In The Veggie Garden

Winners and losers.

Summer is in full swing, but my veggie garden is only just plodding along. It's true what they say, you only get out what you put in, and sadly at the moment my time management skills are really being put to the test. Thankfully we always seem to have herbs growing in the garden...and as I type that I'm wondering if the sage that was flowering beautifully, looking spectacular, and full of visiting bees a fortnight ago is about to give up on life. It is definitely time to take some cuttings and hope to salvage some of it.

Today I picked our first bean for the season, and it was shared between Lara, Olivia and I. It's hard to explain how good it feels to watch your children pick and eat something you have grown.

Chives are going into our chickens eggs on a regular basis, and they sit on a bed of home grown baby spinach or rainbow chard leaves for breakfast on a regular basis. We can manage to pick just enough lettuce leaves to stretch out a salad for dinner, and whilst it is disheartening taking a leaf from one lettuce here, and another leaf from another lettuce there, it really does make us appreciate the food we are eating, and means we aren't wasting anything. Obviously I need to get serious about feeding the veggie garden and sowing seeds successively.

Lara and I are still enjoying strawberries, and two self seeded tomato plants are the healthiest looking tomatoes in the garden at the moment. Our first tomato is ripening off nicely, so we are watching it closely on a daily basis, whilst desperately hoping that nothing beats us to it. There has already been lost crop to bugs since we do everything organically and I'm currently having to put a lot of work into getting our little ecosystem that was so perfect for years re-established. The cycle of life is a fragile one, and sadly getting my house sprayed to deal with our cockroach infestation when the whole street (including us) was renovating wreaked havoc on our natural environment....damn my ignorance and baby brain. That said, we are finally starting to see plenty of insects returning to the garden.

Our first vine of tomatoes for the season, three tomatoes succumbed to bugs already.

I have been trying to spend a little bit of time doing odd jobs in the veggie garden each day, and on the most part that works really well. However, I really need to use the girls nap time tomorrow to have a hard slog at everything-fingers crossed I get more than the standard 45 minutes per day of baby free time they give me these days, because I'm seriously going to need it. I don't know what mums do when their babies stop napping.

The bees are returning.

Oh, and I haven't even mentioned our new chicken situation that is requiring a fair chunk of playground duty. Hopefully I will manage to make the time to record all the funny antics here before they are forgotten. There is always something interesting going on here.

Welcome back lady beetles.

Marigolds, so simply beautiful and beneficial to the garden.