What I bought this month...

a bag of compost
4 balls of wool
a TV guide magazine
a chilli pepper plant
2 books
an aloe vera plant

I feel like I bought a lot this month, but looking at my list it's not actually that much! I think it was the 2 books that did it, one was new (The Edible Garden) and the other was quite expensive (Food for Fee by Richard Mabey - all about foraging for food). I'm not used to buying new or expensive things so I feel like some sort of shopaholic! The wool is another problem, as it's not actually made from sheeps but from acrylic - I dislike buying plastic wool, but I've started crocheting a blanket and it needs finishing with the same kind of wool. Once it's done I'll definitely be looking into more eco friendly crocheting materials!

Felt VW Beetle Pin Cushion...

It was my brother's girlfriend's birthday today, and I wanted to give her a little present. She wants to learn how to sew, so mum bought her a sewing box filled with all the things she'll need and I decided to make a pin cushion for her. I made it all out of things I already had - felt, sewing thread and toy stuffing - so it's better for the environment (using up what's already been produced rather than using something new) and it cost no money, only an afternoon and evening of my time. And it's shaped like a beetle, because she's spent the last year doing an old battered yellow beetle up and it passed it's MOT this week! It's a bit wonky, because I had no idea how to make a beetle pin cushion and I left it till the day before to start - but she liked it!


There are a couple more photos on Craftster, if you're interested.

Product Swap, Aloe Vera.

I've had this tube of organic aloe vera gel that I bought when I used to work in Holland and Barretts as a Saturday girl. That was in 2003. (I now feel old!) After being applied to many sunburns, eczema-ry bits and other random rashes the tube is empty. The tube is also unrecyclable. No more shall be bought! Instead I bought an aloe vera plant from a plant sale at a National Trust place last weekend (we bought 6 large trays of various plants for £5! It was plant heaven!), he cost 50p - he was all brown and dry and sad when I bought him, but a bit of gravel round his bottom, some water and sunshine and he's a lot better. And when I need some aloe vera gel I can snap a bit of leaf of, squeeze it and apply the gel that comes out!

Garden...again!

If anyone's getting bored of seeing pictures of my veggie-babies, well, get used to it - I'm so excited to see them growing, and they're growing so fast - I can't resist sharing my photos!

Tomatoes are huuge and flowery
Big courgette and little courgette are growing fast and big has flower buds waiting to burst!

These are the big and little peppers and I bought a new chilli pepper - it's the taller one at the backGarlics are big and strong and healthy

Potatoes are huge and have been earthed up

I found an exciting patch of wild strawberries down the side of our house and our other strawberries are looking lovely! I split and repotted my mint (they're the 3 pots to the left) and it's really enjoyed the sunshine and so have our other herbs.

Hope you've had some sun to enjoy - it was 27 degrees (c) here today! phew!

The Edible Garden...

Hello internet world, sorry for the lack of posts recently, I've been sick *cough cough!* and have spent the last week curled up on the sofa with my blanky and a box of recycled, FSC, to-be-composted-once-used, tissues! I was thoroughly fed up of it this morning, as I wobbled downstairs, decided I was too wibbly to go to my usual thursday morning garden volunteering and slumped on the sofa to watch This Morning while nibbling my coco pops in a dejected manner...when...I heard some swearing on my doorstep then a loud plonk (the post lady seemed to have some trouble getting the parcel through the postbox!) and yey! My Alys Fowler The Edible Garden book had arrived! Yey! I sold a good many shiny things on Ebay this month and thought I'd treat myself to a new, brand new, not-second-hand, made-made-out-of-new-trees-just-for-me book (it is FSC certified though!). This is a special occasion and doesn't happen very often! Has anyone else been watching Alys Fowler's 'The Edible Garden' programme on BBC2? I've completely loved it, been inspired by it and I want an Edible Garden (sad-sad-sadly I won't be moving for another couple of months, so I think I'm going to have to wait!!) Alys, her dog Isabelle and her chickens Alice and Gertrude live happily in their little urban garden in Birmingham growing a lovely symbiotic, organic, flowery and vegetably garden, forage for food and eat delicious looking meals!

You can watch all the episodes on the BBC iplayer if you want to see it, the final episode was on last week.

I'm off to sniff some more, curl up with my book and dream happy garden dreams :)

My garden monsters...

Everything in my garden has suddenly grown monstrously fast!!!

The strawberries have flowers....

The tomatoes too...
My courgette grows at least a couple of inches everyday! It slightly scares me!

We have a garlic goldmine....

Potatoes sprouting...Lots of new plant babies (peppers, courgettes and spring onions)

And lovely flowery things that I'm not responsible for but which are very beautiful (mum does the flowery stuff, I do millions of pots of veggies!)

The only thing I'm having a bit of trouble with is my Spring Onions, maybe I planted them too early, or they're overcrowded, but they still look really spindly and aren't doing anything...any ideas?

How are your gardens growing??