How Does Your Garden Grow?

Souvenirs from Provence and Sicily

This weekend (in between hayfever bouts) I will be finishing my kitchen garden on the balcony.

The last two years I had mainly flowers on the balcony, however this year inspired by thoughts of frugality and fresh salads I have only a few flowers and am trying to build up enough produce to be more or less self sufficient for my daily salad.

Yesterday we went to one of our favourite (and surprisingly on a Friday afternoon most crowded garden center – it seems like everyone was playing hooky off work like us!) garden centres and came home with strawberry plants, cucumber plants, tomato plants (3 varieties), purple and yellow capiscum/paprika, a blackcurrant bush and because my son insisted upon it, a very prickly blackberry bush….I think this must be a first for balcony growing – not really quite sure how it is going to work – will put it by a railing in a corner and hope it looks after itself.

Waiting to be planted…

I also bought lettuce, basil and red and green capsicum/paprika seeds to plant in toilet rolls. We already have a blueberry and raspberry bush, herbs including mint, thyme, parsley, rosemary, and chives, lettuce, rocket and some beans growing from seed.

Lettuce in hanging baskets- I send the children to pick leaves as I need them…

I am going to be busy for a few hours and then busy with the watering can everyday. I am happy that my children can hopefully enjoy the cycle of nature, learn about how things grow and pick their own food to eat – even on a balcony in the middle of a city!

Flowers on the blueberry bush, fingers crossed…

I do however long for the day that we can have our own garden somewhere which is not 10 feet off the ground. My husband and I have big plans to plant groves of fruit trees for our retirement and live somewhere warm and spacious – maybe in Italy or France… so this is what I will think of while I repot, dig and water this weekend.

Do you have or have plans for a kitchen garden (large or small)?

Filed under: Garden

Kitchen Garden

Photo taken early this morning- some of my indoor plants are out there as well for a cure

I made great headway into acheiving number two from my April Goals list this past week. Spring has returned with a vengeance and suddenly trees and shrubs are budding green. It really does feel like a rebirth of sorts and uplifted my soul.

I was very interested to see what had survived the winter on our balcony- blueberry and raspberry plants did, some lavender and the thyme and rosemary. Everything else dead I pulled out ruthlessly and refilled the window baskets with new soil and some nutrients.

Its going to be very important for me to eat very healthily this summer to get back into shape and part of this is going to be having an inspiring selection of herbs and salad greens just a few metres away from the kitchen.

I am also interested in the cost savings that will result from not needing to pay what I think are quite exorbitant costs for not very inspiring greens here (its very basic in Germany). There is not much available in the way of gourmet baby salad greens to buy loose the way I would have in Australia.

The garden shop won´t have strawberry, cucumber and tomato seedlings ready until after Easter, however I do have lettuce now, rocket and all my herbs planted. I have also been collecting paper rolls to try this and maybe explore some different varieties of seeds that aren´t available through seedlings.

Filed under: Garden