It’s been a while since I last wrote about my efforts to grow some veg without a proper patch, so I thought it was about time for a quick progress update! Some of my veg have been more successful than others, but considering they are all being grown in containers I don’t think I’ve done too badly! (more…)
One of the things we are most excited about living at Waterloo Farm is being able to grow our own fruit and veg. On our garden design we know exactly where our ‘kitchen garden’ is going and we have plans for fruit trees and a fruit cage, so hopefully at some stage in the future we will be able to grow plenty of different fruit and veg. However, at the moment, where the veg patch will be needs a lot of work – it was once a redundant ditch which we have had to fill in and is covered in nettles and other weeds, so a lot of preparation is going to be required before we can grow anything on it! So the irony is, with a 2 acre garden, we currently don’t have anywhere prepared for growing vegetables! (more…)
OK, maybe the title is a little mis-leading as I guess strictly speaking we didn’t actually ‘grow’ the crop ourselves, but the food came off our land so in a sense it is ‘home-grown’ 
. I’m referring of course to blackberries! The kids had a great time at the weekend picking some blackberries from the garden. Fortunately they didn’t have to go very far as there is a large bramble just by the patio, and another one just next to the stable (before it got cut down anyway!).
We have decided that in order to get the very most out of our outside space we need some help! Therefore we have found ourselves a garden designer, Sam, and are both really excited to have her working with us and can’t wait to start the design process! We currently have three parcels of space – the current garden and the two separate paddocks – and know what we want but not where it should all go … just can’t get our heads around it! Ultimately we want to create a kids’ play area, a vegetable plot/kitchen garden, a space for chickens (and maybe pigs!), and a formal garden with beds. We also want to encourage as much wildlife into the garden as possible and have a few spaces to escape with a cup of tea or glass of wine!
I’m very excited – I just got my first ever books on growing your own fruit and vegetables! One is by Alan Titchmarsh, ‘The Kitchen Gardener’ and the other by a chap called John Harrison, ‘Vegetable Growing Month by Month’.
I have only just skimmed them quickly but they both look great! Cannot wait to start putting them into practice.
