It's been early starts for me, so that I can continue to get my work done, before the real heat arrives for the day. This morning I was awake just before 7, I had my power smoothie, which has really being helping me these past few weeks. Helping me to keep myself in balance. When I woke up, it was just starting to get light outside. I don't use curtains, as I like to have as much natural light as possible. So I could tell that it was overcast before I stepped outside. There was quite an eerie mist in the sky, that did not look very inviting and it was already quite humid as well. But I was in the garden today, so I knew it was going to be a good morning.
I've been looking after this veg garden for a few months now. Watering, a bit of weeding ( mostly just chopping and dropping, to make mulch) and feeding the soil. With the hot summers here, you really don't want to leave the soil exposed. I have made some compost tea in the past and I also have some banana skins soaking in water to make some fertiliser as well. It's always a surprise, what veg I will harvest when I come here.
It's quiet a wild garden, which is exactly how I like it. When I first came to help, it was very overgrown, with some veg growing in amongst it all. I spend a few weeks (I come once a week for 3 +hours) just trying to clean away some of the very invasive plants. The garden already had a good watering system in place, a drip system, but some of the pipes were blocked, so I had to spend some time first finding the pipes and then checking them.
Even after doing that, some of the smaller pipes, still don't work, so I have to give those areas quite a good soak, when I am there. There are also two Plum trees that need a good soaking each week. Today I spend most of my time, thinning out some of the mint that just seems to grow everywhere. It's great having mint in the garden as it helps to keep some of the insects from eating too much of the veg. But some of them were now towering over the peppers and courgette.
In the garden at the moment, there are cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, chard, melons and watermelons, lots of basil, pumpkins, squash, strawberries and aubergine. I get to take home any surplus, plus have a little munch a I work. Everything tastes so much better straight from the vine/plant. I munched on some strawberries and tomatoes today as I work in the misty morning. It was super humid and it didn't take long for me to be sweating loads.
I harvested some veg to give to the owner, courgette, cucumber, basil, tomato, pumpkin and chard, with a little for myself as well. The owner then asked me to cut away some grass, that surrounds the overflow pool for her natural pool, as it wasn't draining probably. When I went to work, I discovered that there were a few blockages to clean, before I set to cutting back the grass. It wasn't a big are, so I used a scythe, which for me is my favourite way to cut grass.
Then after that, I got to jump into her natural pool, ( which you can see up above) which was just divine. I felt really refreshed afterwards and ready to face the rest of my day.
