Seedlings Prep for Spring 2020

I finally completed the second and last batch of seedlings prep. This pregnancy surely is different from my previous one. I seem to get tired more easily this time around so I had to stop halfway the seedlings prep a few weeks ago. But, everything's finally done now!! Now I just have to give them lots of TLC. 

These are the seedlings from a few weeks ago, they have sprouted and some have shown true leaves.

Cos Lettuce:

Perpetual Spinach:

Cimmaron Lettuce:

Russian Kale:

Kent Pumpkin and Cucumber:

Zucchini:

The day time weather is warming up slightly in Melbourne. Especially near this large window sill. It's a perfect spot for seedlings.

Garden Bed 1 Update - Snow Peas and Shelling Peas

The pretty pea flowers are finally here. They are looking so gorgeous and they greet me cheerfully every morning. Now the next exciting thing will be when we actually harvest some peas. 

These were planted in April in hope i can harvest some peas in winter. They are taking their time and we haven't got a single pea as yet.

This is how they were looking back on 18th April 2020. The shoots just started to appear:

On 1st July 2020, they grew significantly but still there was no flower:

And today (31st July 2020), we have flowers!!

There are also a few pea pods starting to form. Fingers crossed we'll have some peas soon:

Collecting Broccoli Seeds

The broccoli seedpods are finally ready for harvest and their seeds collected. We're so excited!! This is the first time we collected the broccoli seeds so I hope the seeds are good for planting.

There were quite a few seedpods, so I picked the best looking ones, the chunkiest looking 🙂. As can be seen from the photos, they have the visible bumps which indicate good size seeds.

For the past few weeks I have been peeking inside a few pods to see if the seeds have turned brown in colour, so I'm happy to finally see brown coloured seeds.

There are lots of seedpods, so my 5 year old helped me to peel and collect the seeds. 

We have lots of mature brown seeds. Yay!! Fingers crossed they are good seeds and can grow into awesome Broccoli plants.

Mid Winter Leafy Green Vegetables Harvest

We are absolutely loving the various leafy vegetables in our garden. It's mid winter now in Melbourne and they keep giving us nutritious supply for our meal.

I am so happy with the amount of Cos Lettuce plants that I planted in the garden. I planted about a dozen or so all over the place and they provide continuous supply of the greens.

I also planted around 5-6 Russian Kale and Perpetual Spinach. Their leaves are getting bigger and we picked a few leaves regularly so the younger leaves have some space and sun exposure and they can grow bigger.

GentleSoulGnome July 2020 Garden Update

Our garden grew significantly over the last few months despite the lack of maintenance as I battled the all day pregnancy sickness and gardening aversion. I was so relieved when the pregnancy symptoms finally subsided and I can return to the garden. Since then I had managed to complete a few priority maintenance in smaller quantities and shorter time as tiredness seems to be the major hurdle at the moment.

My first priority was to clean up the weeds growing at the front garden because the Tulips and Daffodils had started to grow new shoots. I wanted to clear the area of weeds to give them lots of growing space and minimal nutrition competitor as possibly can. 

Asahi Tulips

Daffodils Tete-a-tete

The Cos Lettuces and Strawberries that I planted at the front garden seemed to thrive and we had since harvested a few of the lettuce leaves.

I have been waiting for the Broccoli seedpods to mature to collect their seeds, but they're taking so long. So I let them be for the time being and besides they are still sprouting, so we've been harvesting them as well. I left quite a few of the yellow flowers for the bees. They love them, I thought I share a little bit happiness with them.

As for the back garden, the Snow Peas and Shelling Peas had grew so tall and a few flowers had blossomed. So, we're hoping it won't be too much longer until we get some harvest.

The leafy vegetables are taking so long to grow from seedlings. Next year I will try continual planting as growing the plants from seedlings are too slow when the temperature dropped. Some of the Kale are looking promising though, I hope I can harvest some soon.

The root vegetables in the third garden bed seemed to be doing well as well. The White and Purple Garlic are looking good. I never successfully grew garlic before, so fingers crossed they will produce this time.

I also never managed to get a single harvest of radish and these ones are not looking promising either. The leaves are bright green and bushy, but I can't see any bulb growing underneath it.

We moved our Lemon tree from the half wine barrel to the ground a few months ago. They survive the move but only time will tell if they will produce better in the new spot. The new spot has more sun exposure which I hope will be more suitable for the tree.

Some more strawberries plants underneath the Lemon tree. They were also transplanted from half wine barrel and survived the move. Some of the plants are showing flowers, so hopefully we have lots more strawberries this year.

I absolutely love our Bay Tree. It obviously survived the big move from Sydney to Melbourne a couple years ago. The tree has reached new height and growing lots of new branches and good looking leaves.

Lastly, we planted 4 bags of potatoes in grow bags. We keep adding more soil as the plants shoot up. It's very exciting indeed, they seem to be growing taller and taller everyday.

Super Late Post!! Red Cabbage Harvest in April 2020

Hello again everyone! I will be posting a lot of super late posts in the coming few days as I had not been very good at keeping up with the garden for a few reasons.

First of all, I had an unfortunate first trimester pregnancy aversion in gardening. Yes, the sight of soil makes me want to puke. Haha... It's probably a good thing though, as I tend to go a bit crazy with gardening and overtire myself. I also had aversion in house work, especially dish washing.

Secondly, the weather had cooled down significantly here in Melbourne and for some reason I didn't cope too well this time around. Maybe it's to do with the pregnancy too. Anyway, I spent a few weeks taking frequent nap and being super duper bloated. Very unpleasant because my brain wanted to do things but my body refused.

All of these aversions mysteriously disappeared when the pregnancy reached around 11-12 weeks. Now I'm back to my old self and back in the garden again despite the freezing weather and doing a lot of tidying up around the house.

This brilliant looking red cabbage was harvested in April and it was so satisfying to process into a few different meals. I called this one the lucky cabbage as I planted two and this particular one seemed to successfully avoid slug and caterpillar damage, unlike the other one. It's also so pretty, like a bouquet.

Saving Potatoes Plants from Garden Clean Up to grow in Growbag.

After clearing out the remaining of potatoes, I saved a few of the large looking plants and transferred them to grow bags. They were looking limp for a few days but seemed to recovered. Fingers crossed they will produce. I'm not sure, but I didn't want to throw away a decent size plant. Call me thrifty!! Or plant loving.

I do need to get more garden soil though, or check if I still have some ready compost from the bin.

Last Batch of Tomatoes in the Garden

There are still a few more tomatoes to ripen in the garden. I think this will be our last batch of tomatoes. I'm hoping they will ripe at around the same time so I can make sauce or roast them for preserving in jars.

From the back garden:

The plants at the front garden are shorter, but produce more fruits. I think because of the ample morning sun exposure:

Autumn Planting April Update - Snow Peas and Purple Garlic Shoots Emerging Autumn 2020

The long awaited moment had come. Most of the snow peas have sprouted and reached a good height. We had to rush and tied them to the pole with soft plant ties because of the strong wind in Melbourne 2 days ago. See my post here on making your own soft plant ties. 

The soft plant ties provide the much needed support while holding the plants gently and allowing them some space to grow thicker and taller.

On another note, the purple garlic bulbs that were planted a week ago are now showing their shoots.

This is my second attempt at growing garlic bulbs. I'm hopeful it will have higher success chance this time as I'm using this garden bed with soft soil. 

Dinner From the Garden - Quinoa Beans Potato and Tomato Salad

We cleaned up another garden bed at the backyard to install the Birdies Raised Garden Bed and harvested a few remaining potatoes. So, they became our dinner. 

Potatoes, tomatoes and beans from the garden. 

I added in boiled eggs for the boys to keep them happy. 

Autumn Front Garden Clean Up and Preparation for Winter Crops Planting

As the weather is cooling down here in Melbourne, I thought it was a great opportunity to do a bit of clean up and preparation for my various garden beds for winter planting.

My first priority is the small section right in front of my entrance door. This section was previously occupied by Geranium plants, but I decided to utilise this small patch for an additional garden bed for vegetables. So, this is now my Garden Bed 6. I cleaned up the middle part of the section to make way for Brassicas, such as Brussel Sprouts, Cabbage and Cauliflower.

For the border, on the right we have a few Lavender plants that are doing well and have been attracting lots of local solitary bees. They are doing a great job in pollinating my crops. The Geraniums that were planted in the middle of this section had been moved to the back row. The left border has been allocated for the annual Zinnias (the ones with pink flower) and I sprinkled Marigold seeds as well. The front row has a few Chrysanthemum plants that have been doing well after I propagated them from cuttings.

The next section that I cleaned up was the half circle garden bed at the front of the house. This section was originally planned for flowers, but the vegetable plants had ever so slowly crept in. I discovered that this section has the best morning sun exposure and thought it would be an awesome spot for a few veggies. So, this is now my Garden Bed 5. In Spring 2019, I planted Zucchini, Pumpkin, Broccoli and Tomatoes here. I didn't pull them out, I just cleared some of the dead leaves to open the space. Also, a few months ago, I transplanted some of the Strawberry runners here and they have been doing quite well after the transplant.

The plan for this bed is Strawberry plants to remain at the front most, followed by Marigold and Chives (apparently great companion plants for Strawberry). I sprinkled a few Cos Lettuce seeds behind them and followed by the Borage plants at the back.

I haven't pulled out the Zucchini plants yet, as they are still flowering and fruiting at the moment. So, I wanted to extend their growing time as much as I can. So, I sprinkled the Marigold and Lettuce seeds around them.

 

The same goes with the Tomatoes and Pumpkin. Both are still looking like they can still produce, so, I left them be for the time being:

Looking forward to harvesting these tomatoes.

The next section that I really wanted to clean up (because it's so messy) is the section  under the Olive tree. I planted Poppy plants around the tree in Spring 2019 and the seed pods had spread seeds everywhere. So, Poppy seedlings had grown all over the place. I've been waiting for them to get to a manageable size for transplant. The left side of this section now has a few Lavender plants that I propagated from cuttings. 

I haven't harvested the Red Cabbage and Cauliflower yet, but I will be soon. I have also cleared up the front part of this section for a few Japanese Buxus plants that I'm still propagating from cuttings. I'm hoping they will be ready for planting in a few weeks.

The Poppy seedlings transplanted to the right spot:

The left side of this section was previously occupied by row of Calendula plants. I pulled out the old plants, collected the seedlings and moved them to the back row:

And with that done, all the work I planned to do at the front garden was accomplished. I really hope I will see lots of new seedlings popping out soon, especially the Lettuce.