Apricot Delight

Happy New Year! Wishing you all the very best for 2014 and hopefully many more joyous hours reading this little blog.

The start of 2014 has brought with it ripe and ready to pick apricots from our tree. 

They may not be the biggest, juiciest or best looking apricots but there are certainly plenty of them. In fact just the huge number of apricots to deal with is a bit overwhelming.

Mr L'Orange and I have packed up all our cherry boxes (I knew it would be worthwhile to save them (and have filled them with fruit for our friends around town). 

The easiest recipe I've found involving apricots is just to poach them, so I'm planning to give that a go this weekend so we can have something home grown fruit with our muesli.

The apricots we failed to pick that Bailey & the ants are enjoying

Other garden news is that our very unhealthy tree at the end of the 'orchard' is not a plum or an apricot but a peach tree, this has only taken us 3 years to work out! The peaches are big and look lovely, only problem is that they are really high up so difficult to pick. Time for the ladder Mr L'Orange!

The plum tree is also fully laden and the plums are just sweetening up but I think will also be ready to pick next week, how exciting! Now who wants some plums?

Mum's potted flowers are starting to look really good and we got given a pink flamingo for the garden over Christmas which is currently happy residing with the raspberries.

Orange has had very little rain over the last few months so everything is really dry and watering duty takes up a fair bit of time each night, my goal is to let nothing else die. I've managed to restrain myself and only plant 4 new little things which are being closely monitored and everything else is just hanging in there - so glad we did all that mulching now!

Anyway that is it for me, hope you all have a great weekend.

Border Edging & Dog Protection

For entertainment this week Dog A L'Orange decided to drag a bag of chicken manure all over the lawn and then pulled the hose to the middle of the garden - do you think he was trying to help me? He has also been digging up all the pebbles and weed mat from the side of the house yet again and putting holes into the garden beds.

So our Saturday morning was spent fixing up all Bailey's mess, Mr L'Orange after filling the holes and fixing the pebbles has coated everything in citronella oil in the hope this will dissuade our naughty puppy from doing this again.

When we first moved into the house we planted some mondo grass edging in one of the beds, this has grown really well over the last couple of years, so I thought I would replicate the effect in our main front bed.

Mondo edging in one of the established beds

I split the more tufty mondo grass that was growing in the wrong spots anyway and transferred the rooted grass to holes I'd dug in the new bed. I watered the new plantings in with plenty of seaweed solution and then surrounded them with mulch.

I'm aiming for this effect around the front beds

I've completed one large section and have two more to go before the entire bed is fully edged with mondo grass, I think it will look great when it becomes established and hopefully stop the lawn and weeds taking over the bed. 

This is the bed that is going to get the mondo grass edging treatment

I know winter is not typically the time to plant new cuttings but we have been getting such good rain and sunshine that I think the mondo grass stands a pretty good chance.

Mondo transplant complete - can you spot the mondo clumps?

Our bulbs are starting to pop up, I planted a bag of daffodils in April and we have some tulips I put in last year, all of which is quite exciting as winter seem less dull and foreboding in the garden when new things are springing up.

Some new bulbs - whoop whoop!

Autumn Garden in Orange

Orange is looking stunning at the moment with the trees changing colour, bright blue skies and lush green gardens.

Our new Bay Tree for the courtyard

Autumn is my most favourite time of year with the warm sunny days accompanied by cooler nights,   glasses of red wine, hearty soups and wood fires.

My geranium cutting in a pot for instant colour

The lemon tree is fully laden - will be a bumper crop this year

I've been trying to get the garden a little bit more tidy in preparation for winter as the sunny days have also produced an abundance of weeds, everywhere - including through all the weed matting I lovingly put down!

I've been busy applying chicken manure all over the place, which Dog A L'Orange then eats and giving all the beds a good water.

Pretty yellow flowers

This weekend the mulching starts in earnest and I've got a whole heap of spring bulbs I want to try and plant in the front garden.

Another dash of instant colour in the front garden

The veggie patch is still producing lots of tomatoes, zucchini, rhubarb and spinach but we've also planted red onions and beetroot for the winter.

A rather fancy looking dog proof fence from Mr L'Orange

I also forgot to tell you we have 3 pumpkins growing with hopefully more on the way as there are plenty of flowers.

Spot the pumpkins and raspberries!

The pretty front boarder beside the driveway all from cuttings

Wet & Wild Weather in Orange

We had some seriously wild weather over the last week with lashing rain, strong winds and everything else nasty the elements could throw at us. The garden at least has had a really good water, which has been long overdue with the heat of the last few months. According to other locals I have spoken with, Orange has not seen temperatures like this spring/summer for the last 10 years. 

Sadly I have to report the deaths of many plants and trees over the last 6 months, despite my best efforts to keep everything alive. I have been watering furiously (unassisted by Mr L'Orange please note), however many of the plants just can't cope with the extreme dry we have faced.

The casualty list reads as follows:

Rose bush
Japanese Maple (this was a wedding gift)
Wisteria
Olive Tree
Petunias (during the hail storm a month ago)
Pink Cordylite (we suspect the dog has assisted in wreaking this one)
All the tube stock ground cover I planted in spring
Fuchsia plant
Daphne

So cute and well behaved as a little puppy

Dog A L'Orange has also managed to do his fare share of destruction and has eaten my Ponsietta another two Olive Trees, numerous Agapanthas and a Passionfruit plant.

The hole where the olive tree once was...

...remains of the chewed up olive tree

Tell tale dirty nose on Dog A L'Orange

All in all this has been a pretty expensive and sad period, especially given all the hard work in planting and caring for the plants over the last 18 months.

Trying to protect our remaining assets

Have decided there is little point in buying anything new whilst Dog A L'Orange is in destructive mode, I'm happy to take cuttings though and get them going in the front garden our of reach of Bailey!

The new Orange arrival...

You can’t live in the country and not have a dog, so Mr L’Orange and I would now like to introduce our

newest family member, Dog A L’Orange!

Our 8 week old English Pointer, also know as Bailey seems to be settling in well to his new home and to my relief has not destroyed too much of the garden….yet! However I don’t want to leave anything to chance and I am going to erect some temporary fencing around the herb garden, veggie patch and garden beds just to be on the safe side.

The new puppy is very alert and pretty obedient (as much as you can be for a puppy!), he enjoys meeting new people and loves his food. At the moment, Dog A L’Orange is sleeping in a pen in the house until he has all his injections and can move to a nice comfy kennel in the garden (Mr L’Orange is sorting this out – expect some humorous posts in the near future).

The puppy has a habit of curling into anyone’s feet when he wants to go to sleep and is very cute. So far he whines a lot when left by himself anywhere in the house or garden, but we are hoping he will grow out of this very quickly as it is quite annoying.

You can expect to see lots more of Dog A L’Orange in upcoming posts on the Life A L’Orange Blog. Don’t
forget Orange Wine Week starts today and then there is heaps of good stuff on for the next 10 days if you are at a loose end. The full Orange Wine Week programme can be downloaded here.