The Rest of October

 As predicted, there was quite a bit going on during October and it’s about time I got it down here.

It was the month to get some things happening in the garden.  Our beans and corn were planted.  We have had a good success rate with our beans.  A couple needed replanting, but all are up now.  There has only been one casualty to snails……so far.  The corn has only just started to come up.  We’ll give it a few more days, but may have to do some replanting.

We planted our zucchini and egg plants.  This zucchini is planted where last year’s beans were.  It is looking so very healthy.

This one is from the same punnet, but planted in a different bed.  Mick actually lifted it a couple of days ago and added lots more compost underneath it.  Hopefully, it will do better now.  Next year we must remember to plant them where the beans were.  It just goes to show how crop rotation to where the nitrogen has been fixed from legumes really makes a difference.

The eggplants have not done well either, so they have also been lifted and replanted in richer soil.  If they don’t come good in the next week or so, we will buy some new seedlings.

We have picked our first strawberry and now have the plants netted to try to keep the birds out. 

The potatoes are going gang busters.  Fingers crossed for a good yield in the coming months.  You can see the netted strawberries in the background.

Our Zephirine Drouhn rose has really got established now and is looking a picture on the arch.   It is ideal, as it has no thorns and will flower for most of the warmer months.

The sweet peas on the other side are also looking lovely.

We did have a couple of very light frosts during the month, so were covering all frost tender plants each night.  Fingers crossed, there won’t be any more, but it is definitely still a possibility.

We had a couple of days giving things a cut back and also had a big clean out in the potting shed.  It was looking rather neglected.  It still has turned into a dumping ground, but is a lot better than it was.  

In the process, we realised that the zygo cactus were looking very sick. They have now been brought down to the back verandah, along with a few succulents that we bought at an open garden.  But where to put them?  Down came the old plant stand we have had for ever.  It originally came from Mick’s Mum.  There is an old photo of it out the back of his childhood home painted in several different colours, as was the fashion then.  It was white when we received it and we painted it Brunswick Green, as was the fashion in the mid 1980s.  It is looking very shabby at the moment (not just shabby chic), so I may have to get some more paint and give it yet another makeover.  After all that, I do think the plants will come back nicely with a little TLC.

So, what else have we been up to?  We both helped out at the Church Fete, me on the White Elephant stall and Mick on Bargains for Blokes.  My wedding dress and another lady’s christening dress were on display to promote our Wedding and Baptism display scheduled for early next year as part of the Bicentennary of the Parish celebrations.

Another feature of the celebrations will be Pioneer Cemetery tours.  There are a couple of people learning how to deliver these tours, as like so many things, the current experts aren’t getting any younger.  A small tour was given for training purposes.  Although I have walked past these graves all my life and know many of the pioneer family names, I learned a lot.

There is one First Fleeter buried in the cemetery.  Apparently, he lived to the ripe old age of 103.

October is always the month of open gardens.

On the day after the Church Fete we headed up to Cowra to see theirs.  It was a lovely outing and I will do a separate post for the day.

The following weekend was the Bathurst Spring Spectacular.  Another lovely day out that I will post about separately.

One perplexing thing that happened was that we had a blackout.  The reason it was perplexing is that we have a solar system with a battery, although we are still connected to the grid.  The grid did not have a blackout.  We hoped the battery hadn’t failed.  After a few phone calls and the visit of an electrician it was established that the safety circuit breaker switch had failed, not our solar system or any of our appliances.  It ended up being a rather simple fix.  Phew!

And finally, Mum celebrated her 95th birthday.  It was tinged with a little sadness, as she wouldn’t believe it was her birthday and for the first time ever, she didn’t know who I was.  She did eventually start to believe that it was in fact her birthday and she has known who I am every time I’ve seen her since.

So, how did I go with my goals?

No books were read.

No new recipes were tried.

We had lots of fun days out.

All, in all, a good month.