Looking Good!

Well after a couple of productive weekends and lots of hard work the veggie plot is taking shape. It really has been quite satisfying, even if we can't move afterwards! Digging over a very compact and stony soil  has been hard to say the least - lots of radox baths for my husband...

The main plot has been finished and manure added today, the soil is in pretty poor shape. In the last two weekends I have also cleared the area for the herb garden and this is now complete and stocked with a selection of herbs.

In the main plot I have placed three sets of canes to support green beans an runner beans and have planted beetroot, lettuce and rocket. Even though we have dug up more garden there still doesn't seem to be enough room! I still need to plant out my main crop potatoes - that will have to wait for the Easter break. I have just over a week off, so plenty of gardening time.

For the past three weekends we have also been playing at being lumberjacks. A tree had fallen down in my dad's garden into a field next to it and so I have been helping clear this and taken the wood we have cut. We have taken a pretty good haul over the three weekends and nearly filled our wood store. We still have some more to cut but that should fill it. Free wood for the winter :)

We had a great morning out today at Calke Abbey, a national trust property, at their fine food fair. We bought a number of things for a ploughman's lunch namely rosemary and rock salt bread (baked in a flowerpot!), red onion chutney, pork pie and some fantastic cheese. The bread and chutney were delicious. Red onion chutney is my favourite yet I still haven't made it myself. Over Easter I will experiment with the bread and chutney. We have a bread maker and will modify an Italian recipe with oregano with rosemary! I'll post the recipes if I'm successful :)

A productive weekend :)

An extremely tiring weekend but very productive and satisfying. I completed digging over the original veggie plot and planted my early potatoes and parsnip. My son joined in and planted a container of carrots and I planted some leek seed. On a roll :)

My husband started on digging over the new section but it was slow progress when we discovered a lot of glass and concrete where a previous owner has turfed over a broken greenhouse and base! Great!

Saturday afternoon was spent tree-felling. A neighbour of my parents has a tree down in their field and we were welcome to remove it. It is an enormous willow and after 2.5 hours had only removed one branch (a big branch at that...) but the haul of wood was worthwhile. We'll have another go this weekend. The wood store will be looking quite healthy and ready for next Winter.

Onion, potato and parsnip beds below with raspberry canes in the background:-

And so it begins ...

Belated posting...
12/3 - Started measuring out the lawn to create pathways in the grass and section the areas we will be de-turfing.

After a busy weekend, my husband on turf duty and I turning over the current plot we accomplished the first new section and three rows of onions and garlic! It's a start.

The Garden Plan

The Current Garden
Below is a picture of my current garden - from the summerhouse roof. This was three separate photos kindly "stitched" together by my husband using Microsoft Image Composite Editor to gain the full view - pretty cool!

Proposed Plan (rough sketch!)
This is my ambitious plan of de-turfing the lawn to make way for more veggie beds (as you can see I'm not an artist - but you get the general idea :-) )
The circle and paths will remain as grass to separate the veg, fruit and herb beds. I did have a quite a few herbs but as with many of my plants this winter they have been killed off in the severe cold and frosts, so I will have to restock.
I'm also into herbal remedies so shall be looking to grow a wide selection. I have a great recipe for lavender and poppy seed cake which will be great to make again, so I shall plant more lavender; also good for pot pourri and decoration. I love the smell!
If I can get garden canes long enough I will construct a wigwam around the grass circle to grow runner beans to provide an interesting entrance to the bottom of the garden.

The beginning...

Last night I watched a film Julie and Julia (recommended viewing) which inspired me to equally commit myself to a project in a an area I have been dabbling with for a number of years. I am not a “green” nut, just a person wanting to save, economise, some like to call me scrooge, I like to think of as being thrifty (my Scottish roots showing through!).  To date I grow veggies, make jam, have a wood burner which has saved money but I want to do more, save more. My ideal is to be totally self-sufficient living off-grid, but considering where I live, I need to think of the practicalities and so will work towards my ideal and become MORE self-sufficient.  Growing veggies is a great reward and I have been doing so for the past five years after moving to my current house. My veggie plot which started out as a small bed of a few metres square has grown over the years producing a decent haul of potatoes, onions and beans. I grow tomatoes, courgette, chilli, herbs, various types of fruit, but my first task on the road to greater sufficiency is an even bigger veggie plot. It is time to take over the bottom of the garden – Nooooo I hear my husband cry as he knows it is de-turfing time!

I had great intentions to start de-turfing today, however as usual the MET Office got the forecast wrong and instead of a sunny morning – it rained all day! So my progress is very small as I took photos of the garden to plan the plots from the top of my shed; not so much fun when you are scared of heights!