The Joys of Gardening

This is what has become of that patch of dirt we were faced with last october. Not too shabby considering that a). this was our first attempt at growing vegetables, b). my track reccord with individual plants is less than stellar - to put it mildly and c). we are contending with the Australian sun in the middle of one of the worst draughts on reccord. To illustrate this point take a peek at our macadamia tree. It looks like someone left it too long in the oven and it actually burned. Seriously. Look at the tips of the top leaves. They are, well, charred. Anyway the tomatoes and basil are both flourishing. The broccoli was doing well, until I noticed (today) that a massive army of tiny, white, spider-like insects, have taken up residence and are doing unpleasant things to it's leaves. We have a solitary stalk of corn that, despite the odds, survived an ambush by slugs. We are unsure exactly what animal got to the baby carrots, radishes and cucumbers as the tracks are somewhat unfamiliar. Mehran swears it was a rogue possum with an insatiable vegetable fettish. The jury is still out. On the brighter side our eggplants are thriving.

Before dinner the girls came out to help collect ingredients for salad. They worked together to find the elusive red cherry tomatoes which were hiding in between the wild mass of vines belonging to the larger tomoatoes, these were apparently mismarked, either that or they originated from the same source who sold Jack his magic beans.

Notice the horse ears. (Note to self: I must make those enquiries regarding riding lessons.)

Bayan got to play in the soil and enjoyed one of the finer things in life: getting dirty.

He also helped gather tomatoes.
Anisa found: "THE MOST GINORMOUS BASIL LEAF IN THE WHOLE WORLD!!!"

Here is the harvest:

Here is the salad: Yummy!