repairs to wood fired pizza oven

there are some cracks in the pizza oven, due to some shrinkage…probably from overuse! time to fix them, i made a mix of clay and sand and straw, 50/50 with the sand and clay and a handful of straw. if anyone is reading this who can see i have done something wrong please tell me as im flying blind on this one. i packed it on, pretty thick so hopefully it will bond to the oven that’s there and all will be good and we can eat some pizzas once more, amazingly i even managed to clean the barrow and tools at the end.

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replanting

today we planted beetroot, red onion, corn, carrots and three days ago some cucumber seedlings and yellow zucchini seedlings, and some salad greens, as well as queensland blue pumpkins, rockmelon, and honeydew melon. i really don’t know how they will go, the season has been so strange. some rockmelons and pumpkins are well on the run and the beans are re-seeding themselves, so we may be lucky yet. in the meantime there is mulching and manure and compost spreading to do in preparation for the next season planting later in summer.

salad greens, baby zucchin

some carrot seeds. ‘thumbelina’

chickory, purple kings dropping, possible rockmelon or watermelon

salad stuff doing well

sweet potato on the right, sage, herbs

front garden mix

in the front garden most things are doing well, there is such a mixture of plants all together, from roses to kaffir lime tree and sweet potato ground cover, cosmos, mint and all types of herbs. i might go feed them with some organic mix and water it in….before the cyclone hits!

sweet potato on the right, sage, herbs

front garden mix

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picture perfect Anasazi

Anasazi corn is a rare, heirloom variety (found in a cave in Utah that has been carbon dated to 800 years old). May be an ancestor of various Southwestern corn varieties. Ears have multi-colored kernels with many patterns, this one is our first harvested, it survived the wet and is such a delight to have in the garden, seen here with a tiny early gem cob, Anasazi is a bit smaller usually than other corn varieties. it will be a great addition to our rice and salad for dinner tonight

anasazi corn

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daily bread

now i have some extra time on my hands, i have been practising making some bread, i like knowing whats in my loaves, this one is made with yeast leavening and has garlic, basil and olives in it, proved twice while i watched the snake dropping off the gutter from my studio window! loaf baked for 40 or so mins and had with some butter bean dahl, toms and fresh basil. a tasty meal.

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corny moments

early gem

 

amazingly the corn has survived the wet. its an ‘early gem’ variety, none of the others made it, i will remember to plant these next season, they were planted on the high side of the garden so the drainage was good. yum.

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fragile growth

choko vine

this is the choko i planted a few months ago. it is slowly making its way up the verandah pole past the flag to grow on the trellis, tendrils searching for stable upward toe holds. the vine has been slow to grow, it has grown a thick base to stabilise it from the wind, smart eh? i think i can learn a lot from the way the plants grow as to how their longevity will be, they like to have a stable foundation and good conditions to flourish and grow fruit.

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lets slow down shall we??

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weed city

i havent been in the garden for a few weeks, due to the rain and the madness of christmas, the weeds have taken over. so i made myself a drawing pad out of some lunch bags and headed out there to do a contour drawing or two. i hand coloured it with raspberry, comfrey, society garlic, lavender, nasturtium flowers, tongue of fire beans and silver beet. i feel much better now and maybe i can go do some weeding

garden detail 1

garden detail 2

garden detail 3

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