Category: garden stuff

crafts & knitting · garden stuff · spring

shoots

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)58 Comments

I really enjoyed reading everyone’s nostalgia on the last post – thanks so much to everyone who took the time to reminisce with me.

Here things have been hotting up in the garden and all my veggies are getting ready for planting out. I love growing things from seed – it’s like magic really, especially with something prolific like a courgette. You take a tiny wizened seed, poke it into some damp compost and after a week or so you have the most perfect little seedling – looking just like a child would draw one. After a little watering and tending for a couple of months you have a huge bushy plant popping out fat and delicious courgettes.

Lettuce and leaves are quick to reap rewards from too. I sowed some rainbow chard and oak leaf lettuce around 8 weeks ago,

and look at them now!

My little courgette seedlings have me feeling all inspired and so I’ve been playing around with charts and have knitted a new seedling dress design…

I hope to have a bunny to wear this along with a few friends ready by the end of the month.

garden stuff · general stuff · spring

spring has sprung

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)35 Comments

According to my calendar, today is officially the first day of spring here in the UK. The sign that spring has arrived in our garden is always the blossoming of an old plum tree.

Last year it suffered the loss of a major bough but it seems to have survived and hopefully some of the blossoms will yield some juicy plums for jam making later in the year.

Even Toby has been noticing that the trees are changing on our regular weekend walks!

chicken stuff · garden stuff

spring clean up

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)38 Comments

We’ve had 3 back-to-back days of spring sunshine here. It’s lovely how a bit of blue sky over your head and sunshine on your face can make you feel so much more energetic and positive and I’m suddenly feeling the need to get my fingers in the dirt and get the garden ready for veggie growing again.

This will be my third year of growing and so our soil needs a top up with a bit of richly rotted down compost. Luckily the chicken ladies are very helpful in that department. I remember being amazed when we got them at the quanity of poo that they generate but it’s all being put to good use and hopefully my veggies this year will grow big and fat and delicious courtesy of the chicken ladies digestive productivity!

This year I’m rotating the crops in my four beds again with brassicas (broccoli & cabbage), dwarf french beans, carrots & parsnips, garlic & onions. Elsewhere in the garden I’m also growing tomatoes, patty pan squash, courgettes, lettuce, herbs, potatoes, raspberries and strawberies and I have a new little patio apple tree that is only supposed to grow to around 6ft tall.

I’m going to give beetroot a go this year too – prompted by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s  delicious sounding recipe for beetroot, goat cheese and redcurrant salad and his slightly less tempting chocolate and beetroot brownies (both from River Cottage Everyday – I’ll let you know how they turn out!). Are you growing anything in your patch this year?