September on the allotment: super sunflowers and losing the battle against the weeds

Alongside vegetables and fruit crops, many people like to grow flowers on their allotment. Cut flowers from the supermarket can be expensive & often flown halfway around the world. It's nice to be able to cut a few flowers to take them home with your veg. My Mum had the great idea of growing a row of sunflowers on our plot so that we could cut them to have in a vase at home.

However, it didn't turn out quite as planned, we have had a couple small enough to put in a vase, but most of the sunflowers have grown to a massive size. The seed packet didn't say they were giant sunflowers, in fact the actual plants are pretty short, about hip-height, but the flower heads are huge!
It doesn't matter that we haven't been able to take many home to put in a vase because the bees have loved them. Vegetable crops can survive without pollinators, so we've been more than happy to see bees all over the sunflowers. Also, if you leave sunflower heads to dry, birds like to eat the seeds too. Spot the bee in the photo below!

Whatever the size, I love sunflowers. You can't help being cheered up by their sunny yellow petals. I also love the intricate pattern of the seeds in the flower head.



My Mum seems to think the sunflowers have grown so huge due to the volcanic ash she put into the soil last year. Whatever it is, the flowers and the vegetables have done well. But, so have the weeds. I always say that as long as we are getting more vegetables than weeds, then we're ok, but we're on the verge of losing the battle. This Summer has been really wet with burst of warm sunshine inbetween the downpours. Not great for camping or picnics in the Summer holidays, but the plants have loved it. We only need to turn our backs for a few days on our allotment plot and the weeds become rampant.
I think we need to have a major weeding session soon and then cover the unused parts of the plot for Winter. We do still have parsnips, purple sprouting and kale growing and they will stay in over the colder months. I can't wait to try my first ever home-grown parsnips, even if some of them look like curly ram's horns...which will make for an interesting time when I peel them.

I'm linking up with Country Kids over on www.coombemill.com, Whatever the Weather over on www.lifeunexpected.co.uk and monkeyandmouse.co.uk, Point + Shoot over on youbabymemummy.com and www.snowingindoors.com, Image of the Week #IOTW over on www.trulymadlykids.co.uk and Let Kids be Kids over on letkidsbekids.co.uk.

I'm also linking up with How Does Your Garden Grow over on the beautiful mammasaurus.co.uk

Allotment Goodies

My Mum has had an allotment for about four years. Sometimes she struggles to keep up with maintaining her plot, so she's given me a key. My daughter & I love to go down there and do the watering, which is the main thing she struggles with. In return, we get to pick some of the yummy produce. I forgot to take my camera down to the plot, I'll remember to take some pictures next time!

But I took some photos of the produce: beetroot, potatoes and huge blackberries. My daughter also loves to stand at the sink and wash the vegetables.

After we'd washed the veg, my daughter helped me make salmon fishcakes with the freshly dug potatoes. It's lovely for my daughter to see the produce being taken from the ground, prepared at home and eaten within hours of it coming off the allotment.

I also made a salad of grated raw beetroot, carrots mixed with lots of olive oil and sunflower seeds. It was all delicious!

I'm linking up with Country Kids on the Coombe Mill Blog.

A pre-baby indulgence

I made this wave pintuck cushion cover way back in January 2009, but with pregnancy and becoming a mum, this is the first chance I've had to blog about it.



I am really proud of the way it turned out, I have no plans to make more to sell in my etsy store, it was purely a pre-baby indulgence and I want to show it off!!



It's made with fairtrade, oragnic Chandni Chowk fabric in a lovely shade of indigo blue.



It took me about six weeks to make, but that was due to fitting it in around work, it wouldn't have taken that long if I'd concentrated on it fully for a couple of days! I normally like to have pairs of cushion covers, but the chances of me having the time to sit down and make another one look pretty unlikely at the moment! The most important thing is that I enjoyed making it, we use it everyday and it's holding up well to daily use. So all the effort of sewing over 30 pintucks was worthwhile and maybe one day I will make another one to go with it...

Self Sufficient (ish) part two!

I decided this year that my gardening goal would be to grow some vegetables that I had never grown before.

I blogged about my rhubarb success in June.

By far my favourite vegetable I've grown this year is new potatoes. The taste of spuds grown in my own back garden far surpasses anything you can get in the shops. They are absolutely delicious!

Like I mentioned in my rhubarb blog post, I don't have a large veg patch, just containers on the patio. I used these potato planters from Natural Collection, some smaller black grow-bags from ebay and a large plastic pot.




Each container provided a very good yield, the only thing I would say about the large Natural Collection bag is that you have to use alot of water to soak the soil right the way down to the bottom. If there's one thing potatoes like, it's lots of water!

I will definitely grow potatoes again. Not only is it satisfying to know that my evening meal's food miles have been cut dramatically (literally a few metres from pot to plate), but the taste of freshly dug spuds is fantastic.

If you fancy trying to grow your own veg and herbs, check out the excellent self-sufficientish website for loads of helpful information
selfsufficientish.com

Self Sufficient (ish)

I am ridiculously proud of the fact that I have managed to grow rhubarb for the first time this year! I bought a young rhubarb crown from the local pet shop (they sell veg plants too) last year. It was very weak and weedy at first. I dug up a small part of our lawn and planted the young plant. Over the winter it vanished and I thought I'd killed it. Then in the Spring, young rhubarb leaves started to poke through the soil. As you can tell, I'm not a gardening expert, I didn't realise they lie dormant over the Winter. Well, the young plant has gone from strength to strength and I'm picking a fresh crop of rhubarb nearly every week.

The following images show my favourite way to cook and eat rhubarb.

First chop the rhubarb into small chunks


Place in an oven proof dish


Cover with brown sugar


Add chopped fresh ginger


Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes and then eat warm or cold with a little more sugar and some creme fraiche or ice cream



I love to grow vegetables and herbs at home as they taste better and have travelled a very small distance, which means less road and air freight.
I don't have an allotment, or even a raised bed, I grow everything (except the rhubarb) in containers and pots. I don't have a huge amount of gardening knowledge, but each year I try to grow a different plant as an experiment. This year it was rhubarb and potatoes and I'm very pleased with both!
If you fancy trying to grow your own veg and herbs, check out the excellent self-sufficientish website for loads of helpful information
selfsufficientish.com