Puddles

Another reason why I am not having any more children:
Puddles and wet pants and trousers. The joys of learning to use the toilet...

Monkey Love

This is Monkey. He is the non-human, and perhaps-not-alive (in the conventional sense) member of our family. He is irreplacable, down to the blu-tack in his tail.

And last night we had a tragedy.

We couldn't find Monkey at bedtime.

The surprising bit was that Spike (Monkey's best buddy) went to bed just fine, with a substitute bear, but I was absolutely distraught. I was not ready for Spike to give him up!

And I had had a very busy day, including a mammoth trip to the recycling centre with a carload of cardboard, plastic bottles and glass bottles... so there was the panicked thought: Did Monkey go in the recycling skip? (Visions of 'This is the Bear...') I couldn't remember if we'd had him on the rest of our errands that day... it was terrible.

I woke early this morning with a vague memory of Spike showing Monkey to someone at school at pick-up time. Long after recycling. Perhaps Monkey was at school?

And thank God, yes he was. He had spent the night playing play-dough in the Year 1 classroom. So after a nice 'bath' (read 'washing machine') Monkey was ready for a lovely cuddle with Spike again.

Here's a picture of the two of them on holiday last summer. A cuter pair I have never seen.

Aaargh!

It's not the slugs, snails or frost that I have to worry about. It's the ceaseless, blustery wind! My poor baby plants are getting whipped to bits. I put the Cherokee beans and the Butternut squashes outside for hardening off and they got withdrawn this afternoon, looking rather bedraggled. And as for the poor runner-beans. Well, they'll have to survive the best they can. What's a girl to do?

Done it

Well, finally Grampy's runner beans are out. 1-9, but no 7 It went mouldy and died. Sorry.

Now all I have to do is pray that they don't get eaten by slugs or snails or hit by a late frost. My back is aching from hours of digging, weeding and hefting big bags of soil improver. And the bean poles were so long (8ft!) that I had to stand on an upturned wheelbarrow to tie their tops together.

But it's done! See?

Also, all but a few potatoes are showing their first leaves. Not enough to earth up yet, but no doubt soon. Here are 'smile'

and 'Charlotte'

From here on out it's all about maintainance.

Oh, actually, must plant that butternut seedling and see what happens there. Still, that one seems ok inside still, so we'll wait til it gets a bit warmer.

Apple Blossom

You may remember that I planted out three yearling apple trees in January. Well, they have all survived and two are flowering, the Redsleeves and the Saturn. These are both on rootstock M26. 'The tree will reach a height of about 3 metres /10 feet, although pruning twice a year will keep the tree to a height of about 2 metres / 7 feet.'

Saturn

Redsleeves

The Crispin is on rootstock MM106. 'This rootstock will produce an apple tree about 3.6 metres (12 foot) wide and 3m (10 foot) tall at maturity.' I am assuming the difference in rootstocks is why the Crispin is not flowering.

I have moved the mountain of earth that was on the future site of the runner beans and cherokee beans, and have been digging over the earth underneath, teasing out buttercups, marestails and couch grass. It is hard work. My back aches. And it's still not done, and the beans are still not out, but are getting bigger and bigger in the window sills. Things are getting desperate!

MUST ... GET ... THEM ... PLANTED ... OUT!

Still, despite the back ache I had a very peaceful and satisfying time digging, ferretting out weeds and listening to BBC World Service podcasts. Anything to do, perhaps with this? A natural high from gardening? Wow... gotta like that!

Wet Days

We have had two days of pretty much solid rain. Not conducive to sanity for little boys or their mummies! So after tearing around the house for too long they were begging to go out, and I was more than happy to let them. Spike stayed out longest, just pottering around in the sodden sandpit and puddles. Here's a couple of pictures I took of him enjoying himself.

Harrogate Spring Flower Show

You know the trouble with a blog? When you have lots to say you are too busy doing it to write about it. And when there's nothing going on you naturally have plenty of time to report that nothing's going on.

So I am a few days late in reporting that last Friday I got to go to the Harrogate Spring Flower Show! It was amazing. The flowers and plants were so perfect they looked artificial. And it was huge. We missed one of the big tents because Spikelet had had just about enough, thank you very much. But what we saw was wonderful. The bonsai! The orchids! The ferns! The daffodils! Fuschias! Clematis! Tulips! The flower arrangements! All of it was gorgeous. Have a look at the pictures:

'The Wizard of Oz' 'Flamenco'

In the garden there are the first shoots of potatoes coming up, so that's wonderful. My trial peas haven't come through, but it hasn't been a week since I planted them, so that's not surprising. And it has been raining all day, so any plans I had for the garden today were scuppered. Although, to be honest, they were scuppered anyway, since I spent a good portion of the day at the garage while I waited for them to figure out what was wrong with the radio in my new car. They had to take it out of the dash, and when they did it rattled. Seems that the people who had the car before had been feeding the CD player with pennies, and they shorted the system out. So my car has a big gaping gap-toothed hole in it while they fix the stereo. At least I still have my car, and the fact that there's no radio is really no change... it hadn't worked in the whole time I had it! Still, at least it's on it's way to being fixed, and is still in covered by the place that sold it to us. And I had a Gardener's World Magazine to read while I was waiting.