Mowing, washing and watering

We've just got home from being down in the city since Wednesday (well, to be specific, we got home yesterday afternoon) and this morning I started on attacking the rather alarmingly large pile of washing, and mowed the lawn.  I deliberately left the lawn un-mowed before we left, to try and conserve some moisture while we were away.  Boy, can I see the dry spots now that it is mowed! So sprinklers are running full steam this morning....

I do enjoy looking across the garden once its all neat and tidy, and get all sorts of ideas in my heads about getting out there and doing some planting to fill in gaps, and starting new garden beds.  But I get these ideas when its stinking hot, and they don't seem to proceed much further...(see the empty spaces in the bed below...)

While we were away we called in to see The Husband's brother, wife and kids, and while the kids were running around quite ferally  having a great cousinly catch up ;-),  I raided her garden for some things to help fill those gaps.  And came home with this little bundle of cuttings.

A few different easy-to-strike (she tells me) plants, currently shoved in some water.  Everything appears to be in good health after the trip home, so hopefully they will survive my striking attempts.

One thing that seems apparent to me, after filling two trolleys at the supermarket before coming home:  we are going to have to become more self sufficient, or spend rather a lot more money on groceries and fresh produce. Without going too far into politics, this carbon tax they are gabbing on about will have a significant impact on the price of all food supplies, affecting all facets  - growers, manufacturers, transport - and if the bloke producing it doesn't go broke, the price of the end product will go UP.  Which means we all pay more for what goes on our table.

So this vegetable garden business has to get more serious.

I couldn't get lettuce, broccoli or zucchini seedlings, which is a bummer.  I did get seeds, but seeds aren't as instant (I like brooding over my seedlings!)  I've spoken to The Husband as well about getting the vegetable gardens fully bird proofed, in a way that doesn't give the vege gardener the total grumps when it comes to tending the garden.

Right now it give her MORE than the  grumps, it inspires more than a bit of foot stomping and use of quite unladylike language.

So that is what is on my horizon in the next little while, doing some gardening, and hoping that it isn't too hot and too early for the seedlings I have bought.  I normally wait until April/May, so this will be quite an experiment to see if the seedlings can thrive.  I am trying capsicum again - they are the slowest growing and most annoying plant ever to grow, and every year I swear never to put them in again.  Last year I had a dreadful time with both cauliflower and broccoli - some nasty bug just annihilated them (the local ABC gardener guy on the radio is heavy on using urine + water to repell all nasties from the vegetable garden, so lets see if I get desperate enough to start collecting the family's pee every morning!)

Hooroo for now - off to tend to the washing and coo at my seedlings!