The first day of Spring

Today is the first day of Spring. Mother Nature has placated our fears of a never ending Winter, and although there were chilly temperatures and a frost last night, today is absolutely glorious.

My daughter has been photographing crimson rosellas in the back yard. I have been enjoying the sun and Spring air while hanging out the washing. I'm really looking forward to spending some lazy days gardening in the weeks ahead.

The garden centers are selling frost sensitive plants already, but they still need to be protected from the cold temperatures. We have basil and tomato seedling growing on the window sill inside and other seedlings growing in the greenhouse. It's exciting to see their growth, but I have to remember not to get ahead of myself and plant them out too soon.

First sprouts of Spring

Just as the cold a dreary wintery days are taking their toll on my time outside, there are some sprouts of hope for the Spring ahead. To be fair, my work has been keeping me inside just as much as the weather, but my work load has decreased slightly so I have more opportunity to get into the garden.

My children recently bought some window box planter kits with herb, flower and tomato seeds. The boxes were planted out eagerly. As these have been kept inside, the seeds have germinated rather quickly. While my seed trays in the greenhouse are taking their time to produce sprouts, the window boxes are excitingly full of life after only a few weeks.

Seeing these sprouting seedlings and thinking of the planting and growing in the weeks and months ahead I am both excited and invigorated.

Handy tip for purple carrots

Now here is a handy tip for purple carrots. Don't use them in soup as they tend to colour the soup in an interesting way.

A day in the garden

A day in the garden in mid-Winter is not always an appealing prospect. I have gotten out there a few times but the littlies have made it somewhat difficult to get much done.

Today it was their choice. Their choice of seeds, with their names on the plant labels. They were ready to garden in a flash and so keen to plant out their carefully selected seeds.

It's a mild Winter's day today so that made it nice too! I even got to do some much needed tidying up. To top it off, we also have a lovely harvest of carrots and potatoes to go in our dinner. What a successful morning in the garden.

Perhaps tomorrow we'll even tackle some gardening in the patch...

Too close for comfort

I quite like master stock and the lovely aromats that go into it. We have a number of chicken and duck dishes that use master stock so it can get a bit of a work out in our house. In case you are interested, my 'secret' recipe is basically a blend of a few that I found on the 'net.

Now, the weather is getting chilly and so warm drinks are favoured over cold, especially in the evening. A few day ago I thought I'd make some mulled wine and a quick google search gave me plenty of options. Jamie Oliver had what looked like a particularly tasty drop so I made a small batch of that, minus the star anise because I just couldn't find it any where.

It was good, but definitely lacked brandy.

Of course I thought the brandy would just improve it, so the next night I made the same recipe with the addition of the brandy and star anise.

The flavours were good, but it took me a bit to finally put my finger on what in particular it was that was so interesting about this drink.

Hmmm, what is in it? Star anise, cloves, cinnamon, citrus peel... All of those are in both my master stock and mulled wine. They also both have wine (shao xing/ red). Now I'm not about to start adding soy sauce, garlic and ginger to my mulled wine, or sugar and brandy to my master stock, but the similarities were perhaps a little too close for comfort.

It was worth trying something new but given I'm quite happy with the master stock blend, we'll need to go with a different mulled wine recipe in the future!

Planning in the patch

Today's task is tackling the patch. We have a fair bit of clearing and tidying to do in there but many hands make light work.

The seeds that my littlies and I sowed a while ago are growing nicely but I'd like to get some more in soon.

Unfortunately it's a bit cold for direct sown seeds to germinate too well at the moment, but there are a few options. I could buy some seedlings, or sow into paper pots and keep them inside or in the green house or sow under a cloche and hope for the best.

For now we'll get the patch looking neat and plan out where to from there.

How to grow a planet

I caught the end of a documentary on the telly last night and it looked pretty interesting so I've just looked it up on ABC iView to watch it all. It is called "How to grow a planet", a BBC Scotland production presented by Professor Iain Stewart.

Professor Stewart is actually a geologist, but in the opening minute of so he captured my thoughts so well in how he talks about how amazing seeds are. How something so tiny and seemingly insignificant can grow into something truly awe-inspiring is one of the things that I love most about gardening.

I'm looking forward to the rest of the series now!