Plummms! PLUMS for africa!

Our plum tree pulls through with the goods after 2 years of harsh pruning and false hopes!

Note: please dont laugh at my rather large garden ornament in the photo above. It has acted as a great ladder for picking plums. And just In case Gareth asks.. i have most certainly have not been climbing on the roof of his lovely old car...

So many fricken plums i don't know what to do! I've exhausted my sugar stash making shitloads of jam. The yummiest jam EVAH might i add. Have tried giving lots away... but they just keep coming.

Now i am battling with fruit flies and the fricken birds... just lucky i have my BB gun nearby!

My espalier apple is not far away either.. and not to mention the strawberry bed lego has adopted, a passionfruit plant thats double in size, fejoas just warming up and a machine of a lemon tree about to deliver. Just call me Jute the Fruit.

The holiday keeps on giving

So, was feeling quite lucky after the previous post and what Gaz had achieved while i was on holiday.
Turns out theres more...
Last night he teased me to death with "ive got a suprise coming for you tomorrow". I dont do suprises.. and it involved multiple tanties last night as i tried to guess what this stupid suprise was going to be.

He dragged it out all day with texts and phone calls just to make me really grumpy.

Anyway. Arrived home after work... expecting to get my suprise handed to me in the form of comfy pants, slippers or some form of warm clothing... and then he made me go freaking searching!

I stomped around and with a clue 'half of its outside and the other inside' i found my brand new mistubishi heatpump goodness installed in my garden... nevermind the yukka they had removed to install it... that yukka isnt going to keep me warm anyway!

And into the lounge i go to find the inside bit that now makes our house cosy and warm! A FIRST! :) :) :)



Best suprise ever!!!

Come for a walk around my garden with me...

Oh this is just so exciting... Our apple is loving life - look at it poking its little head out. Our lemon tree - courtesy of Brent & Sarah. Check out that new growth!!
And look at this. Stupid lawn grubs? Apparently they munch on the roots of your grass for breakfast and make your lawn look manch. Not impressed. Solution for this Dad?
I'm sorry... but this has to go. Its horrid. Why would you plant a pink camelia anywhere near rusty red coloured bricks? Not a fan.
And here are my river rocks.. courtesy of the Hutt river.. shhhh! Need some more actually.. its looking quite bare!

Hope you enjoyed that little tour.

Blossom baby blossom

When we bought this place, we were told this was a plum tree.


I got slightly excited, that was until he mentioned that it hadn't produced any fruit for a while. I'm not sure how long. In fact i dont know anything about it, but what i do know is that i'm not giving up hope just yet. Especially not today.

About 2 months ago my lovely mother-in-law/Chief gardening adviser helped find out how to revive it and then we attacked it with a huge pruning session removing all the dead and non-essential growth. We crossed our fingers and let it be, hoping it would magically put its fruit producing ability back to good use.

Yesterday, i was shifting all the offcuts into a new pile of crap for the dump. A particularly pretty pile of crap actually - because it was blossoming.
It took a good 10 minutes to realise that the blossoming was in fact the branches we removed in the plum tree revival attempt, and what do you know the entire tree is now in blossom. Cross your fingers that this is the start of our first fruit season from our very own revived plum tree!

1st of September - Its Spring!

You would think it would be easy picking a spot for a fruit tree when you have a blank canvas for a section.

Well its not. But finally, after much neglect i did it, just in the knick of time before spring!
It's not just any old fruit tree either i'll have you know. It's the beginnings of The Best EVER Braeburn Apple Espalier.

What is an Espalier you ask?

Not your average apple tree - i can tell you that much for free.

It is actually a horticultural technique to train trees through pruning and creating two dimensional patterns. Patterns have their own names like: diamond, palmate, pinnate, cordon, fan, basket weave, tiered, candelabra… I am going for the standard version, nothing fancy.



The Art of Espalier has been practised since the Middle Ages to grow trees inside castles and up on walls to save space. I love the idea. Easy to pick the fruit, space efficient and decorative all in one. I also heard that the controlled pruning actually helps the fruit mature faster. So all round.. why wouldnt you do it? A matter of having time i guess.

Gran & Grandad had a couple acting as a partition on their property... and apart from feeling the need to make my grandparents proud.. i can just see the accessability working a treat when its pumping out edible fruit left, right and centre.

And just a bit of inspiration for its future:

Garden sheds

I stumbled accross this cute wee shed.
I want itttt!
Then i remembered we have a shed. Perfectly good shed, that is until a gust of wind gets the better of it and helps it over. The boys have already threatned to tackle it one day in order to provide Gaz with an excuse to build a BIGGER man shed.

Anyway..
This reminded me about the shadow board i am yet to finish. Grandad had a badass one which i would like to replicate. I'll have to hunt down some images of it.

But it was along this lines of this one, and the image is cool so there.

I'll add it to my summer list i think.

Moral of this post?

Garden sheds are cool. Nearly falling over sheds are cool if they are kitted out with sweet shadow boards for garden tools.