Firsts

Dear Aunty,

These first 14 days of the new year have seen big red tangy and tasty strawberries, gorgeous dark green and light green zucchini, knobbly crispy and juicy Marketmore cucumbers, tarty deep red raspberries,  long skinny runner beans and snappy juicy snow peas,  frilly mixed lettuce leaves as well as fan shaped ones which crackle as eaten, mostly green stalked rhubarbs, feathery coriander and different coloured and shaped basil and tiny cherry tomatoes to go with them. ....AND not a photo to share.  They have all disappeared down hungry mouths the moment they arrived in the kitchen. Perhaps I will catch the larger tomatoes when they start turning red.

More rockmelon and butternut pumkins were sown and transplanted as seedlings AND covered with bird netting. All my other seedlings were dug out by our resident birds as they hunted for worms and bugs. I have lost a lot of direct sown seeds to my industrious little predators. These may not have enough hot days left in the season to fruit successfully but we will try. Perhaps plastic coverings over the hoops might extend the season.

One little black bird family has delighted in tossing off the straw and mulch through out all my garden beds during these last few days of steady rain. What a mess they have made.  Fortunately they left everthing alone for the 24 hours before new sustainable gardening friends arrived to have a garden tour and chat.

We had a lovely time getting to know each other and look forward to the next home visit and chatting about raised beds, climate change, seeds, Autumn planting and children. One of the ladies brought her three delightful little children with her. My daughter had a special time babysitting.

I was relieved to discover that my son, you and my other Queensland and Brisbane friends were safe following the flooding that has covered most of South East Queensland.  There were so many sad stories of lives lost and property destroyed.  You don't think that you will see two such floods in one lifetime. The 1974 floods don't seem so long ago.  We have had some flooding on the East Coast down here in Tassie too.

If the rain eases I will be outside putting the mulch back in the garden beds and thinking about what shopping has to be done before the two youngest go back to school after the Summer holidays.