Just desserts...

...at least, that's all I'll be making on the back of this summer's harvest. 

As you can probably tell by the lack of writing on my blog in recent months, I've not been active in the garden at all. In fact, so bad is the situation, a recent visitor to
the garden proclaimed "you really are the hapless gardener..."

The garden can be a daunting place at times. A close friend of mine recently moved into her new home and faced with, as she put it, "200 years worth of brambles" duly got stuck in and only retired back indoors once the cuts had sapped every drop of energy from her.

So I admire all you gardeners who put aside all your worries elsewhere, and embrace the challenge that is keeping your outdoors in check. I don't even have the excuse of a bad summer.

But as I've discovered before, the garden can also be a very forgiving place.

I have a very old apple tree and in the orange hum of autumn afternoon, its fruits have been singing. In answer to the tune I've been apple picking, using a simple technique my mum taught me - twist to see if they're ripe, one turn and they should fall neatly into the palm of your hand. It felt almost wrong to remove them from the tree, so perfect do they look hanging from every branch... 

To my surprise, as I was caught up among the apple tree's tentacles I discovered that the snails hadn't eaten all my runners, not all the pears were rotten, and that even a few borlotti beans had survived my neglect to brighten up my box.

I'm relieved and happy with my mini harvest, I just need to figure out what to do with all this?

x