Garden Girl Blog

Nice sunny day in Edinburgh, and it seems it is going to be a great weekend.  I have a busy day at work ahead but I am going out for lunch, which will be nice.

I did some Wii fit and the other personal trainer thing on Wii last night and my legs hurt today, I am so unfit!  I am going to try and keep it up this time as I seem to be getting bigger in all the wrong places.

Even though the garden is quite dry at the moment the slugs were out in force this morning so I removed a few but also noticed the greenfly are now infesting lots of my plants.  Will need to do something about them as well.

It never ends!

Don't take your oven door off, it is a b*stard to get back on. Note to self... never do it again!

I noticed the roast chicken at the weekend has made my nice clean oven dirty, so I took the door off to give the oven a very quick clean. An hour later I was still trying to get the door back on and did get there in the end!

No need for the Wii work out, I am already sweating like a piggy!

I have stipped the spare bed and puss has decided to have a duvet day...

Lazy puss!

I feel fine after my lack of self control with a bottle of French wine last night, so today I am going to get on and do the house work.  Maybe a bit of Wii later as I need to get back on the get fit get slimmer trail.

Sky looks blue today  but there is no sun out, so not sure what the weather is going to do.

Drank more wine with dinner than I should have... off to be bed for me! 

At work today, and have lots to do.  We are having a team lunch so that should be nice.  I just hope that there is not much going on so that we can get away!

Blue sky in Edinburgh at the moment but not sure if we will get to keep it.  We are doing very well with the weather at the moment.

Today is the final day with our visitors and no work for the husband and I.  So we went off to Kailzie Gardens in the Scottish Borders for a day out.. well morning really.   We all had a two for one card from Gardeners World so only had to pay half price!

The gardens are really nice, lots of flowers and the air is full of the fragrance of them.  It is fantastic for the senses and the bees, of which there were lots.  They have lots of bluebells under the trees and they look great with all the trees in leaf and colour every where.  They have a glass house and also formal beds.

My hayfever was playing up, I had forgotten to take anything, but I just got on with it.  The gardens are great and would like to go back again.  Here are a few pics..

We then came home and had lunch in the garden.  Was a nice sunny day again today. 

The wind dropped and the sun came out.  Barbie was fab and three bottles of wine (between 4) even better.  Lit the chim in the end and all huddled around it. We had a great afternoon and ate and drank lots! 

The husband says it is too windy for a BBQ.. but I only have BBQ food in! Oh no! 

And lots of it this morning.  I think we are going to spend they day in the garden and the husband is going to do lunch on the BBQ.  I just need to get going and go to the shop to get some food!

Hope you all have sunshine today.

We took our visitors off for a day out.  We thought it would be nice to take them along the Fife coast and to the chip shop at Anstruther, but also to go to Crail which we did not have time to do last time.

We set off early and it all was looking very overcast but we carried on.  Got there mid morning and had a walk around Crail and stopped at a coffee shop.  I shared a nice piece of coffee cake with the husband and sat looking at the sea, it was quite choppy so interesting to watch.  We then walked down to the harbour and there were lots of fishing boats in, they were loading back up with lobster pots to go out to sea.  We then walked a short part of the costal walk admiring all the flowers that were out, roses already in full bloom, must be much warmer than at home!   Here are some pictures I got at Crail.

There were a few gulls around and they seemed to be having fun just flying in the wind with their feet hanging down.  They did this time and time again and seemed to enjoy it.  Not sure what type of gulls they were, I did look in my book but could not decide.

We then drove on to the fish and chip shop for lunch at Anstruther.  We had to wait for a table but it did not take long and we all enjoyed our lunch.  The husband tried some fish but I am far to boring and just stuck to chicken.  Our visitors had fish and enjoyed it.  The weather was not as good as last time but we did get to see the lifeboat go out.  Again in the harbour there were lots of fishing boats in and although they were all empty it smelt very much of fish and was a bit stinky really!

We came home after that and were all very lazy for the rest of the day.

I read an article about organic slug pellets and were they really organic.  I am happy to say that it reported that they are, but it also said you should not use them all the time as slugs are famine food for many garden birds.

With this thought in mind, I created a bird size sign for the garden, it said... 'Famine in this garden, please eat the slugs', I also removed all food so they know that it is a famine.  The birds came and read the sign, looked at the slugs and went next door to the bird feeder there.  They are a lot more clever than I had given them credit for!

Still at war with the slugs, hand to hand combat at the moment which is mainly a plastic bag with salt in and me in rubber gloves.  I am sure the numbers are reducing but the plants are still being badly eaten.

Has been a strange old week, my team have come back from the horrible place they were in.  Some of them seem to have had their heads in the sand about the company we work for and the state of the economy in the country we all live.  It all came home to them this week and there was shock, tears and talking.  They have all come through and most of them are going to be fine.  Things do not look so good for one of them but maybe it will be the best thing for this person in the end.  They do not know that I plan to apply for VR and to leave them but they will be fine and it will be months before I leave if I do get VR.  They will move on and they will be very glad that they are still there.  I am happy and am sure they will be fine.

Things were almost back to normal today, a problem at work that we got involved in helped, but it was not our fault which was also nice!

Never got out for lunch because ot the problem! Oh well,

The husbands parents are here for the weekend so we have been out for dinner, a nice relaxing Friday evening.

Blue sky in Edinburgh but there are clouds in the distance.

Did not come to blog land yesterday but will be back up to speed when I get home today.

Busy day at work ahead and going out fo lunch. I like food...

Another busy day at work.  As so often seems to be the case with the things my team are doing at the moment, things did not go quite to plan this morning.  So I spent all morning explaining what went wrong, why it went wrong, what would we do different next time (by the way it was not our fault it went wrong so nothing different next time... not that this is really the answer they want to hear) ... what can we do to avoid it going wrong again.. well even I could do that one... fix it!  Better still go away and leave us alone so we can fix it!!!

Not that I find any of this stressfull (much) but I hate the having to tell ten different people who already think they know why it went wrong (so maybe they should try doing our jobs) why it really went wrong and then them want to discuss their prefered ideas of why it went wrong and then having to explain why I know that is not the real answer... without quite having to say you are wrong..........arrrrrrrhhhhh.  
Okay breath. 1.....2......3.... that is much better..

It was wet this morning before going to work and the slugs were all over my grass, with a few minutes to spare a few of them got dispatched to the land of salt, the grass looked much better after. 

Work again tomorrow.  Going to go in super early and try and slog through my emails... I have lots... not good, am sure the little delete button will help 

Mr and Mrs Wood Pigeon are getting fruity... well Mr is and Mrs seems to show little interest.  He is going round the garden chasing her bowing as soon as he gets in front of her.  It is very sweet but she has taken to just walking off.  Bless him, he is trying very hard but she just does not seem interested.

For dinner tonight I did Usky's lamb glaze recipe, very nice it was.  I had to do it in a frying pan as it was not a day for BBQ and I do not have a griddle but it worked okay.   The husband enjoyed it.  The recipe is on Anti-Weight Watchers, I would insert a link but do not know how.

Back to work tomorrow, we have lots of fixes going in tonight for our recent problems after our big upgrade so hope that things will be much better tomorrow and lots of our little niggles will be gone.

To celebrate the arrival of summer we turned the heating off yesterday.  Now the house is freezing, I need to go and find socks and start running around doing the house work.  Wonder how long it will be before we turn it back on.

Spent most of the day in the garden pottering around but got lots done.

I pulled weeds, seems they can grow quicker than I can pull, but there are less of them now.  I also put out a few of the plants I have been growing, fingers crossed for no more frost.  The husband gave the table and chairs a coat of oil and they look really good.

After several hours of pottering around I have a little rest with a glass of wine on my sun lounger on the top deck, lots of birds came to the feeders just a few feet away from me.  Here are some of the visitors.

They were not going to be put off feeding just because I was there!

I have a babysitting job for work to do now so will be working for a few hours... Oh well, I get paid for it.

The sun is out so will pop out in the garden for a while this morning.  The weather man says it is going to rain later so will get on and get out soon.

The starlings were up early looking for food, they are eating me out of house and home!  Here are a few pics, they always look oily to me.

I have an abundance of natural resource in my garden which I am quite happy to pick and share.... if I could just find a recipe for slug pie I could make my fortune! 

It has been raining so they have come out and were all over the grass, I just had to go out and pick them up.  Some of my plants are looking a bit sorry for themselves and rather eaten, the slugs must have been having a party!

Bad slugs.

Work has been very busy.  After our big implementation there have still been no major disasters but lots of little things have come out of the woodwork and these have kept us very busy.

I did take Thursday off and went out with the husband and got a new apple tree. It has three varieties on one tree so hope they will all do well.  It is planted and a nice drop of rain has watered it in.

Looks like the whole weekend is going to be very wet so not sure I will get out in the garden much.

That it was going to be -1.7 last night!  That was how cold it was in our garden at 5:30am today.  There was a heavy frost on the grass and the little cosmos plants I put in on Sunday are dead.  I am just glad that I did not put the lot out and will wait longer for the rest.

Garden centres must love this.  I did not buy my plants because I had grown them from seed but I have seen lots of people getting all their bedding plants etc and now they are all going to need to be replaced, must cost a fortune.

I know several people at work who have last plants over the last few days.  Hope the frost stops soon.

Got up this morning and noticed there was a frost... Oh no, I put out lots of my plant yesterday!  It was -1 in the garden at 6am and the frost was all over the grass so I could not go and check the plants out.

I went off to work and thought I would check them out later.

Today is really my day off so I only stayed in until about 11am and then came home.  Had some stuff to do in the house and then remembered to go and check the plants.  Most of them seem okay but the Cosmos seem like they have got a bit caught by the frost on top, I hope they will recover. I am not going to put any more out for a while.

I then got on and did a bit more of the deck.  I picked up another tin of oil on the way home, now is that five or six we have used?  Anyway I set to work and within a few hours..... I had finished it!

At last it is done and looks fab.  Just in case you do not remember, the deck was put in about 5 years ago and we have not done anything to it since and this winter it got so dirty it was dangerous because of how slippery it was, it looked very unloved.  Over the last few weeks the husband and I have cleaned it and oiled it, it has taken lots of effort.

Here is a picture now we have finished.  I forgot to take one before we started but they were very grubby.

We had our dinner out on it tonight to celebrate!

Very busy day has been had by all.

The husband and I have been out in the garden doing a bit more with the deck, almost out of oil again so need to get just one more tin and that will be us, picutres when it is finished.

I then moved on to doing a bit of weeding and I have also started putting out a few of the plants I have been growing.  The beds are already starting to look full, so I am sure within a few weeks they will look disorgnasied but full of flowers, seems to be how they end up every year!

The puss went off on a hunting expedition and came back with a mouse just as it started to rain really hard.  She dumped it at my feet and made a run for the house to keep dry.  Big fat mouse it was but not enought for dinner. 

Took a few pictures of the flowers in the garden after the rain had stopped and here are some.

Is back.  I will try and be a garden girl today!

Today has been very wet and not much going on at all.  The husband and I went out for a while this morning to the shops and then came home and sat on the sofa and fell asleep.  Nice but very lazy.

Have just been out in the garden, it needs to be weeded and I am thinking of planting some of my home grown plants out, I do not think we will get more frost now, but it is too wet today so maybe next week.

The match did not work.  Number three has happened, again I think we will get the blame.  Oh well fingers crossed the rest of the day will be clear.

Work has not been good, over the last two days two things have happened, that have impacted hundreds of people and they have both been the fault of me and my team.  We did not do them on purpose but they could have been avoided, but we have learnt from them.. not that it helps.  I am a worried what number three will be... maybe I should ring in sick tomorrow. Or would breaking a match do the trick?... need to go find one..

Makes me very fed up.

Very windy in Scotland tonight.  These two are taking shelter in my neighbours garden and trying to hide from the wind.  Poor things.

Click to make big.

Today should be my day off but have had to come into work for a bit.  Will not be here all day so not a big problem.

Edinburgh is cold, windy but currently dry.  The weather man says rain later but we will have to wait and see.

Sky is blue today and at the moment no clouds at all.  The weather man says there may be some rain later but is not looking bad.

At work today so will be inside anyway.

Very wet here today, lots and lots of rain.  The waterbutt, which was getting empty, should be almost full again now.  I do not think it had ever been that low before, even in summer.

I was at work today and as always super busy.  We are having to do some sort of time and motion analysis at the moment, you would not think we are professionals.  We have to write down in a spreedsheet what we do all day, as with all these things I keep forgetting to do it and then have to make it up.  Not sure what it is going to show really other than my lack of memory. 

Lunch time today I did something different, I went to Yoga.  I used to go on a Monday but have not been for a while as the teacher has been sick.  Because I was missing it and doing nothing instead, I arranged to go with a chap from work, to one during our lunch.  This does mean talking extra lunch but I always do extra hours so not an issue.

Anyway we turn up and it was like yoga on speed.  My old class was relaxing with a bit of streatching and balance stuff for an hour.  This was like 1000 miles an hour stretching and balance stuff with jumping between.  I was very tired at the end of it and a bit hot.   The chap I go with has spent £26 on a Yoga mat so he says we have to go back next week!  Oh well I am sure it is good for me and was nice to do something different and get away from work at lunch time.

Also you get a free peep show as the whole class gets changed in one room.  Me and the chap I went with got changed at work and we only went in the room to get our jackets.  We had not know that everyone would be undressed in there but there was two other men from the call in their pants...and several girls. I had to avert my eyes! All very communal!

My visitors are leaving tomorrow morning so the washing up fairy will be gone.  At the moment if anything thing is left in the sink it is washed up in just a few minutes.  But this is all going to come to stop tomorrow when they leave.  I will have to go back to doing it myself.   At least the ironing is fully up to date!

Lots of rain here today so not much being done at all. Got a bit of work done this afternoon and back there tomorrow morning.  Lots to do so will be very busy.

Very wet today but does not seem to be slowing the chaffinches down.  One poor female chaffinch has four males chasing her round the garden trying to sit on her for some strange reason... Not sure what is going on there! The starlings look very wet but they are still enjoying the pickings to have had in the garden.

No work in the garden today, might dial in and some proper work in a few mins.

The day out went well and everyone had a good time.

We headed off over the Firth of Forth road bridge and then turned to go along the coast.  The sun was shining with puffy white clouds in the sky.  We passed lots of fields with various crops and rape seed with its sunny yellow flowers out in full.  Lucky for me the rape seed does not seem to bring on my hayfever this year.

We saw several fields with swallows flying low above the crops getting the insects, they fly so low and turn right at the last minute to get an insect or avoid a crash, they are amazing to watch.  Another field had an Oyster Catcher hanging around in it, doing what ever they do in fields.  Lots of sea gulls all around, making the crows look small.

We saw a few very nice villages and some gardens that looked very interesting but we headed on to Anstruther as we were a bit hungry and looking forward to getting to the chip shop.

When we arrived, the village was very busy but we were able to get parked okay.  We then went for a walk just along the front before lunch and then headed in for lunch.  We decided to eat in the restaurant bit and were lucky to find that there was no queue so were shown straight to a table.  We ordered, I went for battered sausage and chips, there was loads to choose from.  The food did not take long to come and we were in no way disappointed.  The chips were light and golden, they were crispy and not at all fatty, the sausage was very tasty and they even give you bread and butter.  We all very much enjoyed our lunch and all agreed it was the best chip shop food we have had!  Long way to go, but might go again some time.

We then went for a longer walk around the harbour and took a few pics, here are some.

We then made our way home and got on with doing a bit more of the deck.  We are almost there but need more oil again, and the rain to hold off a bit longer.  Tired now...

Today the sky is a wonderful blue and there are white puffy clouds, but a bit of a cold wind.  The forecast has cheered up and they are saying the rain will hold off another day.  We are off to the East Neuk of Fife today to see some of the fishing villages and maybe get fish and chips at an award winning fish bar there.  Should be a good day out!

Yesterday the husband and I spent the day in the garden (again), I pottered in the greenhouse and got lots of little plants potted on and some more seeds in.  Most things are doing very well and I am going to have lots of plants to go in the garden.

The husband carried on the mammoth job of sorting out the deck.  I am happy to report that it is now clean and we found that under all the green mush and black dirt there is wood that still even looks like wood!  It came up much better than we had thought it would and almost looks new.  The only job left is to oil the bits that were cleaned yesterday.  The big deck is now fully oiled and finished, we have two chairs that still need to be cleaned, to go with the table and two chairs already done.  We hope to get back early this afternoon and do some more.  Will post a picture when done!

Sun is out this morning and the starlings are very busy digging in the grass and on the hill behind our house, they look like little figher jets coming into land, they are very sweet!   They are also very good at eating the grubs in the grass and for free!

We are going to get on with the deck again today and maybe even get it finished, our visitors are also going to come out and do a few bits in the garden as well.  Then maybe tomorrow we will go for a day out.

I had something done I have never had done before yesterday and it was fab...

The husband had the day off work so he stayed at home to meet the man who came to clean my oven for me. Lazy I know but I could not get it fully clean anymore so I got a man who can, and he did!

I am most impressed, it did cost a bit, but I can live with that once in five years!  Bit sad I know!

Looks like a beautiful day in Edinburgh and they are saying the weekend is going to be great!  The husband is going to try and get some more work on the deck done today which will be great.

I am at work and lots to do so off to get on.