Autumn harvest

All the pumpkins, marrows & butternut squash have now been picked also lots of chillies although my chilli plants are still producing. We had an early heavy frost this year on the 19th of October, which killed off my potatoes but luckily that was all.

The first parsnips that I've ever managed to grow, hopefully we'll be picking these up to Christmas.

I've picked some of the red cabbages & pickled them.

Marrow & date chutney, chilli jam.

This year I decided that it was a waste to just carve a pumpkin for Halloween especially when it was home grown. All this from one small pumpkin - spiced tea bread, pumpkin bread & pumpkin soup all delicious and made many times since. You can find the recipes here.

August randomness.

We've been so busy planting, harvesting, watering, weeding & preserving that my blog has been neglected so here's a quick catch up in pictures.

caterpillar control, I never realised that shield bugs like to munch caterpillars.

My 2 hens are in moult but they are such good girls that I'm still averaging 9/10 eggs a week.

The allotment has also kept me in flowers through the summer.

Piccallilli

Runner bean, mango,coconut & Indian spice

Sweet & sour cucumber pickle, Rhubarb & curry chutney, Rhubarb & ginger jam.

Greengage jam, not grown by me but a bargain find.

Blackberry jam.

Bread & butter sandwich pickle

Still here!

We're still here beavering away, so much to do I haven't updated for 6 weeks or so. Her's a quick update of the past few weeks.

I was delighted to find baby cauliflowers this week, they are tiny probably not much bigger than a golf ball.

Amazingly these peppers are just growing now, I think it's because of the lovely sunshine that we have had for the past few weeks.

We also have a couple of squash, I'm hoping that they'll continue to grow.

and more marrows, luckily my family are loving stuffed marrow:)

Lily had another sunflower, a bit bigger this time.

I've also done a lot of weeding

and found some creepy crawlies, this one was on an aubergine plant, it's a flower crab spider, which changes colour to blend in with the background. I assume this one had just come off the gherkin flowers.

Butterflies that left some

not so welcome visitors

We've harvested quite a few things lots of sweet peas.

yummy sweetcorn

There's still plenty growing turnips, swedes, carrots, parsnips, beetroot, leeks, cabbage, cauliflowers, sprouts, broccolli, chard, pak choi, kale, courgettes and squash. I've planted potatoes that should be ready for Christmas and I have red onions and garlic to go in this week.