When planning our tiny garden, we wanted to ensure that we’d have space where GarlicBoy could play safely when we’re home. We also wanted some storage space for garden cushions and tools etc. A playhouse seemed to tick all the boxes and he loves it. My father and I put it together a couple of days […]
Read MoreAn empty raised bed awaiting seeds is a yawning gulf of temptation to me, one that begs to be filled with any manner of plants. The problem is that when space is limited and the year is still too young to allow for the planting out of seedlings as per the carefully crafted urban garden […]
Read MoreWith the growing space that I used to use pre-baby occupied by a busy toddler who has more personal belongings than many Royals, I’ve been severely limited in how many seeds I can sow from scratch. I did have a very small greenhouse but walls of glass and busy bouncing boys didn’t really seem to […]
Read MoreMessy straggly grasses Oh how I envy those lucky souls with seas of grass to tame with a ride-on mower. Not for them the stress of wondering how best to maintain a puny couple of metres of grass marooned within a the confines of a patio and raised flowerbed surround. My patch is nowhere near […]
Read More*Drumroll please*. It is with enormous pleasure that I can now reveal the first of our 2017 harvest! It is a sprig of Rosemary, which we used in one of my absolutely favourite comfort dishes for cold weather, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s Chicken with lentils and rosemary. A puny harvest? Yes. Technically cheating as I bought rosemary […]
Read MoreStrawberries being planted in a hanging bag One of the many problems faced by people with very small urban gardens like mine is that even if you’re lucky, the amount of growing space that you have in full sun is pretty minimal. Because the garden is so small, half of the growing space that I […]
Read MoreThe only nice thing about having our poor little urban garden decimated by our builders was that I was able to start again, planting a completely toddler-friendly garden from scratch without feeling bad about rooting up existing plants (because the builders had killed them all). But one of the problems with that is that it […]
Read MoreGarlic towers is ready for our first feathery patrons A rainy weekday afternoon and an overexcited toddler with energy to burn combine brilliantly to mean one thing – bird feeders! We had a birdfeeder outside our sitting room window before we embarked on our harebrained scheme to gut and refurbish our entire house last year. […]
Read MoreAs our son has grown and changed, so has what we need from our garden. Whilst I want to grow as much as I can, GarlicBoy also needs some grass to play on, and we also need space to keep the kinds of things that I don’t want him playing with (think secateurs…) so we […]
Read MoreIn the past I’ve set myself quantitative goals for our garden. I’ve tried to save us £250 in groceries by benchmarking my harvest against the prices charged in our local supermarket and I’ve tried to grow certain foods in abundance. This year, gardening with a toddler is going to mean slightly different goals: This kind […]
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London to Land Girl 