Wednesday 22 June 2011

I've never seen these before...

The allotment plots are looking so cheerful at the moment.  I'm in love with these flowers (Californian Poppies I'm told). I've never seen them anywhere before, have you? They have grown wild and the different shades across the plots look sooo beautiful. I'm drying some pods out so that I can keep the seeds and scatter them in my garden one day.  My fingers are crossed for my own garden as we've been living in a flat with a shared one for the last five years.  My dream garden definitely includes these beauties!







Isn't nature just wonderful?
*Sign of contentment*

Monday 20 June 2011

Bursting into life

I've been a busy bee of late and am enjoying my first evening in a week at home, chilling. Soooo nice to put my feet up and have a cuppa. The allotment is looking F-A-B and it's getting exciting now that there is produce to eat and more on the way.  Here are some pics so you can see how it's all coming along.
(Ignore the weeds...!!!)


Eat your heart out Mr McGregor!


Where's the Green Giant?


Raspberries are making their way into my morning cereal.

Lavender pouches as pressies for friends this year!

Wow!

My sunflowers are almost ready. Woop!
So proud of my runner beans.  They didn't grow last year but are making up for it now!
Can't wait to cook something using the gooseberries! Mmmmmmmmmmm.

Last week Mr C was away on business so I spent the week catching up with friends. Lovely it was too! One of the jobs I wanted to do was to find elderflowers to make cordial.  It was on my to do list and when I saw Rebecca's post on the cordial I knew I had to do it.  I'd been looking for weeks for the tree but, knowing me, I was worried I'd end up making cowslip cordial.  BLEUGH!

Well.......eventually I FOUND THE FLOWERS! OK, that's a lie.  My friend Han found the tree.....right outside my back door!!! *Can you believe it was there all the time whilst I was googling pictures of the flowers?!*

There are lots of recipes out there on the web and I followed a pretty standard one.  I decided to freeze the cordial in ice cube bags so each time I want a drink all I have to do is pop one cube in and add fizzy water.  It will last for at least a year in the freezer and makes your drinks lovely and chilled. Mmmmm.

The last flowers are still on the trees so there's still time to make cordial!