Gardening

Jen Gets Muddy #KidsGrowWild 10

This entry was posted in Competition Entry Gardening and tagged Blogger Challenges boys BritMums broken bunnies cooking Cornwall digging flower flower pots flowers Gardening HOLE Jen photo play Polly Pansy on

This morning I received a big white box from the postman. It was recorded post too, exciting, I had to open it right away of course. This post is my entry for BritMums’ #KidsGrowWild Challenge”. I took a photo of the lovely gardening kit before the boys got their mitts on it! It had been raining most of the day, but there was a short sunny spell after cycling home from school. Perfect, I asked the boys to come outside and play. Jen was willing but I couldn’t pry D away from Mathletics on the internet. Yes, still in school uniform. We head outside with the plan being plant the seeds in flower pots and pop them into our recently purchased greenhouse to start these seeds off properly.

At Last – A Greenhouse! 2

This entry was posted in Gardening and tagged bulbs flower flower pots flowers green making nature on

So I love gardening, but gardening does not love me back. I try my best but I often kill plants or the seeds themselves never grow. Well not anymore, I have a greenhouse at last, despite having had a garden of our own for about 7 years. The front garden is the sunny place, but due to the open, unfenced nature of the front we have had to stick it on the patio in the back garden. In the back garden it only gets direct sunlight from dawn until about 2pm but this seems to be enough. It’s never hot in there, but it is much warmer in there than outside next to it. The plan is grow tomatoes and veggies we use often in there according to my partner. But as I’m paying for the greenhouse you’ll see it’s full of my flower pots. All the bulbs in the […]

Decking Dream – Creating the Ultimate Entertaining Space in your Garden

This entry was posted in BloggerOpps Gardening Sponsored Posts and tagged boys bunnies fence Garden green outdoors photo style on

When we moved in to out house several years ago it had a patio the previous owners had installed themselves, which we were not very taken with. It looks ok, but it goes a nasty, dirty, mossy green and has no style. It’s so last century, and not in a good way! I want decking instead.   Ok, you’re looking at the first photo thinking that’s not so bad aren’t you? You’d be wrong I’m afraid, so were we as that is what we said when viewing the house. It is a bodge job! Not good at all is the fact they covered the air bricks in the outside walls, reducing ventilation in to the house, and so increasing the damp problem we do have. If we could afford it, I would phone a professional gardener handy man type from the yellow pages. I would like the nasty concrete slabs […]

Planting in Unusual Places, Crazy Containers

This entry was posted in Gardening and tagged broken bulbs chickens coffee cute DIY & home style flower flower pots Garden ideas light photo recycling shoes style trees on

As it is Spring now, I’ve been outside planting containers. Now for most gardeners that would mean flower pots or rectangular tubs, but today I did something a teeny bit more quirky. As I didn’t have an old toilet bowl, or a non-seaworthy wooden boat I decided on mugs, shoes and tin cans. I have previously used a toy box as a planting tub, I kept the lid so in winter I pop the lid back on to protect the bulbs inside, clever huh? I wanted to plant some handbags and wellies but the charity shops had nothing I liked the look of today. Everyone has seen planted willies but I liked the idea of hanging handbags like bizarre little hanging basket dangling from my cherry tree… that would have been cool, but no such luck today. Ready to get going… I have here some mixed seeds, some cute mugs […]

Time to Get Growing

This entry was posted in Competition Entry Gardening Tots100 and tagged blogger bulbs flower Jen photo tots100 trees win on

Tots100 have set another blogger challenge so I thought I’d join in.Any old excuse to get out in the garden.The tots100 challenge is to blog anything to do with growing. It’s for a chance to win a center parks family break, so how could I resist. This follows on from my recent post It’s Raining It’s Pouring where the weather hindered my gardening plans.Cheap bulbs, from Wilko. Seed multipack from a pound shop. Mixed up bulbs, like lucky dip. I do not do perfect straight line planting in my garden. First I dug over the messy messy flower bed. We have clay based soil, which is heavy and clumps together awfully. To combat this I often dig holes and fill them with home made compost, which is why you might see bits of sawdust and hay mixed in the soil. It’s slowly helping fix the issue. Pre dig photo. My […]

Its Raining, Its Pouring 2

This entry was posted in Gardening Kids Random Spring and tagged boys bulbs cold flowers fruit trees green style trees winter on

At last, some sensible April weather.It has warmed up to a temperature where I’m no longer shivering. All day it’s been reasonably warm with anything between drizzle to heavy downpours. Occasionally actual sunshine was seen, great stuff. As a gardener I appreciate the wet weather, my rain water butts were almost empty and the beds were just dusty. Of course I’ve been watering my new trees but within an hour or so the top soil was dry as here we have not had rain in weeks. Today I wanted to get outside in my garden and plant my bulbs, but of course, it turned from very faint infrequent drizzle into real rain at the time I was going to get growing. Tomorrow, tomorrow I will turn over the top soil and bury those 70-ish bulbs I bought in Wilkinsons the other day. I’m still planning on having a mini fruit […]

Patch the Tree Destroyer 2

This entry was posted in Gardening GYO Pets Rabbits and tagged chickens flowers fruit trees Patch trees on

Yesterday I planted the trees I bought from GardeningExpress via Groupon. Partner and me planted them… This means I did the prep work and tidyed the old veggie bed up. As I turned the soil my chickens were going mad searching for worms to eat. It made it hard as I was worried I would hit one of my girls with the shovel. Silly chicks! Trees bundled together and my tools Here are my tools. Shears to lop bits off of the existing red currant bush to give my trees some space, a dirty well used old spade, plant food and my trees with roots soaking in a bucket. I also had a few grow bags to fill the holes around the roots so they could get a better start. All seemed ok. I put some foam around the lower trunk of each tree as I have pets. Here are […]

Mothers Day at my Place 3

This entry was posted in Bed Wetting Gardening Mothers Day and tagged bulbs children Christmas coffee driving flower flowers fruit trees Jen trees washing on

It didn’t start perfect, Jen wet his bed in the night, thankfully his bed has special sheets on and it worked well (a review on that to follow soon). So in the night he came into my bed when I was asleep, the smell of wee woke me, at which point was too late as he’d been lying in my bed for long enough to let his soaked pjs get my bed stinky and wet. Lovely… First task of mothers day, lots of washing including both quilts.Wish he’d stayed in his bed. When I woke this morning I was greeted by an almost naked Jen waving a box of chocolates at me, suggesting I forget breakfast and eat these. I obliged of course. Would be rude not to! Shortly after this partner appears with a mug of coffee and D comes in with this… I love trees. I’ve run out […]

Overgrown and neglected 2

This entry was posted in Gardening Gloucester Photos and tagged bulbs fence on

This is the path we use daily. Overgrown, unloved and used as a rubbish dump. I don’t understand why the people who technically own these garages don’t reclaim them. It’s such a waste of space. It could be so pretty with some love. If people see rubbish on the floor they add more rubbish. Sometimes it’s household bin bags, ripped open with nappies pouring out. I don’t understand why a parent would dump their child’s waste in a place they probably push his buggy through? It’s a mess right, no hope? This is the view if you look through the fence…I’m seriously tempted to wild plant this area, like I suggested on the “help our bees” post the other day. Does anyone have any unwanted bulbs? 😉

Help our bees! 7

This entry was posted in Gardening Nature and tagged Bees bulbs flower flowers fruit trees nature photo trees winter woodland on

Hullo, If you don’t garden you might not realise, but common garden bees are vanishing. You might not know how important this is, and if you don’t then I whole heartedly suggest watching “Bee Movie” as although it’s a cartoon film it explains it perfectly. Without bees we are up the creek without a paddle. They aren’t all about honey, the main thing is pollination. Without them kindly moving pollen about very few flowers, vegetable plants or fruit trees would grow. Or they may grow leaves, but produce no flowers, no fruit, no seeds. Think about it, no seed to grind into flour, or wheat into pasta? What do we eat then? As bees are massively in decline in this country I thought I’d try to encourage readers to do something. You don’t need a real garden, if you have a lawn just bury spring flowering bulbs in the lawn. […]

Gardening ideas 4

This entry was posted in Chickens Gardening Pets and tagged bright chickens children digging flower flowers fruit trees Gardening ideas postage trees on

After having chickens for a few months I have no lawn left, and what was my veggie bed is a muddy puddle! It’s clear veggies aren’t an option this growing season, all edible things are munched, so I need sturdy stubborn plants, the kind that re grow each year. On the left there, that was my veg bed, and on the right was a lawn! Thanks chickens. I was looking for fruit trees, and just bought some from GardeningExpress website, via groupon as there was a good deal. Five fruit trees, normally £100 was £30 plus £7 postage. I know you can get supermarket trees at certain times of the year, they buy them in and put near the fruit shelves, and there is a reason they are cheap. These are often not self pollinating types, so whilst one will grow and look healthy you need another close by to […]

Snowdrops and rain. Is it Spring now?

This entry was posted in Gardening Spring and tagged bulbs cold flower flowers Garden Gramps on

This morning on my way to take lads to school I noticed the flowers have opened. It’s a bit early for Spring isn’t it as was extremely cold over the last fortnight. I am amazed they’ve sprouted up but here it is… My muddy water logged garden is showing life. These aren’t just any old flowers they were bulbs taken from my grand parents garden after my Gramps died. Every year they come out I remember him. It’s years since he died, but he is still so much to me, my “Dad figure” as my real Dad didn’t want me. I’m so glad I said to Nan that I wanted to take some of Gramps’s bulbs. He was a keen gardener you see, so to me taking home some Snowdrops and Crocuses seemed right. My Nan had the garden ripped out and covered in gravel. She couldn’t bare to look […]