Post Comment Love 17-19 June

Welcome to this week’s #PoCoLo - a friendly linky which I co-host with Suzanne, where you can link any blog post published in the last week. We know you’ll find some great posts to read, and maybe some new-to-you blogs too, so do pop over and visit some of the posts linked and share some of that love. If you were here last week it was great to have you along, if you’re new here this week we’re pleased you’re here.

Yesterday we finally got our trees cut. It’s been a while, and it’s been another while trying to find someone to do them. Our usual tree surgeon retired during Covid, and to be honest they were already due a cut back then. Joining forces with our neighbour, who also wanted some tree work done, paid off in the end - between us we found someone that would come and quote when they said they would, who’d put in the necessary paperwork with the council and actually turn up and do the work.

But what a day for it - the hottest day of the year so far - though today is forecast to be warmer. Between myself, my next door neighbour, the neighbour at the back and the garage shop we were keeping the team of six hydrated. It’s a seriously hard day’s work, between them they cut ten trees of varying sizes, and cleared up too. That’s the really hard part!

Our fruiting cherry tree was just starting to ripen, and they were appreciated by them too. I even managed to get a colander full as they assured me they were mostly ripe - we’ll see!

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Silly Greens on tour

This post contains items gifted from Silly Greens.

Did you know you can receive micro greens to grow at home by post? Me neither, but you can - and that’s where Silly Greens comes in.

Silly Greens post seeds that grow straight out of the box, the micro greens, which are seedlings of herbs and veg, and they add a burst of flavour to your meals. They’re short-lived crops, which cut and come again and arrive through your letterbox ready to go, no need to do anything other than open the box.

And it really was as simple as opening the box. In your first pack there’s a leaflet explaining more about the seeds, and the seaweed jelly that they grow in - that helps keep the seeds in place during their journey, and keeps them hydrated too - when they arrive they are well on the way to germinating so you don’t have too long to wait to see them spring into action. And when your micro greens are finished the jelly shrinks back and because it’s natural it can be composted, and the packaging can be recycled.

Radish, Rocket and Turnip

My box of micro greens arrived a week or so before we headed off to my brother’s wedding in Yorkshire last month, and so to get the most of them they came with us. Of course they did! MOH wasn’t sure I was serious to start with, but then remember he knows me well and realised I was serious. In the wedding hotel, they happily sat on the window ledge. They moved on with us when we headed for our week in the North East and were a great way to pep up salads, and even in our burgers - in fact, with less condiments available than we’d have at home it was a great way to add some zing.

The seeds in my first box were pungent, peppery radish, a classic rocket and an unexpected inclusion, turnip. The picture below was taken three days after they arrived, and as you can see they’re well on the way to growing into proper micro greens. You can probably also see some root hairs, or fluff - don’t worry - the booklet explained simply that “root hairs were good, mould was bad” so all is well.

Not unsurprisingly the radish were quick to get growing, much like when you plant them in the garden or vegetable plot. They’re a quick cropping crop which is why you can grow them alongside slower growing crops there.

The advice that comes with the seeds is to keep them covered until the seeds lift the card, and suggests you can also weigh down the card. I didn’t believe that the little seeds would be able to lift the card. However I trusted the advice and even so was surprised when they actually did. Isn’t nature wonderful?

For me the rocket was the slowest growing, and as you can see on the card above it suggests covering it over will help it stretch - I kept mine covered the longest of the three, but had the least success with the rocket, but even so they still grew, just perhaps not quite as long (or tall) as I thought.

Each box is £5 including postage and packing (which is all recyclable); the boxes change each week and there’s details about each micro green on the Silly Greens site. If you’re wondering why you’d want to grow these at home, that’s a fair point. Apart from their ease of growing and their versatility, growing them at home means they’re fresher than buying them ready cut from the supermarket - plus you get to see the seeds grow, and to see them lift that card (they really do!)

We enjoyed adding these to our meals, mostly sprinkled over the top of salads - which worked well for us. I like salads, but I do get bored of them quite quickly so I’m always looking for new additions to change them slightly, and these worked for us as they kept on growing for a couple of weeks.

My second box arrived yesterday - and this month’s box includes a heritage pea mix, coriander and amaranth and a spicy mix. The box is opened and the card is waiting (and weighted) to be lifted. I’ll share how I get on with these.

With thanks to Silly Greens for providing this box of micro greens for the purposes of this review.

Tulip fever

This spring no doubt you’ll have seen me share pictures of one or two tulips here and on my social channels, and I’m very grateful to organised me who last autumn, not only bought bulbs but also planted them. Or most of them anyway. I found another packet in the greenhouse last week which didn’t quite make it into a pot - well there’s always this year for those…

But the ones that did make it into pots, bloomed and bloomed and brought a very welcome pop of colour to our garden, so this post is sharing those, and celebrating them. I planted them in large plastic flowerpots, so that the plastic pots could be easily lifted out of the terracotta pots once they’d finished flowering - this worked out well and is something I’d do again and recommend.

From inside the house it was great to get the pops of colour and to watch them change colours, and then one day they were gone. Their petals dropped completely, but soon to be replaced by the alliums. Given my success with the tulips I had high hopes for the alliums, but it was not to be. My ‘old faithfuls’ - the alliums that flower on the patio flowered as they usually do, but the ones in pots were sadly disappointing. They flowered but were floppy small heads, rather than the brilliantly bold spheres I’d been hoping for - next year maybe!

The tulips also worked out well as we put our house on the market at the end of March and so it was good to have some colour in the garden, and for it not to be “just green” which has been MOH’s observation in years gone by.

These pots were further up the garden, so not visible from the house, and every time without fail I walked past these the colour gave me a surprise - it shouldn’t have, but it did. So there really is something in that saying about not being able to see your whole garden from a single vantage point.

The detail on the petals was fantastic and I couldn’t resist playing with the contrast and colour editing tools a little, well quite a lot - the background foliage is a little on the purple side!

Hopefully I’ll remember to be just as organised this autumn!