Things are growing again!

Well it's that time of year again when is time to decided what to put where..

Every year I have the same dilema.. I say we will not grow as much as we did last year...that we will take it easy and just grow lots of what we actually want..

This year for once I think I am almost there!..well almost...





The veg plot is comming along nicely and the tomatoes in the greenhouse too...






















The garden itself after a few days of rain has really gone green........


















I have been busy with the window boxes..with help from Peggy of course.....

Happy Easter!

The local girls of the village come singing and dancing....a very old tradition that's a pleasure to experience.
















Although not religious myself I always enjoy the Bulgarian tradition of colouring the eggs at Easter,
I try not to get too much dye on me and everything around me...but it's hard!

It's Spring again!

Now that the weather has picked up it's off we go again!


Dodging the rain we have managed to get half of the garden in order ready for our
first guesthouse guests of the year at the beginning of April.

Peas, onions, potatoes, spinach and carrots are now in along with some early tomatoes in the greenhouse.It's wonderful to get going again!Looks
a little bare at the moment but things are already coming up!

















Some of the bulbs are flowering nicely adding some colour to the garden which is already becoming a magnet for all the little critters!





















And some wonderful sunsets now.....





















Peggy and her friend Raffa help pot up the tomato plants

Out for an hour or two....

This week has brought some very unusual warm spells....up to
18 degrees!

Just for a an hour or two Peggy and I got outside and got our hands and paws dirty!

It was so lovely to feel the sun on my back while pulling at the weeds
which, despite the severe minus temperatures last week , are unfortunately looking
fit and healthy!!
Ah who says you can't have everything.....weather forecast is snow at the weekend...
At least we will not be able to see the weeds then!

Merry Christmas

October.....getting a bit chilly....

Well after being away on a break for a few weeks it's really noticeable now that the weather is slowly turning , getting a little chilly in the evenings when the sun goes down.
Still we are determind not to light the cental heating just yet!

All the leaves are turning colour and it really is so beautiful!




















Still a busy time in the garden and we are a little behind this year....
With the possibilty of a frost next week we have been digging up all the susceptable tubers like the Gladioli and the Cannas.





The Cannas have grown so much this year that we had to split them before placing them to dry pre storage!It's hard to believe that 3 years ago we started off with a gift from a neighbour of just 4 small tubers...here now there must be 20 or more 'clumps' of tubers!
Great for next year!!!







We also planted out our garlic and onion sets.
With the garlic we are experimenting with 4 different types...
Some from Turkey, Malta and 2 types from Bulgaria an early and a late variety.
So we will see......






























It's time also to clear up in the garden..but this will take us well into November...so much tidying up to do....though some of the flowers are still in full bloom.
Ah well at least it will keep us warm!!!

4 years today!

Today we quietly celebrated our 4th anniversary of being here in Srebarna!

We cannot believe that the time has gone so quickly and here's to another 4 years!



We were still busy with lots of guests and Mike had the opportunity to Volunteer over in Malta with CABS. (see srebarnabirding.blogspot.com)

We cleared out the greenhouse this week and finally harvested the chickpeas!


As you can see there were not very many.They only survived in the greenhouse, those outside did not do well at all.Although fun and interesting to grow I don't think we will bother next year.The yield was low and they took up quite a bit of space.

We did however really enjoy, or rather Mike did, making our own fresh hummous...




After eating this it all seemed worth it!








We also used up all the green tomatoes by making some fantastic green tomato chutney, it's a great way to use them all up with no waste.