Obligatory Garden Post – because Ella says I’m obsessed

WARNING: SO MUCH TO CATCH UP ON! HERE COME SOME FRANTIC UPDATES!

1. Of course – My garden. I don’t care if Juli thinks I’m crazy for treating my veggies like ‘my babies’ – you can’t say it doesn’t give results!  This was my harvest from one day last week – it made such a tasty dinner! 😀

I can’t say the same thing for my Kangaroo paws – I finally ventured out of my comfort zone and bought some FLOWERS! I bought three Kangaroo paws – yellow, red and lipstick pink (?!) and some Bogonias (I think that’s what they’re called… I keep forgetting).  I managed to love the Kangaroo paw too much and the Bogonias not enough.  I’ve watered the drought resistant ones and planted them in lovely rich soil when apparently all they want is sand.  (At least I refrained from fertilising them). I’ve put my shade loving Bogonia’s in the full sun and neglected to keep them moist…it’s all falling apart! Too much stress.  Clearly this is why I should stick to vegetables.

My sister actually asked me if I was obsessed with Botany the other day.  Ha! It was probably only 12 months ago that I would leave the room as soon as Mum and co got on the topic. So. Dull. And constantly the topic of conversation!!  Seriously – now THERE’S a woman obsessed with Botany –  (kidding, Mum). Having said that, it is kinda addictive. Or more to the point – once you start it’s just hard to stop.  You invest financially and emotionally in this little project, and if you stop or get behind, it can all just fall apart! So once you’re in it – you’re in it buddy.  Big time.  But that’s not necessarily a bad thing…

Ok, there’s one update.  A lot longer than I’d intended.  Stay tuned! I promise the next update has nothing green in it!  xo

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Delayed Devotion

Oh dear, how I lack consistency.  I know, I know.  It’s hard though – I go around reading people’s blogs that are so focused and interesting! And here I am, blabbing about who even knows what.

Anyway, here’s a bit of amalgamation for you.  Gratefulness AND Gardening! 😀

Here are two awesome things I am grateful for today:

A) This bad boy, who exploded into life after the week of rain we had.  (Not to mention the four new ones that have since appeared!)

B) My exciting package that arrived in the mail today.

Yep, that’s right – seeeeeeedddssss! I’m still not sure I understand this process properly, but I’m pretty sure these are wintery vegetables.  As soon as I get some time and energy I’ll dig some more holes in my front lawn. Yooohooo!

The best bit is they’ve sent me what seems like a trillion of each seed.  So if I kill a few in the process, no harm done, right? (Don’t listen Chloe, I’m joking. Mostly.)

C) I’m grateful for new beginnings.  There’s nothing quite like giving it all you’ve got – and falling flat on your face.  I mean, that’s sucky.  Majorly sucky.  I still don’t quite believe that you can’t fix things you’ve mucked up.  I mean, I really, honestly, mostly, almost 100% believe that no mistakes are unfixable.   You just have to have the guts to pick it all up and go again.  Maybe more slowly this time.  My mum once gave me some advice that I didn’t quite understand at the time- not seeing just how well she sees me.

“Hasten slowly, Sarah,” she told me.  This is only becoming more and more applicable to my life I think.  But that doesn’t mean that working for something and not giving up isn’t worth it – I think it’s worth every bit of energy you have.  If you want something, go get it.  That’s what I say.  If you miss out the first time, don’t dwell on it.  Find a new beginning.

Finally some wise words to part with;

If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you; If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream — and not make dreams your master; If you can think — and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build them up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone, And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with kings — nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds worth of distance run — Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And — which is more — you’ll be a Man, my son!

 – Rudyard Kipling

Gute Nacht, und hab euch sehr lieb!  xo

SOS, Help my garden grow!

I’ve started a small vegie garden over the last few weeks,

Novice Gardeners

with some help from my friends.  Having said that, it seems I’ve ignored all the gardening that has been

happening around me during my life till now, and I’m a total novice at it.

So, my first efforts consisted of garlic, celery, baby spinach and lettuce.  I don’t get a lot of sunlight in my garden, so I thought I’d be tricky and put the seedlings up higher where the sun shines.  Exhibit A:

Sunlight Garden

It was so nice to wake up and look at the happy little greenies outside my bedroom window!

Until…DUM DUM DAAAAAHHH!!

Along came Possum.  Granted, it was probably mostly my fault for assuming he would ignore the conveniently placed vegies.  But still, HEARTBREAK AND SORROW!

No joke, I feel educated.  If that’s how much it sucks when a possum eats your three lettuce and spinach seedlings, imagine how farmers who live by their crops must feel when disaster strikes.

Ok, enough of the dramatics. Here are the remnants of the first incident.

Keep in mind, these pots were full and blossoming when I put them up there.

Post Possum

Lucky I had a few out the front, Poss hasn’t found them yet.  Net making is on my list for tomorrow, especially considering I have since updated the pot garden to include three more pots of seedlings! Woot woot!

The survivors

Now for the second and final section of this post.  I have titled it;

Other Problems Novice Gardeners Have.

 This is where YOU come in.  My celery has bugs.  Or a disease. Or self esteem issues.  The point is, clearly something is wrong.  It has black stuff on its leaves and some of them are being eaten/rotting away.  Look!

The Culprit

The Evidence

Any advice?

I’d like to leave you with a quote from a book I’ve been reading, seems appropriate for tonight’s post.

“If a man owns a little property, that property is him, it’s part of him, and it’s like him.  If he owns property only so he can walk on it and handle it and be sad when it isn’t doing well, and feel fine when the rain falls on it, that property is him, and some way he’s bigger beacuase he owns it.  Even if he isn’t successful he’s big with his property.  That is so.”

– John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath