Getting our Garden ready

I was never a gardener until I moved to England. Mainly because we always lived in subdivision with lots of rules such as no vegetable gardens, no clothes lines etc, etc. Never really bothered me but now that I live in England I am a getting the green thumb. We still live in a subdivision but the rules are much more relaxed here. You can have a clothes line and yes I do hang out my laundry on warmer days, you can have pet chickens in your back yard. Our neighbor has 4 and we chicken pet sit whenever they go out of town. Having a small vegetable garden is practically mandatory here if you have any land to your home (no matter how small). I love going into garden shops here because they are so unique and unlike anything in the states. You can find the most interesting gardening tools, supplies and anything you need to do gardening no matter the size of your property.

This weekend we got our first chance to get outside to prepare our garden for planting. So after hitting the garden shop for necessary supplies the children and I got started. First I had to rethink our garden plot and made big decision to move one of the bushes left by the landlord. I originally planned to transplant this bush to a new location in the garden but the root system proved too much for me and after struggling for about an hour I gave up and got out the garden shears. My daughter was quite upset that I choose this path!


I didn't take a picture of the before bush, trust me it was huge. This is after taking the garden shears to it.







My daughter's face watching me cut down the bush. There were real tears and I did feel a little bad about that -- but I had a goal, bad Mommy!:(. Princess clung to those branches for at least an hour. I think we have read the books the Lorax and the Wishing Tree to many times:(! I still need my husband to dig out the main roots but at least now I have a bit more room to place our raised beds. Goal accomplished but at what cost to my child's emotional well being....




My son's contribution was to collect all the slugs and snails found in the garden
and toss them over the garden fence. I would have used the slug/snail killer formula I had bought at the garden shop but after the bush ordeal I thought better of it. I am sure I will see those snails again, and when the kids aren't looking.....




Every year the Potato council, from Scotland, sends free potato seeds to schools and homeschoolers and this year we received two varieties the Rocket and Rudolph potatoes. Along with the seed potatoes comes planting directions, lessons plans, charts and recipes to try. They also have a school contest to see which school produces the largest crop of potatoes. We did this last year and we had a great crop, so I was excited to try again this year!


Planting and watering our potato seeds.






Next I got a nifty little herb container for my kitchen window and planted some coriander and mint. I might get another one and add a few more herbs to my kitchen window. I use these herbs when cooking Thai meals:)














After mopping around for about an hour, Princess finally got over her shock, dismay and disappointment of my need to destroy a perfectly good bush (these are her words).

Her smile returned and she played in her sand box and created a Pokemon castle. WHEW!!!:)











I will be linking up to the Homeschool Garden Challenge once a month. If you would like to join in go here: