Pretty

This is a pot of garlic chives.  They a fabulous hit of intensity to a coleslaw and look much more understated in flower than they taste!

The great survivors

These cavolo nero - black Tuscan cale - were sprouted at the reinventors' last rental property.  Then dug up and left in pots for several months.  They were the first vegies planted not long after we moved in.

They've now been through two summers and are heading for their third winter. 

The ravaged leaves at the back are the result of a bug and some attention from the chooks.  Each stalk is more than a metre tall, and look at the lush new foliage.  We can't bear to pull them out.

Not one of those, then.

Another vine from the chook pen muckings-out.  We thought it was a cucumber.

And neither of us particularly likes rockmelon.  Oh well.

Bounty

This vine grew out of chook pen muckings-out.  We've had one enormous pumpkin already that, after we gave chunks of it to three  neighbours, fed us for four meals. 
This is the ripest of its next five fruit.

And they're r-r-r-r-roasting!

A cheeky blend of columbian and guatamalan arabica beans, roasted on the creative reinventor's home-wrangled roaster, in our stable and sold only to the most discerning customers.

The monster

The reinventors bought a range of seeds from the Diggers Club, including Boston Marrow pumpkins.  Which don't seem to be available any more.

The  plants, two of them, took to the spring garden with great gusto.  The muckings-out of the chook pen most probably helped.  The bees took to the flowers and we got our first pumpkin a couple of weeks ago.  It started off looking like this:

A mere two weeks later, it's considerably bigger than a basketball:

The reinventors are a little worried that, by the time this pumpkin is ripe, it will be so big as to be inedible.  Thanks again to the chook pen muckings-out, we have another pumpkin vine, probably a jap, that has fruit.  We shall not go without.

Favourite things

The practical reinventor has finally gotten her sewing machine sprinkler.  It's a late 1950s Auto So that had its cords removed by someone with no respect. 

It came to Marmalade Cottage via an op shop, discovered under a shelf, covered in dust, five minutes to closing.  It was $5.  It was quite a sophisticated machine in its day, with a variety of decorative stitch cams. 

The foot went to another vintage machine, and the bakelite plugs have been put into a drawer of interesting bits and pieces, perhaps to have another life too.

It's the perfect combination of two of the practical reinventor's favourite things: sewing and gardening.

Pollination

Last year there was much pumpkin leaf action, a bit of flowering, but not a single fruit.  This year the bees have been busy.

We have boston marrow pumpkins, carefully raised from seed

And something that went through a chook and ended up on the vegie bed when the chook pen muckings-out were spread.

And there are these:

Despite Perth's record temperatures these last few days, the established plants are holding up well under their blanket of mulch.

At the front door

When the reinventors are at the back of the house, or in the back garden or listening to music, it's impossible to hear anyone at the front door.

There has been much discussion about some sort of device to alert the reinventors of the arrival of a guest.

This is where it needs to go.

Here's the creative reinventor hard at work.

When you come to visit, you can ring our bell!

Getting ready for Christmas

The practical reinventor has a new sewing table - it's one of those clever ones that has a gas lift and folds away to look like an innocuous corner cabinet.  She has the luxury of not having to fold it away, as she has a whole room dedicated to sewing.  She also has the luxury of the creative reinventor who finds her wonderful birthday presents and always indulges her sewing and craft projects. 

On the new table at the moment is

a selection of tree ornaments, and

a Santa hat for the practical reinventor's Executive Director, a Yamaji Man.  The Yamaji are the Native Title Owners (Aboriginal people) from the Mid-West region of Western Australia.  He has very graciously agreed/been bullied into having a division Christmas party and playing Santa for the compulsory Kris Kringle.

That garland along the bottom is supposed to be gum leaves and the astute reader will recognise the Aboriginal flag.  The practical reinventor had never seen sparkly felt before - it makes a very good, Christmassy gum leaf garland.

Chook update

Shirley is still being terribly pleased with herself and talks constantly to the chicks. 

She's taught them about real food, and they've embraced the varied diet that the Marmalade Cottage CWA enjoys.

Watermelon is a particular favourite.

With a view to the future

The practical reinventor loves gardening surprises - only the nice kind, of course.  Which is why she usually leaves plants to go properly to seed before pulling them and redoing the garden bed in question.

After only one real growing season, Marmalade Cottage has rather a lot of surprise seedlings.

This is the most beautiful, soft carpet of rocket seedlings.  There are also marigolds, assorted tomatoes, lots of pumpkins/zucchinis (they're too small yet to be able to tell the difference), silverbeet and capsicum.

Over-ruled

After the heartbreak of the last lot of chicks, the practical reinventor swore the next time a hen went broody she'd be unceremoniously dunked in cold water and frog-marched into the sun.

And then our remaining chick, Shirley, who had only just started laying, went broody.  There was frog-marching, but before a regime of cold baths and firm talking-tos could happen, the creative reinventor prevailed and we got her some fertile eggs.

And so she sat on her nesting box, with feathers fluffed and looking self-important.

And three weeks later the Marmalade Cottage CWA boasted five new members: Violet, Enid, Marjorie, Gordon and Barry.

Of course, neither of us has a clue how to sex chickens so the names are pure whimsy.

Then there was the first casualty.  We're saying it was Barry, because young boys are generally self-destructive.  One chick got out of the re-re-re-reinforced chook pen - goodness knows how - and we found it eviscerated up the other end of the garden.  Poor, pathetic little thing.

At least this time, we're confident it wasn't kelpie Jodie or tabby Lola.

Anticipation

Our first planting of tomatoes were mostly sick plants rescued from the trolley in the corner of the garden section of the Green and Orange Temple to Lost Weekends.

They seem to be doing all right.  The next lot has been grown from seed (Rouge de Marmande), and will be ready in six or so weeks.

The third lot is just emerging (Granny's Throwing Tomato - a Diggers Club variety, good apparently for salads and throwing at one's nemesis)