musing...remembering what we do achieve.

I muse a lot.... i have been musing this morning....

This year we grew garlic.

We planted the bulbs in January ... they grew.. have been harvested and are being used in our cooking. I was just now cleaning out the garlic press whilst musing. The bulbs are only small, but still very tasty.

It made me feel happy knowing that we are using them and that this year we have successfully grown them.

I know that often i think only about the things in my life that i don't do and beat myself up about it. This is probably common for many of us. Maybe we all set unrealistic goals. However big or small i find that when i focus on what i do achieve rather than what i don't then i am much happier.

Yesterday I did something some may call brave and others may call crazy. I met a virtual friend. I am so glad that i had the courage to do it and thankfully it was wonderful. I shall write a little more about the day on my next post but all that i will say is that we both wished that Pipany could have been there too.
Wishing you all happy weekends .
ginny x

Harvest reflection...

One of my great passions is gardening. I have dabbled with growing herbs and veg for just over 10 years now. Pre children, i spent all my spare cash on plants for the garden in our rented flat. I even managed to bring some favourites with me when we finally moved out of London in the late 90's.
This year my husband has taken an interest in the garden too, which has been great as keeping on top of it with the children still young and with running a business has been pretty difficult.
As we were flooded in freak weather in 2006, we decided to raise the old veg beds and built some very tall beds from oak sleepers. My man built another raised bed for salads nearer the house. The greenhouse was tidied, staging built and we happily sowed away.

It has been a trial and error year and I would like to share with you our attempts ...

Our first harvests were from Lollo Rosso lettuce, rocket ( really easy and really tasty), spring onions, basil and spinach (good for a bit and then bolted).
We then enjoyed some fruit; raspberries, gooseberries and alpine strawberries.. only a few of each but still great.




The potatoes came next and we were lucky that as the beds were raised so high, the damp weather didn't spoil them.

This was our alien potato.

The dwarf french beans were our favourite crop of all.. so fresh and enjoyed by the whole family (good yeild over a long period for only six plants).





The carrots actually grew (a first for me!). They were of variable sizes but the earlier ones could have been sweeter. The spot we grew them in was not in direct sun so we wondered wether they needed more light? We had some this weekend and they were better.





The veg which did really well were the courgettes.. almost too many to eat and many turned into marrows whilst we were on our holiday. I did find a good recipe this book..

'Food from green places' by Rosamond Richardson for

' Courgettes Parmigiana'.

About 3lb courgettes cut diagonally and blanched for 3-4mins, drained, then arranged in layers (as in a lasagna) with fresh tomato sauce and then sliced mozzarello (each layer seasoned well) and then topped with grated parmesan and drizzled with olive oil. All baked at gas 4/ 180c for 40-45 mins. It was so easy to do and tasted really good.

We also have a large clump of rhubarb in the garden and have made fruit crumble a few times too. Crumble is my all time favourite pudding and in times of low moods (i get a few of these from time to time), my mum will always find an excuse to make me a blackberry and apple crumble (my most favourite). A small morello cherry tree gave us and the birds a few fruits too.

The crop which failed dismally for us were the tomatoes. I had sown gardener's delight and my man sowed Super Marmande beef tomatoes. Firstly we grew too many, and found it hard to care for them all, and secondly the they hated the wet and most got brown patches on their stems and got blighted so we had to dig them up. We were pleased to hear we wern't the only ones and even Monty said the tomatoes at Berryfield were a disaster.

A few salvaged tomatoes.

Our final crop to harvest is sweetcorn. We barbequed our first cobs today and they really were the best we'd ever tasted. They do say that sweetcorn is best picked and eaten straight away and it seems to be true.




We still have ridge cucmbers going strong, some blackberries (thornless ones planted by me for the girls), more courgettes, a few salads, garlic and these bannana peppers.



All in all a good year .. i think next year we should plan for leeks and parsnips .. two of my favourites and romanesco.. but one thing at a time ...
It still amazes us that all this comes from tiny planted seeds ..So i want to say thanks for the harvest from our garden this year and how enjoyable it has been to share this new adventure with my husband. Our girls have really enjoyed helping too, especially picking the goodies.
If you have any veg/harvest stories or advice to share please do leave a comment.. i'd love to hear how this year is going for you..
Have a good week.
G
x

Holidays... Lazy days...

Hello .. it's been 2 weeks since my last post...and this is why...
We have been relaxing and holidaying both at home and on The Isle of Wight. It has been wonderful just to switch off and be with the family. We returned to the Isle of Wight and hooked up with friends and the girls met up with their penfriends (also made last year). It was great to have no plans and just to see what each day brought. We were so lucky as the weather was glorious.. suntan lotion and sun hats all week!

Freshwater Bay

This Island has so much to offer. Last year we did the whole Jurrassic, dinosaur thing as our youngest was obsessed with dinosaurs but this year we didn't do the things we intended to,like visiting the Lavender and Garlic farms and revisiting Black Gang Chine (memories of the early 70's as a child here!)
No... we just let the days unfold and had a few beach days, a few sightseeing days and time just hanging out together and with friends.

Freshwater Bay.. ( looking the other way)
Great beach for swimming ( steep gradient and deep water)

We saw lots of yachts as it was Cowes week.

We walked around these walls at Carisbrooke Castle.


Painted these at Chessell pottery.




And enjoyed an icecream or two.



We also saw this open air performance of the Pied Piper at Mottistone Manor with our good friends. We took a picnic and the boys went off to the NT cafe and came back with tea in china cups .... .. sipping tea.. on the lawn.. in the sunshine.. what bliss!

So i am now so rested that i'm mostly horizontal. 3 more weeks left of the Summer hols then back to reality. How i wish everyday could be like Summer.

We have a few new projects on the go at the studio and at home we are harvesting courgettes.. although some of them are now marrows due to the recent rain!
Hope you are having fun wherever you are!
G
x

Inspiring gardens

Hampton Court Palace taken from a bridge over the Long Water

I have finally come back to earth after last week and have rested and taken some time out. The show was great for us and we were really pleased with how it all went. It is a lot of work putting together a stand at one of these larger shows but it is well worth the extra effort. It all came together just as we had planned and the new range with all the fruit and veg fitted perfectly... We also received lots of lovely comments on the overall look of the stand too.

Apart from the very muddy, rainy start to the week and a drip on our stall (at least we were inside!), the remainder of the week was lovely and sunny. We also got a chance to look around and I thought i would share with you some of the gardens that caught my eye.



This is the small garden fom Alton Infants School , which is in the town where our studio is.

The garden represents a microcosm of the school grounds and has been designed for education and fun. As the Chinese proverb says, 'I hear and I forget; I see and I remember; I do and I understand'. The garden teaches the children conservation, recycling, organic gardening, plant and animal life cycles and caring for the world.
They won best small garden and a gold medal. They did have a chicken too but apparently only there for 'press day'.

Selborniensis

Another beautiful small garden was 'Selborniensis', I was drawn to this garden not realising it was created by two women from our locality. It is inspired by the work of naturalist Gilbert White.
I love the use of the apple as a screen, the relaxed naturalistic planting and the clay sculptures.

Best in Show was this fantastic garden;
The Growing Schools Garden - learning outside the classroom

designed by the lovely Chris Beardshaw. It illustrates how teaching and learning can take place outside the classroom and has been created with participation from children of all ages from more than 30 schools. This spider and web is fantastic and i expect we will be seeing them pop up in schools throught the uk!

The Daily Mail had a large feature garden 'The Darling Buds of May', and as you can imagine it was full of nostalgia and extremely popular. They even had a Pig with her piglets who liked to sleep in a row in the sun. Very cute!

And my favourite view was of the lovely lovely veg!

Other inspiring favourites were
The Torres Tapas Garden
The Giving Garden
The Smile Garden
The 'Chase' Secret Garden
Wildlife Garden in a Skip
and
Infinity

After all the rain we've had my garden is in need of lots of attention.. and now i have a few new ideas...i wonder if the kids would like to make a giant spider?

G

x

Going slightly mad...

Well i really must confess i am already slightly mad but this week is just pushing me further into that crazy world of stress and tiredness.. a great combination. Alice said i should post a photo of myself. (as i have already put one of her up). Well i really don't ever look good in a photo..my husband always says i look better in real life as i have a very animated face.. maybe he is being kind. The ones Alice took yesterday do portray a kind of craziness and are also a little blurry ( a blessing maybe ). Well here goes....

Sewing on Alice's trusty Bernina. They are great old machines. I have one too from the 1970's . It was my mother in laws but i inherited it about 5 years ago. They really are fantastic.

We have finished our new shoppers and i can reveal some of our other designs...

My favourite are the peas

and the onions.

And here are the cherries.

We also have strawberries and carrots as well as the apples.
You can tell i have been inspired by my veg growing this year. We have had a lot of rocket and lettuce so far, along with the raspberries but are now waiting for the potatoes, carrots and onions. The dwarf beans are coming on well too thanks to the rain. And this is an exciting sight... the cherries ripening....

Just one week now to Hampton Court so if i can get on the computer (my man is doing our website most evenings) then i will do a kind of countdown.
So today, Sunday is day 8. and i will count down to day 0 ( lift off!) which is Monday 2nd July... our final dressing of the stand and then the Gala evening from 6pm.

Yesterday we brought the paint, some high visibility vests for the get in (very sexy) and sourced some shelving. Today we have been making more stock and i have put together a press release (awaiting Alice's approval).
Tommorrow,.. well tomorrow is another day with lots more to do!
until then...
ginny x

Springtime in the garden...

I love the spring with new shoots emerging and the promise of things to come. Creating our garden is an ongoing project but this year my husband is keen to get his hands in the earth and join me in growing our herbs and vegetables.
As the weather here has been glorious we have all spent the Easter weekend in the garden. We have cleared and moved plants (including this blubell) and have created a rather large new veg bed from railway sleepers. It's pretty big (in height rather than area) and required some strength. After being flooded last year in freak weather we are trying to raise everything... just in case.
So even though the kids have been out for the day out with their grandparents I didn't make it to the studio today as i'm still in the garden!
G