I love Hydrangeas!

I know a lot of people think of them as "old lady' flowers, but I really, really like them. Every year I wait with baited breath for the first ones to flower. I've even gone so far as to pot some in their own pots so I can keep them certain colours. If left to their own devices in our garden, they would go pale blue. I have one that is a dark purply blue and one that is slightly lilac, but their colour of choice is pale blue. I like pale blue a lot, but love a bit of variation.

See, gorgeous!

The garden has really come into its own this year as regards flowers. Even my roses have gone wild.
I found a scabby old bit of flower shop oasis yesterday so decided to see what I could do with it. The roses smell amazing!
And oasis is my new best friend!

And finally I put up the Christmas tree. I really wanted to get a white one, as it was a white one we always had when we were growing up so it has sentimental memories. What I didn't think/realise was that all my lovely old vintage glass decorations are totally invisible in a white tree, so next year it'll be back to a green one and we'll put the white one up in the woolshed...

Oh and yesterday I actually made mince pies. Absolutely going to do this again every year, they are so much better than shop bought ones!

This afternoon a crown of us are off to see The Hobbit. I'm really looking forward to it. I've lost count of how many times I've read the book.

Around the veggie garden

It's been so long since I had anything worth showing in the veggie garden! But now, it's just beginning to come back to life. I let it rest over winter, because I had planned on getting in a whole lot of topsoil to make the beds full again. It's amazing how much soil you lose.
So, for the grand total of just over $100 ( which I thought was spectacular value) and a lot of shovelling, the beds are looking great.

I havent planted everything out yet. I still have some incredibly tiny tomato seedlings, a couple of aubergines and all the chillis in the potting shed. But they won't be there much longer, because I am getting a greenhouse! It's my treat.
Why am I getting a treat?
Well, we've sold the dental practice.
Lloyd and R will still be working there, but as employees rather than business owners. The stresses of running a business will be gone ( and yes, there are many, many stresses) So it's a huge relief all round.
All I will say is it's been an incredibly stressful time and leave it at that. Maybe one day Lloyd will write a book about it.

So back to the greenhouse!

It's not a lovely cottagy wooden framed one with pretty glass windows - they are on the expensive side, it is an aluminium frame thing. But I'll do my best to pretty it up. It's been ordered and should arrive sometime next week. We've persuaded a friend to help us build it. I am super excited!

But, I do have a lot of things coming on beautifully in the garden. I even have 2 teeny tiny tomatoes!

 There are a couple of courgettes, a yellow one and a green one, these will be total overkill as usually we can't even keep up with one! But I like both colours, they're pretty.

Lots of spring onions you can never have enough!

 The sweetcorn is doing great - despite the fact that Abagail, the chicken, got in and pulled some of them out. I stuck them back in again and they're fine! Again, something we can't have too much of, we eat every single one.

 And the 2 tiny tomatoes I mentioned. How cute. As usual I have planted an obscene amount of tomatoes. All sorts of different ones. Some are new to me - bloody butcher, which I've heard very good things about, a rainbow one - which looks like a pink brandywine, some romas...and all my old favourites, sun cherries, black krims, black cherries, moneymakers, sweet 100.

There are also peas, cucumbers, garlic, asparagus still coming up, potatoes, Maori potatoes, broad beans, the herb garden, lettuces and cauliflowers.


 A few years back I bought some wild flower seeds. They came up beautifully the first year, but after that it seems that only the poppies come up time and time again. They're gorgeous though, and there's a wee corner in the veggie garden where there's almost always some. They're great, cos not only do they look pretty, but they attract lots of bees.

And finally this! I know it's all out of focus, but what a wee cutie Brodie is. I know he needs a trim. Soon he'll be getting too hot, but he looks so sweet.

I'd also like to thank all the people that bought Lloyd's book on kindle and those that would like a hard copy once that's available. It's been so lovely for him. I read out your comments and he beams!
So thank you all.

Roses!

My first rose blooms are out and picked! I get so excited when they start to bud up.
None of my new ones are ready to pick yet, so I haven't managed to see the actual blooms yet. Two of them are doing really well though. The dioressence is covered in buds and the Auckland metro is as well, but, sadly the Blue Sky is doing almost nothing. It's planted in the same bed as all my roses so gets identical treatment, however it has about 4 leaves on it and is tiny. The only thing  can think is that it gets slightly less light than the others. I may have to move it.
Does anyone know if I could move it now??

It is lovely having fresh roses in the house again.

Spring... it feels like it's been a long time coming

Finally the rain has stopped a bit. Well, it did rain yesterday, but we've had a few lovely days. It's given me a chance to do a lot in the garden, which has been totally wonderful ( if a little stiff making of the old body!)
So after a bit of hard work, it was nice this morning to just have a meander around the garden, with the camera,  and look at the signs of spring appearing.
When it's sunny like it is now, this is one of my favourite times of year. I'm not a huge fan of winter up here. It seems very long, wet and damp. I actually wish it did get freezing cold with a bit of snow!

I'm much happier when I can see signs of new life appearing everywhere.

Plum blossom

 Cherry blossom - about to burst open

Clematis, almost in bloom

Bluebells springing up everywhere

 And one of my absolute favourites... the fresias are out. As I sit here typing I can smell them!

And it's not only flowers. The asparagus season is just starting in my veggie garden. There are 5 spears almost ready for eating. Something ate the top off the first one - it looked like it could have been a mouse?? So I've covered the others as they come through and it seems to be working a treat. I LOVE asparagus.

There's some spring greens, which I actually grew this for the chooks! The garlic is also doing well, as are the Alderman peas which have been growing all winter. Oh and the potatoes are coming up beautifully too.  Apart from that I didn't plant much in the veggie garden, because I knew I was going to have to buy in some top soil or something as the beds are looking a bit low. So really, I just wanted pretty much empty beds at this time of year so it was easy to fill them up. This is a job for tomorrow or Tuesday as I need Lloyd ( who is away on a writer's course this weekend) to drive the jeep with the trailer on the back - I can drive forward with a trailer, but have never mastered reverse! It should be fun!

Oh, and my egg sign? What a raging success that's been! The eggs have been selling like hot cakes, mostly to people from our wee village which is lovely, as they could become regular customers. Already quite a few have said they'll bring the box back to be refilled, which is great. I hope they all like them. I've also met some lovely people. One old chap came to meet all the chickens with me and gave them a pat. Another lady and I swapped lemon curd recipes. It's been so nice.

So, in 4 days my lovely girls have earned enough  money to pay for their feed for the whole of this month! I had to go down to the verge this morning and rub out the "For Sale" part and change it to "sorry all sold out, more tomorrow" It felt really good!  What I've also realised is that I have to keep back some eggs for ourselves and enough to put down at The Acorn, for guests. It's getting really booked up now which is amazing. It's shaping up to be it's busiest year, ever!

All in all a lovely time of year!

The Garden

Not a real post today - but just a new 'page' on the blog. I thought as I'd rabbited on about the farm, the house and me, that I should devote a page to the garden, it is, after all, where I spend pretty much all my time!
So have a wee look HERE!

It's been a good day, today

The sun has come out for a fair bit of the day - and going by summer so far, this is a huge deal!  We found a break in our electric fence that the cows were escaping through so we fixed it. Our friend Danny came round a couple of days ago to give us a lesson in the traditional way of fixing fences - the good old knots and twists etc. using a strainer tool. We truly thought we'd mastered it but today,  without Danny there to keep us right, we were rubbish! And after an age of trying we resorted to our pretendy farmer skills of joiners and metal twisty things to tighten the wires. We're a little disappointed - poor Danny will be begged to comeback and give us another lesson!

However, we shouldn't be too downhearted as the fence is at least fixed. We wouldn't have been able to even do this a wee while ago. We have to remember that! So yes, it's been a good day!

Feels like Summer

The weather has been lovely for a few weeks now, but it's only in the last few days the heat has really kicked in and it feels like summer. It's not...yet, but the lush spring green is fading fast as we've had no rain for over three weeks, and with the heat, a few breezy days and the blue skies it doesn't take long for the ground to dry out. We're luckier than most as we have an irrigation system for the veggie garden and the farm has lots of water.

Some of the animals are really relishing the heat, though. Here's Pango having a snooze.

 

 I chased this bee all around the chive flowers! It was having none of my nonsense and made absolutely no effort to stay still, at all. He was far too busy.

 Tonight is home made pizza night, we're firing up the pizza oven and we've got some lovely Mahoe mozzarella and basil to top them with. Bliss.

How Lucky am I?

A friend came round this morning, and not only was she bearing cakes, but she also had a pile of Uk Country Living magazines she had finished with! There are few greater gifts than Country Living back issues!!

She's very brave, I can't bear to part with mine.

 I'll spend hours reading these ~ Happy Days.

The wild flowers are actually still doing beautifully. Well, I say 'wild flowers' but pretty much everything is eclipsed by poppies, vast amounts of poppies. I don't mind, though as they are so pretty.

 

I haven't posted any photos of the veggie garden recently, this is probably because everything is growing so slowly I'd need a huge macro lens to see anything. Also the birds have pecked out 2 tomatoes and a couple of sweetcorns - this has never happened before.

  I'm at a loss as to why it's all so slow this year. The weather is pretty nice, it's warming up well, the irrigation is working, there seems no reason, I'll just have to be patient, but when I compare it to what it looked like this time last year there is no comparison. Here's hoping the summer is a long one!

Out and About in the Garden

Finally, we have sun and blue skies. They've been an awful long time coming.
I've been mowing the grass all morning then I went to check on Mavis. She's gone broody and is sitting very peacefully on 9 (hopefully) fertile eggs I gave her. Usually I get heritage breed fertile eggs when I have a broody chicken as it's nice to keep these old breeds going. But this year I have King Bertie and I'd like to know if he's fertile or not  ~ just for interests sake, and I think some of the crosses I have might make for interesting looking wee chickens! I mean how about a silver laced wyandotte and an araucana cross? Could be fun.
Here she is ... growling at me.

I have high hopes that she's going to be a good mum. I've never had a broody that has sat so tightly on her eggs before. Time will tell. They are due to hatch on the 6th November.

Some trees are almost fully in leaf now, while others are still bare. This tiny pin oak was Lloyd's christmas present from me last year. I love how miniscule the leaves are. To give an idea these are perfectly formed and around half a cm long.

And I know it's early but look! A strawberry, and it's almost ready. Lloyd was given a few strawberry plants from friends for his birthday. I admitted that I had never grown them as I didn't really like them, but Lloyd does. So it's a treat for him. I potted them up in hanging baskets as I had the veggie garden all planned and didn't really have room for strawberries. It seems to be working really well.

and, what I think are some of the most beautiful flowers, pink daisies. They are out in force now. I love how simple they are.

A Present for the Chickens

I have a wooden 'chooketeria' that my chickens eat their food out of. It's one of those feeders that has a step and when the chickens stand on it the door opens and their food is free! I tend to have the feeder in their house so it's not out in the elements. I now have a lot more chickens, and it's been so successful that I decided to get another one.  This time I went for a metal one ( it may be aluminium?) as I thought this may be more durable . It remains to be seen how long it takes them to master it. It took them months to learn when I got the first one. I really hope they learn quicker this time round. (Oh and if you think that if they can use the old one, surely that can use the new one? Think again! I may as well have put an alien space craft in the chicken run!)

Anyway, here they are, pretending to use it.

Next... the signs I made a couple of days ago are all up in the right places.

I'm really pleased with them. I think it helped that I found an old bit of wood to paint on. 

And finally more flowers!
It's spring...sorry!

Everything is bursting into flower, bud and leaf. My favourite time of year.

A job well done.

We've extended the chicken run numerous times as I've added more chickens to my collection. We have gates so we can close off areas to let the grass grow again that way  they have something tasty to eat ( along with their proper diet that I feed them, of course!)

For a wee while we've been planning to section off another area, it's the smallest part of the run, perfect for sectioning off to plant some of the King's seeds "Chicken Greens" ~ this is a mix of seeds that will turn into nice tasty green things that chickens love. You can plant them in trays then take them out of the run to recover, but we went for the plant them in the run idea, with the plan that we'll close that part off to let the plants recover once they've been noshed a bit. 

Today we put in the new gate and built the little fence. It wasn't a huge job and we didn't have to buy a thing. We reused an old gate and an old post and we had left over chicken wire from the last run expansion!

You can see we flipped the gate so it was taller.

I dug up a wee bit so that the chickens would scratch around and break up the soil a bit before I plant the seeds in the next couple of days. The packet seems very full of seeds, but I don't know how much of this area it'll cover - we shall see!

 We screwed on recycled gudgeon thingies and hung it from an existing post that just happened to be in the right place. Then we cemented in a second post and made a new bit of fence. It didn't take that long and it's just what we wanted. The chickens tried to help but were pretty useless!

Heres a bit more of the run. You can see 2 gates - these close off the area in front of where I was standing so all the kikuyu grass can grow again. The green leafy plants in front are actually huge weeds, but the chickens love them to have dust baths under and lie around in the shade.

Oh and this has nothing to do with chickens, but the camillias are still flowering and I love this one.

Confusing weather

Ok we've had a bit of rain here and there but the weather has been so mild, nay hot, for this time of year that poor old mother nature is somewhat confused. ( lloyd has just informed me that the word 'nay' was popular some 400, nay 500 years ago! Cheeky Monkey!) The leaves have stopped dropping off the trees, and spring flowers are starting to appear. We haven't even had winter yet!

Supposedly it's set to change next week and finally get colder ( we can get that fire lit at long last!) but until then we'll just enjoy.

Jonquils

I thought I'd have a wee look back to last year and find out when these started to flower in the garden and it was June 20th! So they're over a month earlier this year.

Confusion reigns!

Caterpillar

The eggs are beginning to hatch! This one is the biggest. It's about 5mm long at the moment. That chomped piece of leaf must be his dinner! I've counted only 2 more so far, well that was all I could see, but I have 2 swan plants and they are pretty big so there could be loads more than that. The butterflies are back so there must be lots of eggs, so I'm hopeful at least some will make it to chrysalis stage.

It's not in very good focus - it was really windy and the leaf was blowing all over the place!

I think this one is called Fred.

Our datura/brugmansia is in full flower - it looks cool, but it's the smell I love. It's just amazing, especially at night. I'm not sure it's ever had as many flowers on it as it does now.