Yes I know that it looks like a typo, but it isn’t. So let me explain. I saw these plants in Thompson and Morgan at the beginning of the season, and thought what a strange combination. You have tomatoes on the top and potatoes on the bottom. Now every bone in my body is going “No!!! This just isn’t right!” As gardeners we know that tomatoes and potatoes should be kept as far away from each other as possible because they can give each other blight. So how can this work? The answer, I really don’t know, but I’m curious. Now I didn’t buy any at the beginning of the season, because to be honest, I thought they were too expensive. But, when I went to the NEC last week, they were selling them for £1 each or 5 plants for £4. So I really couldn’t say no. Thompson and Morgan had loads left over, so they were selling them off cheap to get rid of them. I’ll let you know how they get on, but today I planted 4 on the allotment and will have one growing at home, just incase something goes wrong with one set. I’m just as curious to see how they get on as you are. If you have grown them this year, let me know how yours are growing. Also I weeded another couple of beds, so now that’s three quarters of my area perfect and done, just the final quarter to go, which hopefully I’ll get done by the end of next week. I also picked loads more strawberries, so I’ll be making more jam this weekend. Hope you will all have a great weekend, the weather looks very good, so I hope you get lots of sun and enjoy yourselves in the garden…I know I will.
Tis the season to make Strawberry jam, yummy yummy yum ye yum yum yum! In fact I made 2 batches today, and we’ve still got some strawberries left over for pudding. I got the Strawberry jam recipe from Delia’s Complete Cookery Course. I’ve used it before and it’s brilliant. I also made a little video to go with it, so hopefully that’ll be up soon, so you can watch it, and then try it yourself. I expect I’ll be making lots more jam as the season goes on, and we’ll have enough to last us until next year.
Another lovely day today, a little overcast, but dry, so the perfect weather to go up the allotment. I managed to weed and water the Onion bed today, so that’s the last bed sorted on plot 1. The Onions are growing well which is great news as we do tend to go through a fair few of those during the year. I also cut back my Comfrey bush as it had got rather large. I will make some fertiliser from it one year, but I keep it going as the bees love to buzz round it and collect nectar. When I do get round to making my Comfrey feed I’ll make a little video to show you.
Plot 1 all ready and sorted.
I then moved onto my second plot and the Asparagus bed. I knelt down to trim the grass round the edges and then had to come up very quickly because I felt pain in my lower leg. The little buggers of Red Ants had bitten me 4 times on my lower right leg. They even got one on my knee! I don’t like them at all. They itched for a while, and puffed up, but then stopped itching. They’ll really itch tomorrow and most probably won’t go down for a couple of days. Ants are everywhere at the moment, does anyone know anyway to get rid of them? I’m sure they’re around for a reason, but what that reason is I don’t know.
I was back to the allotment today after my little trip away. It was good to see it again, I know it sounds strange, but I missed my allotment. Fortunately it had behaved itself very well, and the plants were growing really well. I started with some weeding, going through the beds that I’d done before I went, and just had to dig out a few weeds that had popped up. Then I continued from where I’d left off with the watering. So it was a thorough weed of a bed, then a thorough water using the Seaweed Fertiliser. I managed to get another couple of beds done, and then I had my lunch. Afterwards it was time to pick some more Strawberries. I’d not picked them for 5 days, so many of them had ripened. In fact as I was picking them, I found more and more. It actually took me about and hour and a half to pick them all!! I filled up my trug, which is quite large, and they were piled high. I think I’ve now got enough for lots of jam and some to have for pudding later on today. I’d better find a recipe.
I hope they taste as good as they smell!
The last day of my trip away, but again a very busy one. I spoke to the kids the night before and reminded them that they needed to make Mark breakfast in bed in the morning. Well it was Fathers’ Day after all. They’d got his card a present all ready before I went. They did him toast and tea, which he was really surprised about. And they didn’t burn the kitchen down which was a bonus. Emily is very proud of the fact that she knows now how to do toast under the grill, so I’ll expect breakfast in bed every weekend now. I left my grand parents house at 9.45am as I was due to bell ring at a local church from 10am – 10.30am. So I made my way to St Luke, Farnworth. A lovely ring of 6, which is hidden at the very back on the church. It’s a very old church and was built in the late 1100’s but the bells weren’t put in til the 1300’s. I made 4 ringers which they were very pleased about. They knew I was coming, so that was a bonus.
Little ring of 6 bells at St Luke, Farnworth.
So after we’d rung for the service I got back in the car and headed for Daventry to see my cousin Jane. The drive wasn’t too bad, and I stopped half way to have a break at another National Trust place Letocetum Roman Baths. Basically this place is the remains of a load of thick brick walls, with pictures showing you what it would have looked like when it was in use in Roman times. It was fascinating, but you couldn’t spend much time there, as there wasn’t much to look at. Still it was a great place to stretch your legs and stop to have a wee.
The remains of the Roman baths.
There was also a little church up the road, St John, Wall, which I popped along to see, but they only had some very small bells which were chimed, but it was very interesting to walk round and have a look at the ruins from another angle. Then it was off to Daventry to see my cousin. Now I’ve not seen her for a very long time. I wasn’t really sure how long, but she came running up to the car and gave me a huge hug. “I promised I wouldn’t cry” she said, but she did, it was rather emotional. We worked out that the last time we saw each other must have been in 1988 when I was 14!! I’m now 40!! We sat and chatted for 2 hours, drunk tea, had lunch and went out in the garden and looked at some tadpoles turning into frogs. She’s married with 2 children who are really wonderful. We talked about all sorts and it was like we’d seen each other on a regular basis. I then left at 4pm and started on the final leg of my journey back home. It was only supposed to take me 2 hours, but you know what the M25 can be like. We came to a halt around the Heathrow junction because of a “Stranded Vehicle”, not a sign you see very often, but it was stop start until the junction where I got off. I arrived home just before 7pm, very tired, but Mark and the kids were there waiting for me. They helped me in with all my goodies, and we ordered dinner and I think I was asleep by 9pm at the latest. So that was my little trip away. I hope you enjoyed it, I certainly did. I saw lots of relatives, not all, but lots. I rang at different towers, had fun at Gardeners’ World and Good Food, and saw lots of culture at National Trust places. How many miles did I travel I hear you ask, well….503.9 according to the car!! Tomorrow I’m only driving to the allotment, and no where else.
After a well earned sleep I was all ready to catch up with all the latest news with my grandparents. I’ve not seen them for 2 years, which I know is a long time, but it’s a very long drive to see them (just over 200 miles from my house, and then the same back home). It was lovely to chat about all sorts of news. They’re now getting rather old now, Granddad is 89 and Nan is 91, but they’re still living at home. They’re due to celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary at the end of this year!! As you can most probably imagine, they’re not as spritely as they used to be and getting out to tidy the garden is rather tricky. So being a wonderful grand daughter I offered to spend a fair chunk of the day in the garden weeding and tidying it for them. I didn’t manage to get it all done, but at least three quarters of it. I’d also bought them some plants from Gardeners’ World, so filled in some gaps in the garden with them. I caught Granddad looking out of the kitchen window in the afternoon, and I asked him what was he looking at? “My lovely weed free garden” was his answer. He’s so lovely. They made me a lovely dinner at lunch time, and we then had soup for tea. We then watched a DVD in the evening of Russell Watson. He’s very good, and it was the first time I’d heard him. When the orchestra played some classical music I let Granddad know what films they came from. I think he was rather impressed. Nan’s hearing is very bad, so the volume was rather loud, but she finds it tricky to watch the TV as she can’t hear it well, so they watch either Russell Watson or the 3 Tenors in the evening. Then it was to bed and time for me to prepare for the long drive home, via my cousins house, which I’ll tell you all about in part 4.
After a marvellous breakfast at my hotel I headed off to the Gardeners’ World Live at the Birmingham NEC. I arrived just after 9.3oam, and the place was still rather quiet. It tends to get really busy from about 10.30am onwards until about 2.30pm, then calms down again. The weather was fabulous, in fact suncream was needed. This was a lovely change as the last 2 years when it’s been raining and was rather cold, so to have the sun shining was brilliant. I took loads of photos, so I’m now going to bore you with lots of them, I hope you don’t mind. Firstly I wandered round the hill on the left as you come in. There were some wonderful wooden carving by Siiren.co.uk in all shapes and sizes, from wooden spiders, chickens, scary faces to nesting boxes. But I think my personal favourite was this scary figure.
Please don’t have nightmares if you have this in your garden.
I then saw some more wood carving of horses, and some very intricate designs of elephants, as well as wooden rabbits and these fabulous ducks, with perfect little Hunter Wellingtons on….no purple ones like mine though.
Ducks in their little pink Hunter Wellies. Mustn’t get their feet wet now.
I wandered round the marque next. I went this year with the intention of getting various plants for various places. But not specific plants, I’d just see what took my fancy. There were some amazing displays in the marque this year, congratulations to everyone who got a medal. There were several displays that went far beyond the usual displays and made you go “Wow!!” when you saw them. The first example of this was the Royal British Legion display. You could walk through it, and it was made up as a World War One trench. It was about 6 foot high and made of sandbags, with plants all over, it just looked amazing!!
The Royal British Legion Trench display. Absolutely brilliant.
Having looked round the whole of the marque I then went back outside and looked at he rest of the gardens outside, before going into the main building to see what I could find in there. I found, what could only be described as palaces of bird houses by Mark’s Dovecotes, and the British Beekeepers Association (I didn’t hold a bee), but I did hold a chick.
It was so soft and fluffy I wanted to take it home, but didn’t know where to put it.
A rather scary top half of a zombie from Gardensite.co.uk which I thought would make a great display for Halloween, and a rather bizarre Fathers’ Day gift, which I’m sure some dad’s would like, but it did seem rather strange.
Not sure Mark would appreciate this for Fathers’ Day.
I then wandered round The Good Food Show which is next door and I bought some really tasty sausages, some cheeses, fudge, popcorn, chocolates, cakes and other bits and pieces. I left about 4.30pm having spent all I was going to (I’m not going to tell you how much I did spend that my little secret). But let’s just say I got everything I went for and more. Then it was time to drive up to St Helens to see my grandparents for a couple of days. It’s just under 100 miles away from the NEC, and should take about 1 hour 45 minutes. But the M6 being the M6 it took me longer and I finally reached my grand parents at 7pm. I was very exhausted and hungry, but very please to see them.
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