...and on it goes into the jolly month of April..

         

One of my "learned" hens studying botany.  

Yesterday I was in the kitchen garden planting; the rain stopped for a day. This morning rainy days are back it seems for the whole week and the Commonwealth games are on now for 2 weeks.  I rather would like a "Commonwealth garden show".  At least we gardeners do not cheat.  Anyway  I planted many essentials for cooking and health like red onions, beetroot, celery,  potatoes and brassicas follow later. It is still very warm and humid and the 

kitchen garden struggles. The tiny tomatoes have grown on their own and are very prolific. Tiny fennel from thinning them out, a few beans, they really struggle in this humidity.

Lunch for one. When ready, anointed with olive oil, vinegar liqueur  and may be some double cream Brie.

Rose Perfumed delight, cuttings from last winter are already flowering the third time, stems are still quite thin, planted in my newest adventure, grandly named  "Rose Walk" when in deed it is not at all grand, it might become so, one never knows, depending on my energy.💪

April hath put a spirit of youth in everything.   William Shakespeare 

Yes, sure even here in the subtropics, April  lets the spirits of the Antipodeans soar. 

Azales flowering means April, Autumn. This is "Dreamtime" 

I received  this Azalea from a couple who visited here when I was establishing  this garden in 1989. Her  husband’s name was Rex so I called  his wife “Rexona”. Her real name was Dawn, She was a lovely lady.
There are still the google gremlins at work the spacing does not work.


Purple Salvia "Black knight" and Salvia Madrensis mingle well together.

• A favourite combination  S. Waverly and S. Black Knight.

Hoya flowers many times through the year. 

This one makes meter long trailers, sitting in a tiny basket.

The days are getting now rapidly shorter again, this means more time to read and to reflect.
“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”
Aristotle

Small tomatoes grown in the compost scattered on the garden beds. These are already made into pasta sauce.

I usually make the sauce in the Thermomix. 

Gathered in the kitchen garden; mini capsicums , some I added to a risotto. Basil became a pesto and  some was added  to the Risotto. A handful of beans, they have a hard time with the heat and humidity. Hopefully it is getting soon a bit cooler. Pitaya or dragon fruit,is lovely especially when chilled before eating.


Risotto with capsicums and pesto.

Hanging pot  does best with succulents, as it dries out very quickly

Never forget to dream,  life is so much poorer if you don’t Ts

13/04/2018

Old Rose, Marie van Houtte. 1871 Tea Rose,nice fragrance.
...and goes with this


Salvia, not sure which is which😏
..and with this

Salvia Leucantha


Buddleja , white summer lilac
....and with this and more growing in the same mix  and match garden bed.


Iceberg Rose
Garden lore
I wonder if there is an other  planet where people live and plant flowers? Ts
24/April2018
...and slowly autumn settles  to cool nights and mornings.

'Autumn' my art journal,  this might go on a canvas in Acrylics.



When you live here you get these sort of visitors. They are around and one must accept them and get used to them being around. They are quite placid and if you leave them alone, they are ok. One has to be careful with small pets as this is a Python , not poisonous but very strong and strangles her food.

Seen..

through the window...

on the eastern side of the house.


Rain and warmth have prompted some daylillies to bloom again.



Sweet, old  french rose Perle d'or.
End of month 30/4/2018
Our life is our book written by us, as every day is a new page  and ends at the end of the month. Then we can’t wait for the next month to start a new chapter again. Ts

Rollinia, Brazilian custard apple, ripening now. They must be golden yellow, fully ripe to harvest. Taste wonderful.

Small wild Gladioli are lovely to pick





Old french rose Jeanne Ducher. Roses come into their own now with the humidity and heat gone, cooler days arriving.

Clerodendrum wallichii 'Bridail veil' a spectacular shrub when in full bloom.
With this I will say goodbye until the next month which starts tomorrow;😉

...maybe we see each other again.

©Text, photos my garden Ts Lavender & Vanilla

March, lets autumn sing...

The  first few days of autumn continued the heat and humidity of summer. Last night it seems it broke, the rain came down in buckets, all night long, and today it's raining...raining..

6/March 2018

Lotus leaves in the pond  are hearing the call of autumn, preparing themselves for a rest.

Beautiful autumn colours of this pretty Hibiscus with its intense show of  reds and yellows.

Bulbs too wake up.

Lycoris

This bulb, belongs to the Amaryllidaceae family. Lycoris  originate from  China and Japan. Lycoris resembles the South African Nerines. Suddenly in March the spikes appear very quickly from today to tomorrow. They are spectacular, exotically beautiful.  40-60cm tall. They are very unpredictable depending  on seasonal factors, like rain  or dryness etc.

Bulbs wake up too.

Zephyrantes, Rainlilies.

A couple of paintings in progress. While humidity and heat were beating down, it was  nice sitting under the ceiling fan and paint while humidity and heat of the summer season was prevalent. 

Lovely to gather fruit in the garden, delicious Passion fruit.

I am getting back to you soon, enjoy what ever you are doing.

22/03/2018

The pleasure of growing
Salvia for the warm climate



S. leucantha Pink Velour
I thought I lost this beauty, but luckily I made earlier  a cutting which is now flowering.  Must remember to make a few more!




S. Anthony Parker, an autumn flowering S.




S. Meigan's Magic, flowering from spring into winter when it has its final pruning, to restart in spring again. Its white flowers contrast beautifully with its dark purple calyxes.




S.Peru Blue, a fantastic intense blue with exotic anthers makes this one a favourite. It grows easily with underground rhizomes, does not mind dry soil.



Stately and freely flowering S. Madrensis is everyone's favourite. It makes the occasional seedlings with self sowing.

These are just a few of my collection growing since many years and thriving in my garden.




Dahlias are doing well at the moment in the upper garden, they like quite a bit of moisture to flourish. At the beginning they had a struggle because it was to dry.

Tomorrow is always present to pounce... see ya..


Last day; 31/03/2018
March went so fast, I am holding on to the last day, but it is slipping ...



In the spare dry days and sun I dried some herbs to make herb salt. Peppermint, Fennel, Parsley, and Scots bonnet
chillies., I grow in my herb  and kitchen garden. I mixed  the herbs with pink Himalayan salt. I would like to and I did before, use sea salt. but I do not trust it anymore as the seas are so polluted with plastic and so much more human waste.
I guess humans must go to another evolution to be able to cope  with all these chemical waste products swamping food and water. No other animal has polluted the world as humans have. Humans must not be proud  of their achievements they are  born  on nature''s and animals backs. Humans  think they are special  but  in the short time they have been around, have done  as much as possible to destroy their own habitats. Humans are a disgusting lot towards Nature and animals.😢



Booby would love to go and play outside, but the ground is still soaking wet.





Rainy days.






Brazilian Trumpet vine, climbs over the Magnolia and on the other side over a Paperbark tree.






I will now let March slip away and wish you all  Happy Easter days.



As a child Easter was a wonderful time,  Sunshine, first time knee socks,  new shoes, new dress, colourful eggs,  hoping your own  were the best and the prettiest, rolling  them down a hill to check  which egg had the strongest  shell. We were not bothered with the churches dogma.

See you around in April.



I had a lot of trouble with blogger, I could not get into my blogs anymore despite EM and PW. I hope it is sorted now for good.👿

© Pictures my garden Text Ts

February...a walk around the garden in 28 days...

4/02/2018

February has never been my favoured month. To me it is sort of not here nor there. Summer is on its way out and autumn winks, yet there is not that much difference in the weather, it might still be hot, thunderstorms hopefully, and another sprint of flowers from summer plants. The long waited for rain has arrived and revived the garden.

Some of the daylilies are making another appearance. This is the lovely "Pure Indulgence" a strong and floriferous daylily.

Today, enjoying a coffee sitting quietly at the edge of the pond and watching all the small visitors around. Many butterflies flitting past, lovely colours, blue, yellow, some dark with white spots. Dragon flies like ballerinas dancing over the water.  Insects, bees are busy and it seems this is a place where one can hear the silence. To have the capacity to enjoy solitude is an inner force. Just now I see my little bar-shouldered dove sitting on the rim of the food bowl, enjoying the sun, lifting her wings. Small momentary observations are precious.

Little Corellas are sweet birds, welcome to the food bowl.

New leaves on cycad. Cycadophyta/Cycads, plants with a long fossil history, dinosaurs of the plant world. They typically have a stout and woody trunk with a crown of large, hard and stiff, evergreen leaves. 

February is the Month to harvest Mangoes; making Mango chutney and Mango jam for family, friends and myself.😉

Mango sorbet.




Bromeliads are a good choice for the subtropical garden, if you do not have a lot of time or do not enjoy a lot of gardening. They are nearly self sufficient. Especially the species which do not grow to fast.

8/02/2018



A glimpse into the garden, after rain nice and fresh again.



Daylily Daisy Broussard tricked by the rain to flower again.



Bougainvillea, pretty with variegation.




Yesterday it was windy to make the big palm leaves sway and rustle.




China rose "Old blush"  still pretty  past the prime.

This early morning I was in the kitchen garden; I have sown
 a row of sugar peas
a row of  beetroot and planted spring onions.




Cucumbers, Zucchii and Aubergines  are already growing. Most of the summer crop is finished, the last the pumpkins to go.

That's it for today see you around next time.🍆🐍 I have a Python in the veg garden.


TO EPICURUS, PLEASURE MEANT ONE MUST LEAD A LIFE OF RESTFUL CONTEMPLATION, EATING & DRINKING MODERATELY. ONE MUST LIVE WITHOUT ANXIETY, FORGOING THE WANTS & WORRIES OF LIFE.

16/2/2018

It was a very hot week. the beans were growing nicely but have succumbed to the heat, a few are still standing.

I am harvesting Soursop. they are big between 1-2 kg each, some are a bit smaller. It is not a big tree and I won't let it get to big.





Tree in my garden.





the fruit is fibrous, delicious and very healthy.



Soursop Ice cream a tropical delight.

I use the Thermomix reverse cycle to get the seed out as they  are enclosed in small fibrous pockets  and quite tedious to get out. With the Thermomix it works  well.

A few excerpts from https://www.organicfacts.net/health-benefits/fruit/soursop.html


While the flavor is enough to make this a popular fruit, the rich vitamin and nutrient content of the fruit includes vitamin C, vitamin B, and a number of antioxidant compounds. The juice from soursop has been used topically, while pulverized seeds and decoctions made of leaves are also popular forms of natural remedies. You can also use the leaves and pulverized seeds to brew a powerful tea, which also has a number of impressive effects on the human body.

The anti-parasitic nature of soursop has made it a popular treatment in many of the rural areas of Latin and South America, particularly in areas where parasitic infections are more common. By brewing a tea from the leaves of the fruit, you can cleanse your gut and ensure that your gastrointestinal system is running smoothly...and so much more. 

If you are interested 

https://www.organicfacts.net/health-benefits/fruit/soursop.html

28/02/2018
Last day in February. We had very hot and humid days, rain  was good, easier to get into autumn, as vegetable planting starts more seriously in March through April.

Today I have harvested again  2 big  Soursops, the last for a while. 2 big ones have fallen down and  were rotten when I found them, as it was raining heavily and I did not go up to the kitchen garden where the tree grows.










I can also harvest lots of Passion fruit now. Sweet and delicious.


I think I give everything a miss now and I see you again in  March.

My favourite time of the day when the early morning sun hits the garden.





Happy Morning, happy day. Ts





Morning is my favoured time because the whole day is still a  Mystery,Ts

Sorry, I can not reply to comments. I have alerted Google but I guess I wait in vain, nothing has been  done despite sending feedback a few times. I have tried again the replies disappear. I have seen many other bloggers have the same problem.

©Photos my garden, Text Ts Lavender&Vanilla