Wednesday 27 February 2013

Homemade garden stove.

Have you been in the garden on a cold damp day and wished for a small stove to warm your hands,boil water for some soup mix or best of all have a nice cup-a-tea, here's  the stove I use..I made this one last year, got the idea of the internet.I was surprised how fast it could boil a cup of water.
 


 I used these type of cans to make my stove.

Monday 25 February 2013

Iris pictures

A few pics of some of our Iris plants,I wanted to include them with my other  posts about Iris but I just found the card they are on.The plants pictured at the top are the ones I saved seed from.





Sunday 24 February 2013

Thrifty gardener

I try to be thrifty in the garden when I can,so these 'eyes' were cut from a bag of  grocery potatoes that were sprouting. This is good way to get seed for next spring. I cut them a good 1/2 inch thick,then I'll keep them in the cellar at 0-5c for the next 5 months till planting time.The remaining potatoes we eat.
   







reds



netted gems

 russet

seed potatoes 

Thursday 21 February 2013

New garden pics

I took these pictures yesterday Feb 20/13 to check the snow depth on my vegetable garden, almost a meter, normal for this time of year.

                                 





Monday 18 February 2013

Mrs. Beeton ......

I'm posting these images because I believe this to be one of the books referred to by Peter Thoday on the Victorian Kitchen Garden series.As readers of this blog would know I'm loved the series with head gardener Harry Dodson and presenter Peter Thoday.I love old books and this is a beautiful one.

I used these pictures with permission from here.


                                       











 Isabella Mary Beeton, 1836 1865, universally known as Mrs Beeton, was the English author of Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management, and is one of the most famous cookery writers. Isabella was sent to school in Heidelberg, Germany, for two years where she became an accomplished pianist and afterwards returned to Epsom. After her marriage to publisher Samuel Beeton, Isabella Beeton began to write articles on cooking and household management for her husband's publications. She was also involved in the English Woman' Domestic Magazine and The Queen, launched in 1861. "Whether she was visiting Paris, writing articles, dealing with layout, even demonstrating how to cut out a pattern for a perplexed reader, Mrs Beeton's energy and organizational skills were crucial to the management of the publishing house." (DNB)
In 18591861, she wrote a monthly supplement to The Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine. In October 1861, the supplements were published as a single volume. Later this was to become popularly known as Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management, and it was essentially a guide to running a Victorian household, with advice on fashion, childcare, animal husbandry, poisons, the management of servants, science, religion, and industrialism.

http://www.rookebooks.com/product?prod_id=8906

Sunday 17 February 2013

Blue Flag Iris

I saved these Iris seeds from one of our plants we have in the garden.We love the Iris as an ornamental grass and the short lived bloom is as pretty as any in the garden.I started these plants around Christmas, they seem to be doing ok so far.

Read an interesting article on iris plants here.









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