Gardening in the sunshine

Last year was my first year owning a garden. Last summer we grew tomatoes, courgettes, peas, sweetcorn,  lettuce, peppers, chillies, runner beans, strawberries and raspberries.

The tomatoes suffered from tomato blight and blossom end rot; the courgette plant had powdery mildew; the sweetcorn was eaten by birds as were half the lettuce plants; and the runner beans were infested by aphids! Despite all that, it was fun, I learned lots and we did get a reasonable amount to eat.

This weekend we've had lovely weather and so yesterday I mowed the lawn. I'm really enjoying the way  the garden looks at the moment. The apple trees are in blossom and the ground is covered in forget-me-nots.

I started sowing some seeds today. I've planted garlic chives, marjoram, rocket and lambs lettuce so far. I also harvested my first salad leaves for the year - they grew in a pot I used to grow salad in last year and then left outside over the winter. I guess that the warmer weather meant that some leftover seeds germinated which meant some bonus no-effort salad for me.

Afterwards, I used the instructions from house on the hill road to make some gardeners' hand scrub. It simply involved mixing together some sugar and liquid soap. I used some moisturising soap so it left my hands clean and soft.