A Greenhouse?

Yup! A greenhouse!

The Hub has agreed to build me a lean-to greenhouse against his beloved shed:

Site of future greenhouse!

Materials (you may need a magnifying glass!) timber, plastic from skip, perspex.

Tidied up compost heap, courtesy of the Hub- he can't bear a mess not of his creating, and the compost heap is MY mess...

A jungle tamed!!

A nicely weeded and mulched bed- with SUCH a straight edge!

I've started off so many vegetable seeds and they have begun sprouting now so I hope he really does built the greenhouse as promised. I'm going to be the most organised vegetable grower in Ireland come Spring!!

Funny thing a friend said last week about when I told him about the proposed greenhouse: 'The Irish do love their lean-to's, they even build lean-to's onto lean-to's!' And when I thought about it, its true!!


On another note, back to work/school yesterday, although the children don't return until next Monday. I thought it would be a nice gentle ease-in but no such luck- parents wanting second-hand uniforms, phone hopping, returning messages, booking services for office machines, staff trying to get organised, builders problems, Principal catching up on paperwork...and just what does all this have to do with me I ask?

Dunno, but it sure keeps Muggins busy!

State of the Jungle

Many years ago in my youth (summer 2010) I got really into gardening blogs, looking at the photos, reading them, drawing plot layouts, noting beautiful plants and yadda yadda yadda. Then I grew up (spring 2011) and realised that none of those people lived in the boggy, exposed hills of Leitrim and that there was no way in this life that I would ever transform my weedy stony hillside into a lush paradise. After that I turned old (summer 2012) and decided that if it doesn't grow happily in a movable pot, stuff it, I'm not even going to consider it.
That's the theory, but as you know, hope springs eternal along with the rain and gale force winds so although my head says 'forget it', my heart still says 'maybe if I...'

So I still have two raised veg beds, although one is rampant with triffid raspberries and one very brave rhubarb! The other has self seeded garlic at one end with gone-to-seed-cabbage-that-never-grew and some fabulous specimens of dock leaves at the other.

And then there are the pots...and pots...and more pots...oh and look I do believe that's a thistle come to join the pot party!

So much for the idealistic planning...ah me...sigh...


BTW, the idyll is over, with Youngest and the Hub back home. The Hub didn't seem too happy with his week's work in Holland, but Youngest had an 'amazingly awesome' (quote herself) week with her sister in Dublin. A lot of time was spent working in Theaters alongside Eldest but she also got to do some shopping and walking around Dublin, which is good. It is a lovely place alright.

I didn't get a girl's night in, but my parents had visitors, relations who are great fun, so I had that instead last night. This evening Youngest is taking Middlest's boyfriend to see the play Middlest is working on and the Hub is holed up in the office writing tomorrow's sermon.

Modom, your taxi awaits!!!

Progress? I Think...

Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday of last week I was busy out of the house, or, when I was at home, I worked in the garden.

To the uneducated eye this stretch of gravel may look very dull, but I assure you that many hours of hard weeding went into making it look this boring!

Next on the agenda is dealing with the two veg beds, which, as you can see need quite a lot of attention. I harvested a bucket of onions and garlic from the right hand one, but its since gone over to dock. And the left one is just a Triffid Nightmare. The rhubarb is happy but the Brown Wind ruined the raspberries, and the rest is just things gone to seed and running rampant. Its keeping me awake at night with its Rave music...

In the greenhouse (cupboard!) I sowed a few seeds in the hopes of having a last hurrah before the winter sets in. We very often have mild weather until the end of October, and some years it has even been mid-November before we've needed the heating, so with a bit of luck we'll get something out of this batch.

I sowed mangetout, borage, mullein (an investment against next spring) also cress and winter salad. The cress, peas and winter salad are sprouting, the others are still thinking about it. Also, indoors, I sowed Evening Primrose, which is germinating madly, so that's exciting! Oh, and spring onions... (As usual I got my seeds from Seedaholic.)

I found some cabbage seedlings around the side of the house, so I put them up on the shelf to see whether they would recover. Also, the apple pips I planted last summer sprouted, to my surprise, so I separated and re potted them. I don't know whether they will ever do much, but its worth keeping them going to see what happens. Oh, and I shook out some seeds from a foxglove on the lane and sowed them to see whether they would germinate (VERY clearly LABELLED!!).

I pulled the rapidly multiplying montbretia out of the salad bed, and intend taking them in to the Churchyard and planting them there next week. For the moment they are in water with some compost tea added to hopefully keep them happy. They'll be drunk as skunks by Monday.

And so to the salad bed... minus the aforementioned montbretia, and all the chard which had gone to seed. Parsley, ditto, mustard, ditto ditto. I pulled up reams of strawberry runners which were holding a Berry Olympic around the edges of the bed...in fact there were so many strawberry runners that there was no room for weeds, which was kinda handy I suppose.

I've planted a few of the perpetual spinach at the far end, as usual I forgot to water them so they were a bit sulky. I'm waiting to see whether they turn up their toes or kick up their heels.

I have to admit to having mixed feelings about growing strawberries. For a start, although home grown berries are delicious, there are never very many per plant, and you'd need to put down about 40 or 50 plants to be worth eating. And secondly, take your eye off them for a fortnight and they either keel over and die or they run rampant and strangle everything within reach. Or perhaps its just my slap-happy approach to gardening which is at fault, rather than the strawbs!

And just to finish, Heinz has learned a new trick which is either funny or annoying, depending. If you ignore him when he wants to play, he goes gets Bear (present from Eldest), brings it to you, and if you still ignore him he somehow flips it up at you to get your attention! Yesterday everyone was out for several hours so I was working on the laptop and Bear kept hitting me, and occasionally landing on the keyboard!

So there it is. Getting out into the Garden is a step, right?

And the Hub bought me hiking boots so now I need to brave the wider world...well, step outside the gate at any rate...

Eat Yer Heart Out Bugs Bunny!

Now isn't this a sight for a Bunny's eyes?! The carrot on the left was so perfect I just had to show yez!
Last night we had 'Chunky Soup' for supper, which was basically everything that was left from the summer crop in the veg patch, including my perfect carrot! I felt I should preserve it for immortality somehow, but Youngest thought that was taking the whole veg growing thing a bit too seriously!

I believe this is what is called a 'Swiss Cheese Plant'? My Granny used to have one in her hall and she always referred to it as the 'Cheese and Wine Plant'! So, thinking to add a touch of elegance to the bathroom, I moved Henry in there:

As you can see, he is very happy, which is good, I do love happy plants!

The only 'down' side is that it has recently become necessary to be armed with a machete when you want a bath!

C'est la vie en pays! Everything comes with a price!!

Sharpen Yer Hockey Sticks!!

So there I was on Sunday afternoon, spending a nice quiet time with my blogamigos, when I hear a loud mooing.

It gets louder, and louder...and louder...until next thing a big hairy head looks in the window at me!

Hells bells and buckets o' blood! Did I spend all summer working on my garden, and all autumn nurturing winter veg seedlings to have the whole bloomin' lot munchagobbled up in ten minutes flat- roots and all- by a bothersome bunch o' bovines?

Did I heck!

I don't keep a hockey stick in the front hall for nothing you know, and its not just hockey balls I hit with them either!

I tell you Queen Maeve and Granouille had nothing on the virago who belted out to protect her precious garden! Them cows never stood a whisker of a chance! I may have been the strongest hockey player with the worst aim in the history of the Grammar but the players in Connaught knew to run when they saw me coming...cows included!

Whew!

I hope those cows don't know that motto about 'he who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day' because I'll be waiting! I'm tellin' ya!

You Know That...

Summer is nearly over when...

...you begin to collect and break up old pallets for the woodpile...
...you need to rust-proof the trailer before another winter's use...

...the raspberries are finished, the Summer veg becoming sparse, and the second bed is being prepared for sowing winter veg...

...the salad bed is full to bursting and you just can't eat enough to keep it in check!

...the montbretia are flowering...

(And how did that one get into the salad bed anyhow, I'd like to know? Cheeky!)

Then there's the return to School, naming new uniform, turning up school skirts, finding mouldy PE kit from last term...

Ah well!

We've had some beautiful weather this year, better than we have had in many years, so I'm not complaining really. Its just a little melancholy to smell Autumn on the wind and see the leaves beginning to turn...

Stuff...and PINK Stuff...eeeww!

Remember the box of pink scraps? ta-dah!
You surely wouldn't mistake it for anything other than a scrap quilt!
I was going to leave the border as is, though I'd usually add a wider one. I was also thinking to appliqué some flowers up the plain sashing- opinions? (partly to disguise the fact that I had to piece the sashing...)

If you nip over to Robin's Egg Bleues she is having one splendiferous giveaway!

(And I'm only telling you as that is a condition of entering...)

The other evening I was visiting Sue, and after inspecting all her potted plants, was laughing at the fact that she has 50 plants around inside her house! Well, sez I, I've only about 10...so I went and counted them...ahem, sez I, I've 32! Golly but they do multiply so!

This morning I went around the garden for a think of what to plant where and its really looking most awfully sorry for itself. We've had snow every day this week and night temperatures at -5 which is normally very rare, but this winter fairly continual and I'm afraid to even touch the soil for fear of damaging the cell structure, even if it thawed enough to weed.

These are shrubs and tree seedlings I'm growing on, but I can't tell yet if they are all alive:

This is the most sheltered of the beds, parsley and cress doing fine, but even the bay seems to be suffering:

Everything looks so terrible in February, like it'll never be summer. And these are the other veg beds in which everything had died it seems. I'm hoping the rhubarb and raspberry are resting underground and will return.

But, lest I leave you depressed at the ravages of winter, here's some photos I took on Wednesday (I think) as a storm was building:
In this I suddenly noticed the Rowan tree has buds, obviously I got the focus wrong...I just can't sort it on the digital camera...yet!!
Thought for the day:

How many times do I have to tell them-

Do NOT use the stairs with a TOOTHBRUSH in your mouth when you are carrying the vacuum cleaner!

Bank Holiday Monday put to good use.

Is it possible to be a 'lavender junkie'? If it is, then I think I am! Lavender to sleep, for stress and distress, for cuts and bites, for hands, headaches, and lavender bags as presents. I think I need therapy...lavender bathsalts?
This is what this morning looks like: real summer weather, but it hasn't actually begun raining.
Progress on the shed! The Hub has been hard at it all weekend, and now the roof is on (minus the felt membrane) he isn't getting as wet.
Yesterday I thoroughly weeded the veg beds and boy! did they need doing. I had to slather myself in Jungle Juice as it was very buggy, but tidy veg beds are so satisfying to gaze upon.
Lots of broad beans coming along, we had the first batch with dinner last night- it's my favourite veg, but only home grown, the bought ones have no flavour.
The packet instructions of these mangetout said they were low-growing, which I took to mean they didn't need staking. Obviously it meant they only need short stakes! With all the little curly tendrils they are now a tangled mat, but very happy and putting out plenty of flowers, so I'm hoping the harvest won't be affected by my ignorance! Mum used to grow mangetout when we were children, but she kept eating them straight off the plants! The Hub tossed this mat back onto the bed whilst cutting the grass but it has to be out as a few tomatoes and a basil have decided to grow beside it.
Here you can view the rogue potato which has taken over the carrot patch. I pulled as many of the carrots from under the potato leaves as I could find, and we had them for dinner too as they weren't going to bo doing much more growing with that monster breathing down their necks. I suppose I could have pulled the potato? Oh and the white flowers are self seeded rocket.
Finally found where the nasturtium went, it was hiding under the dock leaves- what? you don't have dock leaves in your veg patch? What do you do to remove nettle stings then? Oh, you don't have nettles either? Well don't boast about it, if you had extreme rheumatism you would be wanting to roll naked in a nettle patch at dawn...or maybe sunset...or is that arthritis I'm thinking of... I planted two whole packets of tomato seeds and something ate most of them and the rest are kinda spindly. The single tomato I DIDN'T plant turns up in the scallion patch and is thriving. Sometimes I think my veg patch has its own agenda, or else it just really knows how to get up my nose.
And then when the rain set in and I was waiting for the dinner to cook, I got out the quilting and did quite a bit. Kim, at http://kimsbigquiltingadventure.blogspot.com/ is having an 'Encouraging August' for all those sluggards (like me) who need a bit of motivation to get their projects finished. Great idea, especially since I need to have two small quilts done and delivered by the end of August and I'm finding it hard to keep at them. The other top is still in blocks, not sewn together.
And as if you aren't fed up with all the photos, here's a few from the hedgerows which I took this morning. As I've said before, I love the way hedgerows develop and change with the seasons, and year to year. Patrick Whitefield has a new book out which is about how nature changes landscape through time as well as between places. Its on my wish list for next year when all the expense of Debs' dress, Kenya visitors, Sos and Dilly's College monies are done. (Tried to do a link but as some of you know my links are a bit dodgy:book is called 'The living landscape: how to read and understand it')
(http://www.green-shopping.co.uk/books/book_pages/natural_history.html#LLS)
Harebells
several different ferns growing on the wall together.
Irish lanes are often so worn down that they are almost tunnels, here the top of the bank was way over my head (as are most things...)
And there you have it! or as Bugs Bunny says 'That's All Folks!'

Country Stinks and Patchwork Progress!

Today inside the house looks like a mad Midsummer Hallowe’en party. The farmer down the road is spreading slurry and as our land is plonk in the middle of his fields we are surrounded by spread upon-ed fields. One of the hazards of country living but the stink is AMAZING! Not that it’s new to us, but it must be extra-ordinarily potent this season. All the windows are open, since there’s no point in trying to keep it out, and I’ve lit candles here and there to try and speed up the deponkification.

We seem to have some random potatoes growing in amongst the carrots, not to mention some weeds. Guess it was peelings which hadn’t rotted properly when we used the next batch of compost. The carrots, spring onions and onions have shot up this week; I hope there is just as much going on underground!

Yesterday evening I planted out a tray of tomato seedlings, two trays of rocket which were too shallow, and transplanted those bolshy beans. It seemed everything was twice the height this morning. I’ve a problem with what to plant in the middle as I won’t be able to reach to pick veg once everything gets big. Actually I’m thinking of just putting a row of sunflowers in the middle for decoration!

Returning from town earlier there was a traffic jam on the lane, a tractor filling his slurry tank (in front of the blue barn), then a tractor and trailer, then me. It was a bit of a wait but there was a lovely section of old stone wall beside me so…

My Asiatic Lily has just begun flowering and it’s lovely. It’s actually got more of a black sheen to the petals, but I couldn’t get that on the camera.

This is the little quilt I’m working on at present. I’ve got the blocks from an old Better Homes and Gardens book-‘ 501 Quilt Blocks’ , which I’ve had for donkey’s years and used a lot. These are the first nine blocks, and another which needs a brighter border but I haven’t found the right shade yet. Two more blocks: a snowdrop and a Church. Then we’ll see how it should go together. I’m particularly impressed that I put the daffodil together without any ripping or swearing as I haven’t done such fiddly appliqué before. The snowdrop will be an equal ‘challenge’…please be keeping your hands over your ears!

I’ve seen photos of other folk’s work- spaces so here is mine, if you can make it out, complete with Ben-dog. It’s in the kitchen, like almost everything belonging to this family, including the animals, which is why we so often have to eat meals from our knees in the sitting room!! If I’ve a big project on, or trying to get something finished to a deadline, I’ve even served the girls friends’ by spreading a tablecloth on the sitting room floor and laying it like a table. Whilst Sos was studying for and doing her Leaving Cert this last few months she’s had a table covered in books in the kitchen too!
I’ve got used now to having the house and particularly the kitchen to ourselves, but in Kenya only cooking was done in the kitchen. Just about everyone has indoor and outdoor workers and a kitchen is as much their space as the family’s. In my Father-in-law’s kitchen particularly there was always some sort of hooley happening, and it was more like a Club really, especially when he was entertaining and all hands were called in to help. One time I walked in before a Dinner to see the Cook at the stove, the syce and house-man making pasta with strings churning out of the pasta machine in all directions, the ayah chopping vegetables and the gardener having hysterics in between doing something else, setting the table I think. Anyhow it was pandemonium, but not unusual. Sometimes I miss that here.

This morning I was changing all the bath towels, but despite having folded the clean ones off the drying rack earlier in the week I couldn’t find them anywhere. After hunting through the linen press and various possible places, I started on the irregular places…They were in with the Hub’s jeans…Hmm…in what way exactly do the bath towels resemble his jeans I wonder? I noticed (while going through the press) that a number of the hand towels are very grey looking although with plenty of wear yet, and I wondered whether I should dye them bright colours- like yellow maybe?