Gardening For Beginners - Grow All You Can Eat In 3 Square Feet

Book Review

I'm a relative newbie to gardening, having only grown bits and bobs in the past, so when I embarked on my new hobby I was seduced by the book section of the garden center.  I love a nice book, the kind with fabulous photography and easy to read.  I have hundreds of books about fashion designers, fashion from the 1940's and the history of fashion and bras in particular - I must point out my day job is in the lingerie industry.  And then there are my cooking books, the photography especially exciting in these because - well FOOD!  But I never thought I would get that same giddy feeling from gardening books.  As I am such a rookie, once I had bought all my plants and seeds and such, I thought well I should probably learn how to actually look after them properly.  After all I want my fruit and veg plants to thrive and grow into happy and healthy plants bearing lots of fruit.  One of the first books I bought is 'Grow All You Can Eat In 3 Square Feet' and I just had to share with you how fabulous it is for complete novices.

I was attracted to this book as I have to grow my food in a relatively small space.  Living at home with my parents, I can't dig up their garden to have a nice allotment sized space to grow food.  Instead I have to restrict my growing to lots of different sized pots and grow bags.  There are sections on 'Small-Space Projects', which shows you how to utalise everyday objects to create attractive and creative planters, as well as 'Crops in Small Plots', lots of different planting plans for the 3' x 3' raised bed.

Firstly though the book takes you through everything you need to know about starting your own veggie patch.  Everything from understanding light, how to prepare your soil, companion planting and thinking about where your plot is situated in regards to exposure etc, to actually telling you which plants would be most suitable for you life style - ie shallow rooted crops or easy care crops.  The book really breaks the process down to inform the newbie gardener on how to set up their plot.  Perfect for someone like me who knows nothing!

My absolute favourite feature of the book however, is how to get the most from your small space.  As a beginner, one assumes that most plants are harvested in the early Autumn - after all we are taught this at a young age as we celebrate 'Harvest Festival'.  It's one of those smack your head on the table moments when you realise, 'oh yeah of course there have to be plants that grow through the Autumn/Winter as how else would people have eaten in the olden days!'.  Yes people, you can cultivate your small 3 x 3 plot to provide a continual crop of food all year round.  You just need to know which plants they are.

There are 6 of these yer round plans for the 3 x 3 plot and a Spring/Summer to Autumn/Winter plan based on 9 containers of different crops.  So this book comprehensively covers almost any situation a person with a small plot or balcony or whatever the growers circumstances may be.  For example, crops for a Shady Bed, so that would be good for perhaps someone who lives in an urban environment with houses and fences surrounding them as they will not have sunshine on their garden plot all day long.  Another example, The easy-to-grow bed, perfect for people with busy lives who perhaps don't have much time to dedicate to tending to their plants.

The plans are quite particular in the crops that they grow.  With such a small space to grow in they have thought very carefully about which plants grow well together and don't infringe on each others space.  The even tell you how many of each plant to put in the plot.  But another great feature is that they also give you ideas on crops you can swap with, in case you don't like a particular veg.  So not only do they give you a great plot plan, they make it possible for the slightly more adventurous to go 'off plan' and create your own veggie garden plan that will work for you and your space.

I really couldn't recommend this book highly enough for the novice veggie gardener.  If you are like me and know next to nothing about gardening, then buy this book.  You won't be disappointed!

Until next time, happy gardening!

Cocktail Garden Kit

By an amazing stroke of luck I was given a Birthday present that is related to my new gardening shaped hobby.  Back in January, my sister gave me a 'Cocktail Garden Kit'.  One of my other hobbies is enjoying one or two cocktails (or three or four whatever).  She gave me this fantastic kit to grow my own herbs for an array of exotic and tasty looking cocktails.  I had been meaning to plant up my seeds for a while but not quite got around to it, but my new hobby made it the perfect time to do so.

So what did my kit include?

6 x tiny pots
6 x compost discs
6 x packets of seeds - Borage, Mint, Cucamelon, Agastache, Lemon Balm and Lime Basil.
6 x naming sticks

Now I haven't come across these little compost discs before, but what a brillo idea they are!  I guess they are sort of vacuum packed, but you just stick em in water and they re inflate into compost juuuust the right amount for the teeny pots.  They took a surprisingly long time to re inflate!

I love that the leaflet says 'for the gardener who enjoys a tipple'!

All you have to do is pop the compost in the pot, add the seeds and cover with the remaining compost.  Obviously it helps to add the name label of herb that is in the pot too.  Et voila!

Six tiny pots of different and exciting herbs.  I popped each in a plastic bag (found in my kitchen) as per instructions, watered them a little and then put them in my dining room windowsill to grow. *Update*  The Borage and Lime Basil seeds have started to grow already!

Aint they cute!  Teeny weeny little plantlings.  No news on the others as yet.  I am rather taken with the 'Cucamelon' though.  Is it a cucumber?  Is it a melon?  No!  It's a Cucamelon!  I wonder if it will taste like a cucumber or a melon?!  Anyway, in a few months time I like to think I will be sitting out on my decking in the *hopefully* sunshine and sipping a 'Classic Mojito', 'Lime Basil Ade' or 'Cucamelon Martini'!  I will of course share the recipes with you!

If you like the sound of the cocktail kit for gardeners who enjoy a tipple, you can get it here:

www.plant-theatre.com

As well as other fun filled kits such as the 'Funky Veg Kit' or 'Psychedelic Salad Kit' which I rather like the sound of.  Perfect for the beginner gardener like myself.

I did also pot up some Aubergine and some Tomato seeds at the same time, but they didn't make it through the high winds we had the other day.

See look at me all enthusiastic and planting lots of exotic varieties of veggies.  I also bought this amazingly cheap sort of green house sort of not thing.  It was £10 in B&Q (£9 with my dads OAP discount).

I popped all my leftover little plants from my spending spree at the garden center in it, as well as the aubergine and tomato seeds that I had planted in the leftover pots.  I wedged it in between my big planters, and weighed it down with some stones...................but it fell over backwards and all the soil complete with seeds emptied out.  I did however chuck the soil in my planter so maybe if the seeds survived they might magically grow in between my broccoli's, garlic and carrots.................but I'm not counting on it so will buy more seeds and start them again!  The greenhouse thing has now been wedged in between our BBQ and trellis on the decking so fingers crossed it won't fall over again!  It has however made me look at proper greenhouses; now just to convince my parents that we need one in our garden ;)

Until my next post, happy gardening :)

My first week

My first week of gardening has been eventful to say the least.  I had a vegetable theif!  But onto that later on.

A couple of days after planting my peas, salad rocket, rosemary and thyme, I planted out some of my carrots, garlic and broccoli plants.  Now being a true rookie I followed the instructions on the little label things about spacing the little plants out - how important is this?  I can understand plants need space to root and gather the nutrients so you don't want to plant them too close together, but I am fast running out of space.  So advice on spacing my dear readers would be awesome.  Anyway the OCD in me dictated that my plants need to be in nice straight rows.  So I improvised, not having any gardening string, and tied what I did have around two bamboo poles -knitting yarn!

I planted out my carrots as per instructions on the label, about 3" apart.  Then I had a little visitor have a good nose around.  My little sausage dog Tess jumped straight up onto the planter uninvited to see what the heck was in her garden!

Frank sunbathing on a cushion and fleece whilst
I work away on my plants

It got the OK from her though the cheeky monkey.  I suppose at this point I should share with you that I have five doggies, who often help me whilst I'm out in the garden.

Planter #1

Anyway back to the gardening.  After turfing the sausage off my planter I then planted up my garlic plants of which I had four and my broccoli plants.  Now this is why I ask how important spacing is.  According to my labels the broccoli plants need to be about 60cm apart.  This would have meant probably only two plants in a row in my planter.  Now these things aint cheap people!  So I ignored the instructions and put three in.  They're probably only about 45cm apart but ho hum.  I also put the labels by each row so I know which plant is which.  I don't really know why because they are quite easy to distinguish from one another, but it felt like the thing to do.

Then it was on to my potatoes.  I have 10 tubers or whatever you call them so have decided to stagger my planting to get a more spread out harvest.  Because seriously how many potatoes can you eat at one time!  So I will wait about a month until I plant the next tub of potatoes so we have home grown potatoes for longer :).  These are a 'rocket' variety.  Don't really know what that means but I read somewhere they were an easy variety to grow and tasted good.  Of course I covered over my little potatoes and watered them in nicely.

Now do you remember last post I mentioned that I had grown herbs in the past with varied results.  Well this is the last lot of herbs that we attempted to grow.

I'm not too sure if they are dead or not, they look it.  I suppose time will tell whether they regrow this spring or not.  But this is what I am hoping to avoid with my new hobby!  Lots of dead looking twigs!  So I am making extra sure that each night I tuck my plants up nice and warmly so the frost doesn't get them.   I've also had problems with slugs on my plants - they love a nice courgette plant they do - so any tips on how to protect my plants with natural remedies would be most appreciated.  I say natural remedies as I want to keep my veggies and fruit organic.  Also being inspired by the Land Girls, one would have thought that in the 1940s all these modern pest sprays ect would not have been around, and I want to keep things as close to my inspiration as possible.

Anyway there is one pest that I can't control and that is the lesser spotted Arthur sausage.  Not long after the first dog incident where everything was thoroughly checked over, another hound was spotted on top of the planter and chased off by my dad.  He hadn't seen anything but I know that dog better and thought I should check to make sure he hadn't weed on them or anything.  This was all that was left of one of my three broccoli plants.

Complete with chomp marks.  Needless to say the planter has been dog proofed, try getting into this doggie!

The offender - Arthur sausage

He may look cute people, but I assure you his is most evil!

Next week I will be tackling my second planter, planting out the rest of the leftover carrots and broccoli as well as the onions and a few other bits and bobs.  I also went a bit mad with packets of seeds as I got all enthusiastic, so will have a go at growing a few veggies from seed.  I also discovered some exotic herbs that I got as a birthday prezzie from my sister.  They are a cocktail herb kit that is intended for you to grow the ingredients that are then used in various weird and wonderful cocktails.  Right up my street!  So I look forward to that, especially growing a 'Cucamelon' whatever the heck that is!

Until next time, happy gardening!

Garden Get-up

I'm not going to lie.  My foray into gardening has been mainly about the cute Land Girl outfits I can wear.  So I have gathered some images on Pinterest that inspired me.  I did look at gardening type things too I promise - I'm not totally shallow ;).  Click the thingy below to go to my Pinterest page and see all the inspirational fashion, style, gardening and plant inspiration that is helping me to keep enthused about growing my little veggie and fruit patch.

Follow 's board Land Girls on Pinterest.

My favourite image has to be this one:

It is a knitting pattern from Debbie Bliss and would be a perfect knit for me to wear under my gardening dungerees.  The pattern comes in a booklet of Land Girl inspired knits and I am yet to find just this sweater pattern so I may have to buy the whole booklet.  I have learnt from my foray into gardening that one can get quite warm whilst working away, but at this time of year it is too chilly to go completely jumperless (I now understand those god awful gillets that women of a certain age wear - they are actually quite practical for the garden!), so a short sleeve little sweater like this will be a perfect accompaniment to my gardening wardrobe.

Anyway what inspires you to get gardening?  Perhaps a nice sunny day?  Or are you a big girl like me and love the fashions?

Until next time, happy gardening! 

In The Beginning

My bounty

Well I don't know if it's just the nice spring weather today, or because I have been watching my Land Girl DVD's recently, but I have been inspired to create a veggie, herb and fruit garden!  I'm not sure how this new hobby is going to progress, but I am starting it with much enthusiasm and have decided to plot my progress through this blog.

Day 1 of new hobby

I love the idea of getting fresh veggies and fruit straight from my garden.  When my sister and I were little girls we grew lots of veg in our back garden.  We grew courgettes/marrows, raspberries, runner beans and I think a few pumpkins here and there.  We had the good fortune of growing up with a big old house behind our garden, which had a fabulous fruit and veg patch with huge bounties of fresh produce - I suppose that is what inspired us.  But time and age came upon us and I suppose we must have grown out of that phase.  The big old house was knocked down and five houses built to replace them.  In the house directly behind ours three old fruit trees were kept, so we did occasionally accidentally knock a few plums off into our hands.  In the last 10 years or so I have had countless pots of herbs which some have died and some have stuck around for a few years before eventually succumbing to the slugs or frost.  So I have sort of kept my interest in growing my own produce, but not had the time or inclination to properly dedicate to keeping them alive.

I am a keen jammer so in the past 5 years or so have collected apples, blackberries and plums from anyone who will let me.  Why is it that people have fruit trees and don't pick or eat the fruit?  The past couple of years our neighbours fruit trees haven't yeilded much as they don't maintain their trees, so last summer we bought a couple of variety of apples and a plum tree.  So I have had a sort of interest of recent.  We also still have our raspberry plants from when I was little.  They grow like weeds in our garden and every year we get hundreds and hundreds of juicy ripe raspberries to eat.  Last year we had so many there are still some in the freezer!

My sort of interest in growing my own fruit and veg has also been stirred by my recent purchase of the BBC Land Girls series on DVD.  I completely missed out on seeing them on the telly but thought I would treat myself to the whole 3 series as I love the wartime fashions and hair and beauty, so thought they would be a nice series to watch whilst working (I work from home on my own business www.bettybluesloungerie.com).  I was right, they were a lovely nostalgic series and I loved the outfits instantly, even if they aren't so historically accurate.  So much so I bought these pair of dungarees so I could pretend to be a land girl myself.

Tara Starlet Loveheart Dungarees £95

I bought them in the dark blue colour though not in the red as pictured above.  But anyway, when I put them on - I'm not sure what came over me - but I thought wouldn't it be great if I had my own veggie patch so I could wear my land girl style outfits and have lots of fresh yummy food. (I have to mention my other passion is food - I love cooking and EATING!).  So here I am having freshly come back from the garden center with lots of new plants and gardening paraphernalia, how middle aged am I!

I thought doing a blog would a) keep me motivated to actually look after my veggies, and b) be a great way for me to track the progress and failures/successes of my plot.  Like any good hobbiest, my first port of call was to google the best plants to grow in the UK climate that hopefully are quite easy to grow and hard to kill.  I then enthusiastically went off to the garden center and bought my kit!

Of course being a fashion conscious girly type of girl, I had to get colourful and stylish kit.  My kit here were some fleece lined cloggy things for the summer (wellington boots for the winter obvs) and a two pack of gardening gloves.  I was all set to go!  I had my dungerees, shoes and gloves sorted, my plants from the garden center and some planters for planting my little shoots in.  As I live with the parentals, all trowels and other such kit I already had at home, buuuuuut in the future I may have to get girly gardening tools, and DEFINITELY some sort of tea receptical because all gardeners have to have a special gardening cup for tea!  Anyway I started to pot up my plants.

Things I have learnt.
1.  I am really really weak and compost and soil is heavy.
2.  Gardening gets you really dirty - shocking revelation I know!
3.  It's kinda hard work - it counts as exercise right?  My doctor did tell me I need to exercise more......
4.  I'm gonna need a gardening hat.  My sunglasses are way too expensive to drop into dirt and I need to protect my milky white, pale and interesting, complexion!
5.  I'm gonna need a nail brush to get the dirt out from under my nails!

Anyway, here is the results of my first 'go' at potting up

Helpful doggie is helping me garden (I suspect he may be after the food)

We have a tub with peas in with a trellis and wire growy uppy thing for them to climb.  I used three of the sections of the tray I bought and spaced the little plants out evenly so they have lots of space each to grow.  Then the small squat tub is my herb and salad tub.  I put my rosemary and thyme plants in, then added five little rocket plants all spaced out so they will hopefully grow and spread nicely.  Thyme and rosemary I have grown in the past with varied results, but on the whole they are pretty hard to kill.  The rocket I have not grown before and fear the delicate little leaves may die easily in the cold weather.  But rocket is one of my favourite salad leaves and I think it is important to grow things you actually like to eat - so it may survive if I tend to it with care and attention.

The rest of the tray of peas I popped in another tub and using some bamboo I found lying around the garden (hope Dad doesn't need them!) I made a little structure for the peas to grow up.

By the time I had done these planters the temperature was starting to drop so I stopped for the day and covered my little plants up in case there is a frost.  Fingers crossed they will survive the night and in the next few days I can plant up the rest of my little plants.  The remaining veggies and fruit I am growing are:

Potatoes (Rocket)
Rhubarb
Carrots
Onions
Garlic
Purple sprouting broccoli
Blueberries

Again these are all items that I love and eat regularly so that is why I picked them along with items which are good bountiful growers perfect for the English climate.  Time will tell which are the most successful I suppose!  The above items plus the fruit plants and trees we already have will hopefully provide me with much food in the coming seasons and I will probably include some recipes I make from the resulting bounty................if they grow that is.  So keep tuned :)