All In Bloom

I've been focusing so much on my veggie gardens lately that I forgot about the gorgeous flowers that have started blooming in my cutting garden and surrounds.

Walked outside today after it had rained all day yesterday only to find these gorgeous irises has opened, lavender in my chicken coop now in flower, a rose bud and single calla lily just shouting out 'cut me cut me'

My first David Austin  Rose for the season ' Chaucer' - one of my favorites!

Dutch Iris (miss 5 cut most of them before I got a chance to take a photo)

White Calla Lily - the plants given to my from my Grandmother

Lavender in the chicken coop in bloom and one of my hens, Sarah

Nothing compares to home grown veggies as opposed to store bought, there is such a huge difference. But the same goes for flowers. Home grown flowers last longer in a vase, have brighter colours and stronger stems. When I see something in bloom, I just have to cut it and bring inside to pop in a vase and enjoy whether it be a single stem or a small posy of blooms.

Next year I will work on adding more plants to my cut flower garden . When ever I cut some flowers to bring inside, miss 5 and miss 3 want them in their bedrooms and I miss out unless there is lots of blooms. But that is okay - that just shows that they like pretty flowers like their mother ;-)

It's been a little while

Well it's been a long long time since I have been here - 2 years to be exact! So much has happened in 2 years. Biggest thing of all, another addition to our family making me a mummy of 4! I have always found the first year with a baby quite overwhelming at times, but around their first birthday I tend to feel more on top of things.

So last week my baby turned one and Spring is here - so it's the best time to start fresh in the garden! I am super motivated to get my hands dirty and to provide my family with lots of fresh organic, home grown produce. Last summer, my veggie patch was not as productive as I would have liked, but I was too busy with a newborn baby. Then Autumn came around I was was itching to fill my beds, but still short on time - I managed to get a few things in. Garlic made it into the beds in May (a bit later than the recommended March date for Sydney) Oh well, if I get smaller garlic this this harvest then so be it. Small garlic is better than nothing I say! I also managed to put in a few cauliflower, kale and broccolini seedlings.

Check out my first cauli!

    

A crop of carrots also got planted about 2 months back and are ready for their second thinning. I really need to get another crop in so I get a continuous supply.

I also put in about 8 silverbeet seedlings thinking I would have WAY too much but it actually can't grow quick enough!

A few weeks back i put in some bare rooted fruit trees and created more gardens for more veggies and fruit but I'll talk more on that another day.

I germinated some tomato seedlings indoors in my heated propigator a few weeks ago, but when I put them outside in my mini green house, either to wind or the dog knocked them over - I was soo upset! So instead of putting in more seeds, I bought some seedlings of tomato, eggplant, capsicum and lettuce.

This weeks job is to put in more tomato seedlings, as well as Beetroot, and cucumber. Oh and carrot seeds.




What are you currently harvesting from winter?

Garden update - 6th September 2014

So much to do in the garden now that spring has arrived, but with constant rain it is too hard to do anything! From yesterday's trip to aldi, I stocked up on sugar cane mulch which now needs to be laid in the patch before the weeds start poking through. Also an impulse buy - seedlings of oregano and sage because I am too impatient to wait for my seeds to grow! But the way I see it, you can never have enough herbs. They are always getting used and this year I plan to use a lot of companion planting techniques to minimise pests as last summer was a shocker! So I want herbs and flowers bordering the entire veggie beds. Oregano is supposed to be great for detering many pests

2 packs of sugar cane mulch

Impulse buy! Herb seedlings, a few packets of seeds; sunflowers for my sunflower house I plan on creating, nasteriums for planting around cucumber and zucchini's and for feeding to the chooks (keeps down any internal parasites) and little river daisy seeds to plant around my water taps throughout the property for a bit of low maintenance colour. Oh and a new pair of gloves! 

I have started reading ' new plants from old' by Jackie French. I was very blessed to receive this book for free when I ordered a batch of seeds from an organic seed company! It talks about ways of propagating plants from fruit and veggies to flowers by collecting and sewing seeds to taking cuttings. Very inspirational! I'm just realising how easy it is to grow things without spending a tonne of money. I am hoping to save my own vegtable seeds for next year! 

I am hoping to plant out my cucumber and zucchini seedlings tomorrow if the weather clears up :-) 

A windy day

It was way too windy to be outside today. We have so many trees on our property that it is just to dangerous to take the kids out there. I did of course sneak out by myself to check on my seedlings and collect the eggs. 

I have started giving my chickens shell grit in their food and it is making a difference. The egg shells are really hard! Miss 2 has gotten her hands on a few of them and no broken eggs yet! 

The garden bed that I plan on using for this summers tomatoes still has 3 healthy silver beet plants growing in it. I will unfortunately need to pull them out this weekend to prepare the bed for the tomatoes, so tonight was steak with veg (and lots of silverbeet) for dinner. The rest of the silverbeet in the garden will get pulled out and then I will freeze it. 

Ready to steam! 

Thought I would take a pic of my hyacinth that I have sitting on my kitchen bench. It has started to topple over because of the weight of the flower. Any ideas of how I can prevent this? 

Welcome to The Little Potting Shed

With a little encouragement from a gorgeous friend ofmine, I have decided to start this blog! Passionate about my garden is an understatement!  It produces wonderful REAL organic food for my family, gorgeous flowers to decorate my home, a place for my chookies to peck around and just a wonderful place to enjoy the outdoors with my husband and kids.

We had a gorgeous first day of spring yesterday and while todays weather wasn't so good, that didn't stop me from being outside and 'checking up' on my veggie patch! I have lots of summer seeds growing in my mini green house. Tomatoes 'money maker' the large round tomato, 'gardeners delight' a cherry tomato and 'San marzano' the Italian Roma. I also have celery, capsicum, basil, parsley, oregano, zartaar and thyme. Cucumber, zucchini, corn and nasturtium's are currently being 'hardened off' so they will be ready to plant out in the garden hopefully this weekend! 

 

Seedlings in my mini green house

Close up of tomatoes which I potted up into these bigger pots yesterday. They are getting so big now! 

Seedlings of cucumber, zucchini, corn and nasturtiums being hardened off to be planted I to the garden hopefully this weekend. 

Miss almost 2 throwing seed to the chooks! 

Do you start your own seeds? What do you have growing?