nights are quite chilly at the moment, though, so I’ve taken measures to prevent the temps from dropping too low.
First of all I always have a water butt inside the greenhouse. This soaks up heat during the day and radiates it at night when/if it gets colder than the water temperature. This has a great buffering effect on the temperature in my small-ish (12 m2) greenhouse. Also I light three candles on chilly nights. It is amazing how effective this is in keeping the temperatures just a few degrees higher.