Saturday 5 April 2014

Garden play!

One of the reasons we wanted this house (and went over budget for it), was for the back garden. It's not acres of wonderland, but it's there and it's very private and it's ours, and I think it has big potential.

We moved in at the end of last October when it was freezing, and the back garden looked like a junk yard covered in freaky leaf creatures and moss monsters - some seriously scary looking weeds! and I was way too focused on Halloween (I love Halloween!) to even think about it.

Now it's spring I'm determined to be a slave to it whenever I can. I'm a total gardening amateur, but I really want a lovely outdoor space for Charlie to play in during the summer (and barbecues and a couple of loungers would be lush!)

There are so many outdoor activities available to you when you have a garden!

We're going to start on the lawn tomorrow by ourselves. I'm guessing it's going to be a long, strenuous process; pulling up all the weeds and what look like doc leaves (which means nettles are around somewhere, I think!), raking up the bald patches and planting all the lawn seed - then manually watering it all (we left our hosepipe at our last house so we now have a watering can!)

So what we did, along with our mini-Gardener, is tackled the flower bed which leads up the path. We managed to finish a third of it before Charlie started his whinges. He's only 21 months so I'm pretty proud that he lasted half an hour!

We pulled up all the dead trees, shallots, and weeds, and saved all the worms by putting them onto the grass (hope they escape into next door!)

Then we raked it over, mixed in some Miracle-Gro, and planted some peas and some other mixed flowers. We also planted carrots, pumpkins and sun flowers in little pots which are in the kitchen, ready to be re-plotted outside in large trays and pots outside. (We have a little patio at the top).


Carrots, pumpkins, and sunflowers.


Please note: All the junk at the back is NOT ours, it was kindly left dumped there by the previous tenants and our landlord is taking forever to get it shifted!

My little helper :)


Pulling up the prickly (half dead) tree!

Exploring the overgrown grass!


   Raking up the soil.


Fascinated by the worms, he thought they were snakes!

                                        Digging and planting the seeds!

I'm planning on buying a wooden bird table and making an activity out of painting it multicoloured. I LOVE how many birds there are around here even though the place is crawling with cats! (Cleo isn't an outdoor cat so she won't be catching any!)

I really want to plant a blossom tree at the back of the lawn for Earth Day.


Linking up to fun activities in the outdoors over at Coombe Mill! :)

5 comments:

  1. Sounds like a fab project, it will great when it's finished. Worms are great fun for little ones aren't they :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I need to tackle our garden and start making it nicer #countrykids

    ReplyDelete
  3. A whole family project which is great fun for Charlie to be able to dig and explore all the insects that he comes across. It looks like you have your work cut out for you - although you have made a great start. I'll look forward to seeing how things develop and I hope the seeds grow well and brighten up your garden. Thanks for linking up and sharing with Country Kids.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Always good to get little ones involved in gardening early on. I'm not keen at all hence we still have a paddock rather than a garden as such and N is showing no interest in planting little pots of anything either

    ReplyDelete
  5. Sounds like a great project, can't wait to see it when it's finished. Lovely to see your little one having fun helping out too :) x

    ReplyDelete