Mortgage free in Forever Home :-)

Karmacat

Loving the curtain discussion.  I like Dunelm for lots of things - I've bought my last pair of curtains, though, I like the ones I have, and I have enough material to stock a small shop.  Blinds, however, are a different matter ... I hope you get some good options in your own cupboard or a charity shop, KK.

KajiKita

Spend this morning on fuel and a sandwich (the latter is a Friday treat!  ).
Did use the Petrol Prices app to have a look at fuel prices near where I work but as I still had half a tank it didn't seem worth the fuel needed to drive further. So instead I used the £9.09 I had on my BP loyalty card off my spend - better the value be in my account and not theirs! 

KK

Chiglepig

KajiKita said:

So, this year's plan is just to focus on cultivating the bits I already have as borders / veggie beds, keeping on top of weeds (planning a weekly 'snip patrol' for the bindweed, bracken and brambles!) and I am aiming to only grow things from seed this year (I have a lot that I didn't get time to sow last year) apart from things that are more difficult such as (small!) shrubs and snowdrops etc. There are also some lovely ornamentals in the garden (e.g. Japanese anemones, bugle etc.) that will respond well to being divided so I hope to do a fair bit of that this year

I grew dahlias from seed last year and some of them were lovely!  Those are overwintering in the cellar 

KK

Quite a few pages behind on your diary KK. Focussing on a few beds is good - I added a new one each year for the first five years in this house, I'm now in the process of going back to the first ones  and renovating . But I do have some bad news for you . . . weekly snips won't work on bindweed and brambles, it has to be daily - esp. for the bindweed, otherwise it will never weaken.

KajiKita

@Chiglepig But I do have some bad news for you . . . weekly snips won't work on bindweed and brambles, it has to be daily - esp. for the bindweed, otherwise it will never weaken.

Ah .... 

Well, I probably could do daily on bindweed, barring the odd 'life happening' days 🙂

Thanks for the heads up 😊👍

KK

Suffolk_lass

I have had limited (read "no real") success with eradication of bindweed with the one exception of using nitrile gloves and wiping it with glyphosate gel on the stems and leaves, then the next day I unwind it so it is no longer strangling the raspberries and do it again. Unfortunately the mother of this particular invader is in and under a trellis of Japanese honeysuckle and while that copes fine, out-competing the bindweed the spreading tendrils continue to wreak havoc and come back. I have tried carpet and the following year there has been less but it comes back. I have the big trumpet white one (hedge) there but also the smaller pink tinged field version. Some people recommend a cane for it to climb and then treat it but the roots can be 20ft deep so don't hold your breath - it is an ongoing battle

KajiKita

Suffolk_lass said:

I have had limited (read "no real") success with eradication of bindweed with the one exception of using nitrile gloves and wiping it with glyphosate gel on the stems and leaves, then the next day I unwind it so it is no longer strangling the raspberries and do it again. Unfortunately the mother of this particular invader is in and under a trellis of Japanese honeysuckle and while that copes fine, out-competing the bindweed the spreading tendrils continue to wreak havoc and come back. I have tried carpet and the following year there has been less but it comes back. I have the big trumpet white one (hedge) there but also the smaller pink tinged field version. Some people recommend a cane for it to climb and then treat it but the roots can be 20ft deep so don't hold your breath - it is an ongoing battle

Oh I feel your pain!  
I think one of the ‘taxes’ of living in the country is living and gardening alongside bindweed (yes, I have both types too!), brambles and nettles ….  

I can’t bring myself to use weed killer. My very serious gardening friend (yellow book standard) does and blithely talks about ‘poisoning’ beds that have got out of control, but it just makes me shudder … Soppy I know, but that’s me  

KK

Cheery_Daff

I won't be poisoning my garden either KK, not just you! Although I do understand the frustration that can lead some people to it! We are countryside too, but fortunately don't have a bindweed problem, certainly not where I have the veg patch. We have hare, sheep, chicken and cow problems, and all manner of other critters, but not bindweed

Suffolk_lass

Yes, nettles, brambles, ground elder and bindweed (as discussed) plus, now oxalis corniculata (creeping wood sorrel) which puts down tap-roots, puts out creeping tendrils that root and explodes seeds like bizzy-lizzies. Apparently it was imported. It is very difficult to see until too late and if you leave any fragment of it, it comes back more dense and difficult. It strangles other plants.

Pests we have are a few deer, many rabbits, now moles, and most recently crows and magpies (they will have to be controlled because they think our thatch is their nesting material, aside from destroying fledging song birds on our lawn last year) as well as mice, rats, voles, shrews, American Lupin Aphids and Rosemary beetles.

It's a wonder anything grows or survives.

I used to be much more tolerant - live and let live but I have to draw the line with certain things (eg I happily expect and tolerate small rodents in the garden (we are very rural) but do take action in the house and garage. We happily accommodate wasps until they get to the sugar rush stage when they are a nuisance (we control ground nests by or on footpaths in the village, because there are lots of new families with small children and many small dogs, and if they are near our honey bees). We have quietly removed a number of queens hibernating in the roofs of farm colonies this winter.

Chiglepig

@Suffolk_lass we have the Oxalis too, and I loathe it with a passion. We struggle with brambles, but I have managed to eradicate bindweed in two gardens now. My current gardening bugbear are ash and maple seedling . I don't 'poison' my garden wither, and I know the yellow book enry requirements are rigorous, but I can't see them standing for that much longer.

KajiKita

Caught up with a friend-neighbour for a brew - we had a good laugh setting the world to rights as we saw fit 😉
Hubby has done his books ready to pass onto his accountant.
Cleaning - done.
0-12 of MSE's 2022 decluttering challenge completed and recorded in my spreadsheet, of which 3 items were trugs of prickly clippings of holly and hawthorn from behind the veggie patch so that's another job I am a bit more ahead on than this time last year 🙂 I will post on the thread once I have caught up with reading it all ....! (hahahaha)

Time to put the kettle on and curl up with my knitting on the sofa, in front of the fire whilst watching Call the Midwife - it's about to be 1966 😉

@Suffolk_lass - similar policies here. Traps in the loft above where I sleep for mice as they wake me, though we try to rescue every one that the Floofy cat brings in alive and we eradicate wasps when they nest on the houses or sheds as it makes those areas unusable. 

Wow ... I cut some little sprigs of Christmas Box (I think it is) that my very serious gardening friend gave me last year, that is just flowering and I can smell it from the other end of the table that I am sat at typing this   

KK