How lucky are we? We've had a dry and sunny summer so far, with much needed rain and cooler days (lower 20's) the last couple of weeks. I'm hoping the weather fairy will be in a good mood when we go away to the Norfolk coast for a week with Mr Fluff's lovely parents and the wacky whippets later in August... she does owe me a few favours :0)
Having a garden has been such bliss, I don't even mind the gardening! And I love mowing the lawn with my sexy monster - not that I've had to do it much with the dry weather we've had.
During spring and early summer we had our fill of the strawberries that were already planted in pots when we moved in. The huge cherry tree in the garden gifted us delicious cherries, and now we are waiting for the plum trees and apple trees to do their magic. Our veggies have also been doing splendidly - too well in fact - and we have been eating home grown food for a while now. We have so many courgettes and cucumbers it is difficult to keep up, and we are already struggling with the tomatoes. There are so many that we will run into some serious glut soon. I'll have to dry the extra tomatoes to Mr Fluff's delight. And don't let me get started on the salad leaves! YUMMY. We had so much and for such a long time. We just recently planted more seeds, so the new leaves should be ready in no time.
We have also had super-sweet peas, and the pepper plants are finally producing tiny peppers. The corn will be ready soon and I can't wait! We've even had potatoes (that we didn't plant). The only plant that seems to be struggling is the butternut. I'm not convinced that we will have any at all. Oh well, not a bad outcome really.
This veggie-planting experiment of ours was a fantastic idea, and we have learned so much. Next time, I will know to leave PLENTY of space for the courgettes, and not to plant 20 tomato plants at once, and to space them out a lot more. I'll also attempt more corn, and we need to plant way more peas than we did, and less salad leaves at a time. See? Now we're super clever.
The only problem with growing your own food is all the bloody pests, but I think in some ways we have been quite lucky, because none of our plants got completely destroyed, and many just shrugged off the ruthless bug & slug attacks.
One horrendous experience we had was while the new boiler was being installed: Attack Of The Thrips! Oh my gods it was awful. Thrips are also known as Thunder Bugs or Corn Lice, and they are these tiny 1-2mm black insects that can fly (but not well or far), and they are the little buggers that cause the silvery patches you sometimes see on plants and leaves. Anyway, as you know we are surrounded by wheat and barley fields, and these evil little bastards were having the time of their lives harassing us en masse. For about two weeks they would appear in the morning and only leave early evening.
The first time I saw them was when the boiler guy was busy upstairs in our bedroom lifting the floor boards to check out the water pipes. I was downstairs. All the windows upstairs were open because it was a very hot day. Anyway, at lunchtime the guy left to get some food and I went upstairs to the bedroom to have a look, when I discovered that every inch of our bed, pillows, walls and curtains were covered in tine black insects. I freaked! My first thought was that they came from under the floor boards, but then I didn't see any where the boards had been lifted, so I realised they must come from outside. I closed the window and got the vacuum cleaner in a panic and started sucking the tiny freaks up from every surface. They even got into the pillowcases and bedding. I nearly died. If you know me well, you know that I have no problems with insects, but i can't stomach swarms of anything, and this was beyond my worst nightmare!
So, after spending an hour sucking them up and sweating like a crazy freak in the stuffy, horribly hot house I got ready to go downstairs, only to realise that the buggers were all over the staircase walls, and bathroom too. (I'm actually calming myself down as I type this hahahaha)
To cut a long story short, I had to keep the windows and doors closed to keep them out, but even just going into the garden would mean getting covered in them. The poor boiler guy was oblivious as to what was going on around him, until the day he had to install the piping outside the front door. He came in and told me that he has been itching all day and there seems to be these little black insects all over him, and all over the walls. I told him what happened to me and then Googled to find out what the pesky insects are, but when I told him he nearly freaked out. Poor guy had a tough time with them all over him, in his hair and crawling into his ears. I had exactly the same experience when I vacuumed them up. YUK
Thankfully they are now mostly gone, and the farmers are harvesting, but next year they will be back... I'm just glad we won't be here to deal with them!
Here are some recent veggie pics
Alula munching on the courgette leaves
Kaya munching on the cucumber leaves
peppers and even more tomatoes
the cucumber plant moved to the trellis
courgette & cucumber plants
the small courgette plant and the struggling butternut plant
This really is living the good life. Too bad it won't last!
Now all we need is that letter in the post requesting our passports so that we can start to properly plan our next chapter.
Much love to all of you, until next time. xx
