TARRAGON & THYME

Ooohps I forgot to post this! After I had "sat down" for the day, (I cannot just sit and do nothing) I liberated some of my old gardening magazines to have a look through them to see if anything will be of use to me for the foreseeable.  I have not been able to afford the more updated ones, but hold firm in the belief that  a lot of the information needed to garden is usually available from publication to publication. It is times and fashion that change but not essentially the basic information needed.  I have bought on and off for years the Kitchen Garden Magazine and Grow Your Own Magazines, so they are being put to work.  Everything has to earn its place here.   As we are not off to Cornwall at the moment I am trying to make the most of my time at home and with what I have available to me.  I tend to buy seeds that interest me when I see them or get freebies from magazines.  I usually end up with more than I need, but I also keep seeds (apart f...

 Although not in the garden for a full day, I managed to spend a useful couple of hours inbetween showers on the patio slab border area, which because of the weeds and roots is taking a bit longer than anticipated.  I had initially part weeded the border, which was always intended as a rough weed, before then on another day being able to weed the rest of the long border.  I was aware that there were a lot of roots in the soil and that they needed digging out.  I was able to get the border half-forked over and roots removed yesterday until rain and a thunder storm stopped play.  There was no end of "twitch" and it was difficult in places to dig wherein I reverted to the spade and then went over again with the fork. Where I started from this morning.  Only half the border had been dug and forked over yesterday. Today, I have progressed with the fork work completing to the end of that border.  I am hopeful that I will be able to spend more than a few hour...

It has been a grey overcast day here in Peterborough with no sign of the Sun at all.  It has also been extremely chilly and I have popped my jumper back on.  I have been in short sleeves for the past couple of days. Such is the British weather. I have not done much today at all.  No energy again - worn myself out with the gardening and no energy to boot.  Cest la vie have to take things as they come. I saved a load of veggies from the Italian sausage and roasted veggies on purpose and in anticipation of having a go at making a homemade Frittata.  Until quite recently neither of us had tried this and when we did decided that it would be putting in a regular appearance as it is a good way of using up leftovers in the fridge creating something that is tasty and not wasting anything.  You can literally use what you have in the fridge.  It is worth though, (if like me you have prepped up a load of roasted veggies to keep some back for use in a dish like thi...

  From this: To this. It has taken some doing taking off the thick of the weeds.  I could not pull the Dock leaf out near the pots as it is well and truly stuck.  I need to take the slab up and dig it out.  However, that will happen another time as I only had a little time to tackle this border, giving it its first rough weed.  It really needs a good fork over to remove all the bits I have missed and also the roots of the plants I have pulled.  Some of the roots just were not playing ball. I only managed to work about half the border.  Will need to finish it off next time.  I will probably finish off the weeding and then fork it over next time I get to it which is very dependent on the weather.  It looks as though we have some wet weather to contend with over the next few days. I did manage to do another couple of pots tidying them up before coming in, which involved taking out trees that had died or their stalks in any event. Every little he...

 ........no gardening today. Rain did stop play plus it has been a lot chillier than it has been.  However a warm weekend is predicted!  Will wait and see what happens. Therefore kitchen duties have prevailed.  I am slowly starting to get items back into place in the cupboards plus putting a few more in as well. Cupboards have also been cleaned out as I go into each one, so the job is a bit slower than it was otherwise needed.  However, I took the view that it was a good opportunity to give them a spruce up whilst I was in there in any event. Job still not completed, however, the garden will come first tomorrow if I can get out and about.  If not I shall just go back to my kitchen. Himself has made a couple of repairs to a saucepan lid and also a frying pan handle which I have been meaning to ask him to deal with for ages.  Whilst I remembered I took them to him so I could get them out of the way with.  A successful conclusion despite a thread bei...

 And so the rubbish from the garden continues to build up.  I already have loads of bags filled with mostly green waste from trimming the Bay tree, and emptying pots, and weeding part of the garden. All these planters below also need to be sorted out, some of them washed and stashed away on the racking which also needs to be sorted out. I managed to clear the pavement, and the side in front of the patio slabs of weeds, and get this all sorted with being swept, and weed killer put down the sides and the seams of the pavement.  I have had to resort to the weed killer as I cannot get the weeds out of here.  I have only used a very small amount and it is not a glycophate, but still something I prefer not to use.  I tend to use white vinegar but as I do not have any to hand at the moment and we had a little weed killer this is what I used.  It is not going on any growing area or where wildlife is feeding either. After clearing this area I then set about half of ...

Today has not gone according to plan. As I type this we are in the middle of another Thunder storm.  I am not a friend of them.  Not enamoured at all and it is lashing down with rain, heavy rain that will do some good. Today started with me being  in the garden to carry on from where I left off yesterday.  I started off by lugging about eight bags of rubbish into the front garden which is nearly full of rubbish.  We will have to go to the tip at some point.  I had hoped that today was going to be like yesterday on the weather front, however in reality, we hade had far more rain and fewer short showers that I have been able to nip out inbetween and do a little bit more. I managed to dig one strip of garden today, before going in and I have been doing some housework instead.  There is always something to do here.  I am hoping that I will be able to get out again tomorrow to set about the digging again.  Must say it was hard going this morning a...