An Organic Lifestyle (Organic Growing Pains)

I got some photos of the awards winners at last! The basket of mouthwatering veg was a prop brought by the photographer and not grown by me, he also brought spades ,gloves etc. All of the award winners, this is the first year of the awards so we are all inaugural winners!There was an award for novice gardeners,community gardens, allotment providers and experienced gardeners.Each category had 3 winners, receiving certificates and medals with the outright winner in each receiving a cheque also! I am no longer at home in the mornings so the computer is only accessed in the evening when I have time and having a Spanish student who spends the evening on the computer has seriously curtailed my time online!I will be back to sole use of the computer after this week as he is returning home so I will have time to visit everybody again. Gardening has also been curtailed due to the cold and frosty weather some parts of the country actually had snow yesterday! Leeks and turnips are being used and s...

I have not spent much time on the plot in the last couple of weeks due mainly to the weather conditions but yesterday was sunny and not too cold so I was able to do some clearing of beds.I dug all of the carrots ,a bit late probably as there is some worm or slug damage to a lot of them . I also cleared all of the sprouts as they seem to be early this year and I was afraid they would be past their best for the Christmas dinner! I spent last evening blanching and freezing the sprouts and some of the carrots with another session of carrots this morning.I must do an inventory of what is actually in the freezer for the winter. I pulled 2 leeks as D.Aisling is making pots of Leek and potato soup at the moment. The leek bed with the cleared carrot bed in the foreground. The beds further down were cleared by Kathryn and Gemma and covered with manure for the winter.It all looked a bit bleak yesterday. The blackcurrant bush which I pruned a couple of weeks ago, I took put about a third of the ol...

We are all survivors,consider the changes we have witnessed. We were born before television,penicillin,polio shots, frozen foods, Xerox,contact lenses,frisbees and the Pill. We were before radar,credit cards, laser beams and ballpoint pens. We were before panty hose,dish washers,clothes driers, electric blankets,air conditioners,drip dry clothing and man walking on the moon. We got married first then lived together, how quaint can you be?! We were before house husbands,gay rights, computer dating and dual careers. We were before daycare centres, group therapy,shopping malls and nursing homes. We had never heard of FM radio,tape decks, electric typewriters,artificial hearts,word processors, mobile phones,email,yogurt and guys wearing ear rings. For us Time Sharing meant togetherness not computers or condominiums. A Chip meant a piece of wood Hardware meant hardware and software was not even a word. In 1950 'made in Japan' meant junk and the term 'making out'referred to h...