In my garden: A sparkling clean greenhouse

It's a job that I've been putting off, but one that I know needed to happen before I got too many seeds on the go, and that's cleaning the greenhouse. It needed to happen as the glass was showing signs of green, and I'm sure there was less light coming in because of it. And so on the warmest weekend of the year so far I decided that the time had come, and started to empty its contents. 

After several trips the pile outside was beginning to grow, but there was still a lot more to come.

With everything out I took the opportunity to check under the wooden floor, which is actually the side of our old wooden shed. One part of it had become a bit spongy and I was keen to check it was ok. I half-expected to find a massive hole, so was pleased to discover it was just where the ground level changed a little and where the wood was starting to rot. We'll need to replace the floor in the not too distant future, but not this year. I added some sand and a bit of broken paving slab under the spongy bit in the hope it gives me a bit more time.

And there was quite a pile of stuff outside. Considering we have a 6 x 4ft greenhouse, it's pretty impressive, and the contents completely filled our stone circle, and some.

Next up was some Jeyes Fluid, lots of water, the hose and some time to work out our best implements. For MOH it was the hose, for me it was MOH. For some reason he couldn't help himself and was itching to get involved, so not wanting to get in the way of a man and his cleaning habit I found myself a deckchair to watch from.

He got bored pretty quickly too, and was soon heading off to clean more manly things like his barbecue. Luckily though the green grime came off easily and it wasn't long before the greenhouse was sparkling inside and out.

I also took the opportunity of having some space to work in and added some manure compost to the greenhouse bed before moving everything back in, after a brush down. The good news is that everything went back in, and even better than before so it's tidy and there's places to work, and now I can't wait to get on and sow some seeds. I know they'll thank me for the extra light.

In the greenhouse bed I've this gorgeous ice plant which has overwintered in there. It's clearly happy as has some offspring so that's good news and I'll be potting it on and out soon, before it gets too used to being in the greenhouse. The giant fuchsias which I shared in my post at the weekend are now potted up and I'm waiting for them to grow into giants...

GIANT FUCHSIAS IN THE MAKING

We'll see how they do.  I was pleased to see two pots of thyme had survived the winter too (you can see it just creeping into the photo above) and I'll be planting many more herbs in the next few weeks too.

Elsewhere in the garden

My garden is bursting into life, and despite its greenness, there's plenty of colour. This Kerria, or yellow pom pom plant, came through the fence from next door and now I have two mid-sized bushes for nothing.  And looking as beautiful as this, it's very welcome to stay.

KERRIA, OR YELLOW POM POM

The euphorbias acid green flowers continue to add highlights throughout the garden. I've noticed that they've started to creep towards the house along the fence where I'm struggling to get anything other than bulbs to grow, so I'll be encouraging them to do more of that. MOH still calls them dalek plants, but has conceded they add colour to our Spring garden.

EUPHORBIAS, OR DALEK PLANTS AS MOH CALLS THEM

The garden is growing, and this shot of leaves gives a good clue to how much. What I like about this shot is the density of the leaves, and all of the shapes that happily grow alongside each other.

LEAVES OF ALL SHAPES AND SIZES

At the back of the garden the pear and cherry trees are in blossom. All white, all of them. This is from the pear tree, but the cherry is very similar to this. The lilac - also white - is starting to flower, but only on the branches we didn't cut last year, so I'm glad we didn't cut them all. We do need to finish the job but will be waiting for it to flower before we clamber up the ladder with the extendable loppers.

PEAR BLOSSOM

I've spotted some of the brightly coloured flowers of the honesty plants too. They're looking great against the zinc pots behind them, and I still can't believe that for many years I missed these as they were pulled up with weeds. MOH still brings plants over and says is this a weed, which to be honest is too late to say no! He's getting better, but even so...

HONESTY

The sempervivums - or succulents - appear to be doing well in their trough, and I'm keen to see how they get on and multiply. I've read this week about taking the top out of these plants to propagate them too - as an alternative to propagating from leaves - so I'll be looking into that more, and maybe even trying it for myself.

SEMPERVIVUMS

The camellia is finally flowering, it's in a very shady spot by the fatsia and so it's always much later than others, but it feels late even so. The newer white one at the back of the garden is growing well but flowers are few and far between. The peonies at the back of the garden have almost doubled in size in the past week, the one I struggled to find is easy to spot this week, so I'm hopeful for lots of flowers from them this year - keep your fingers crossed!

And finally the sambucus nigra, or black elder (think elderflower but with pink heads) is still with us. I was worried about it during the winter months, and wasn't sure if it'd make it. It's the plant I planted for my first cat Dylan (who was a black long haired moggy), so I was hoping I hadn't lost it, and I haven't.

THE BLACK ELDERFLOWER

It's at this time of year that we struggle to keep up with our garden, but hopefully it won't get too far ahead of us, and will look half decent for the party for our 110th that we've got planned in June. More on the party another day, that's a whole other post, and organisational challenge I'm working on!

How do you keep on top of your garden as it starts to grow like crazy at this time of year?

Typically Tyrollean style and hospitality

After the warmest weekend of the year it feels a little odd to be sharing this post from my trip to Germany in January when there was snow on the ground, but I'm going to anyway as if you believe the forecast today's going to be ten degrees cooler than the weekend, but hopefully it won't drop so much that we'll have any of the white stuff. 

Usually I'm not a fan, but I think that's because we just don't know how to deal with it. In Germany, and Austria, as you'd expect it's dealt with without a fuss. And that's admirable. 

Today I'm sharing pictures from the hotel we stayed in, although in honesty, like many hotel rooms I didn't spend much time in it. I wasn't surprised to see the duvets folded and pillows karate chopped (that's what it looks like anyway) as I remembered this from our trip to Bavaria, a couple of years before. It still made me smile though.

After a flight delay and a long day at the Viking factory, I had twenty minutes in the hotel room before meeting for dinner. But it made quite an impression. I was impressed with the coffee machine, but didn't have enough time to work out how to use it sadly.

After a quick selfie in the bathroom and a change of clothes I headed back to reception to meet the rest of the party for our dinner at Fortress Kufstein, which I'd spotted out of my hotel window just a few moments before.

It wasn't until gone midnight that I got back to the room, completely full after a great meal, including some local specialities, and after a nightcap in the bar. It's as well that MOH called me as I realised then I'd set my alarm for the morning an hour out, whoops.

In the room I was very taken with the open wardrobe - and the light that came one every time you walked past it, now that was useful and saved having to scrabble around for the bathroom light switch.  The room was hot though - I find hotel rooms often are, but this was super hot. In the twenty minutes I'd had in the room earlier I couldn't find a thermostat, nor a valve on the radiators so even with the temperature at minus ten, there was only one thing for it. And that was to open the window. I slept with the window open all night, something that I don't even manage at home, but I'm pretty sure the heating has been racked up to combat the minus temperatures. But I was melting...

From my room I got a great view of the Fortress in Kufstein, which is where we ate earlier than evening. And the view was just as great in the early daylight hours too.  The food was so good, and so plentiful that I opted to skip breakfast the next morning as I was simply just not hungry. And knowing there was a typical Bavarian lunch ahead of us in Munich, I wanted to be sure to leave enough room for that (and this was a great move on my part as I discovered later - phew!).

Looking in the alternative direction there were the alps and yet more snow. The air just felt clean, and the temperatures felt nowhere near like I'd expected them to feel, which I was grateful for. And sometimes the overactive thyroid - and always being hot - comes in useful! 

Before we left the hotel I had a wander around to check out their decor. This was the bar which I'd spent some time in the previous night hugging my schnapps. I'd seen the candles, but not necessarily the gin bottle - that's a lot of wax isn't it?

The big clock worked well, but I was less sure about the cushions on the sofa. I think I prefer how we space them along, rather than piling them out like this, what do you think?  But open shelved units speak in any language, and I'd happily have this one (and its contents) as well as they leather oyster-like chair in front of it.

And it's only now that I look again at the photo above that I've spotted some more dripped wax, I kind of like it but have never managed to get candles to go like that.  It's got quite a ghostly feel to it doesn't it?

* While this post isn't in collaboration with Viking or Stihl, it was only possible because of the UK press trip arranged by them. 

Spring and new routines

Spring is a season that brings with it hope, new life, renewed energy and lots of colour and there's no mistaking the Spring cleaning that many people get the urge for at this time of year. It sort of makes sense doesn't it?  There's been elements of Spring cleaning here - and more to come, no doubt - but I'm not the expert cleaner in this household, so I often contain myself with a bit of Spring rearranging. And there's a fair bit of that going on right now. 

Our eat the freezer challenge

We've currently got two fridge-freezers. When I say currently it was supposed to be a temporary thing, as the fridge-freezer I brought from my old house surely wouldn't last very long. For many years it was on our top floor and we used it for the cats' food, as they ate in their room and it saved having their "stinky" food (as MOH rightly called it) in the main fridge. It was also good for for cans of drink and as an overflow fridge space, and we've just got used to having it.

Well, that fridge-freezer is still going strong. We've lived here fifteen years this year! It's now in the conservatory, and well, it's not the look we're after, so we're restarting our eat the freezer challenge to get down to just one, because that's more normal right? 

Already I've rearranged some of the contents between the two as it makes sense to find space for the things we use regularly - such as bread rolls and bagels mainly - in the fridge-freezer in the kitchen. Now we're aiming for as many meals as possible to involve something from the freezer. I'm sure at some point it won't work, or we'll end up with some very odd combinations.

I'm also trying to use less of the fridge space and that's meant sorting through many of the opened bottles that were on the top shelf. It was amazing what I found, but probably best not to go there!

Getting my spray paint out

The lighter evenings are also a good incentive to get crafting again, especially for those crafts, like paint spraying, that need to be done outside. During the winter months I find that hard as I only have the weekends to complete that in, so if I've plans for the weekend that knocks that out too. I've a project in mind for the garden involving a pallet, some spray paint and Sugru, the mouldable glue, and now all I need to do is work out what colour using the new PintyPlus paint chart.

This is only one of the pages of the paint chart, and I'll freely admit I was way more excited than I should have been when I received this. I've loved using the chalk paint spray, but I'm really looking forward to using some of the bolder colours.  Definitely a case of watch this space!

A refreshing and decadent feeling cuppa

Another of my new routines takes place when I remember to leave work on time and arrive home before MOH on bright and warm days. It feels super decadent to get out my posh tea and my new Charles Viancin Tea Magnet and Infuser Set, to give it its proper name. I was sent this to review a while back and it's only now that I'm using it regularly. For me there's something about the brighter Spring days and proper tea and the ritual of brewing loose leaf tea.

The tea goes into the metal drum, and when your tea has brewed enough you use the magnetic camellia stem to remove the drum and place it onto the camellia leaf, to avoid mess. It's dishwasher safe and the accompanying information says they'll never tarnish or lose their colour.

I'm a big fan of silicone in the kitchen and you'll most likely remember the daisy lids, the poppy trivet and the cute vegetable bottle stoppers from the same company. This works equally as well and while I like using it home for my early evening treat, I can see it being equally useful at work and am quite tempted to have one on my desk too.  I think drinking loose leaf tea, whether it's white, black or floral gives me the feeling of being more healthy than I actually am, which brings me onto...

Time to get into shape?

Over the winter months it's much easier to disguise an extra pound or two, but I know that deep down I'd like to tone up a bit. That'll partly come down to eating more healthily, and getting out on the bike again, but I think there probably needs to be more than that and a sustained effort. I'm toying with the idea of daily routine of press-ups and sit-ups and now I've typed it here maybe it'll happen. It probably should, but as you can see I'm still talking myself into it. I know that I'll want to see instant results, but I also know that it's going to take more than a day or two of healthy eating and a fitness routine.  

I've started with the willpower thing during Lent, by giving up cakes from the cafe at work. That may not sound much, but the cakes are huge (and lovely) and very tempting. It's a start, but it won't be enough on its own, so I need to convince myself - and to actually do something about it - while there's time to actually make a difference.  

I know it makes sense, I'm just still getting my head around it. How do you convince yourself a new routine is a good thing, let me know your tips, I think I could do with the extra motivation!

And pottering in the greenhouse

I've not done much pottering yet, but I'm hoping too. I need to get some seeds sown both for the allotment and some flowers for the garden too. We're having a bit of a do in the garden in June and of course I want the garden (and the house) to look its best. No doubt it won't be long before the greenhouse is full of seedlings and I'll be running out of space, but what a problem to have!

What's on your list of Spring jobs?

* This is a collaborative post but all views are my own.