Hello from Ashford (Middlesex)

Hi all - newbie to this site, and fairly new to gardening too.

Until three years ago, I had zero interest in gardening (mainly because we didn't have one!), but that all changed when we moved into our last house.

I had a reasonably successful season last year with most of my plants coming from Homebase, however we had to move house toward the end of the summer, which meant that the garden ended up not getting the attention it should have.

The new house has a much bigger back garden (remarkably big given the usual size of gardens in this area), so I have a new challenge!

I was googling for information on begonias earlier, and came across this forum - I liked the friendly and informative posts that I saw, so decided to join up, and hope for your patience as I try and learn from your knowledge and experience.

 

Thanks

I really liked the friendly 'feel' when I was browsing - I prefer down to earth, friendly forums as opposed to the more highbrow type (not that I am a member of that many, and the ones I am are mostly to do with cars).

I just hope that you all don't get fed up with me asking questions!

 

Thank you

Being ever so slightly mad, I think I will like it here - I've got so many plants kicking around my house at the moment, it looks like Percy Thrower's long lost cousin has moved in - I'll try and get some photos posted later, which will no doubt give a few giggles.

 

Hello fat controller and welcome to the forum. Looking forward to the photos

 

Thanks all

I've just uploaded some photos to photobucket, so I'll work out how to post them and hopefully have them up soon

Have you been to one of my public appearances?!?

 

Where to begin......

This was my back garden last year (old house) - I think this was taken early August if I remember correctly - not long before we had to move in fact. Although I cannot lay claim to doing anything more than planting the plants and looking after them, I was pretty chuffed with the result given that this was really only my second full summer where I had attempted gardening.



In September, we started the move to the new house, which has a lovely size garden (especially given how small gardens can be around these parts):



Almost immediately, I added a shed:



My polytunnel now lives behind the shed.

Living out of boxes for a while (you know how it is!), meant that before we knew where we were it was into winter (albeit not much of one), so I am only just getting cracking with the garden now. According to our neighbours, there used to be an old couple living here and the fella kept his garden immaculate - sadly, once he died, his wife couldn't cope with it; not sure if she passed away or moved, but the house was then rented out for a number of years (as it is now), however previous tenants simply didn't care much and only did the basics.

Back in Feb, I got started with growing from seed, and planted tomatoes, cucumbers, sweet peppers, hot chilli peppers, coleus and pansies. To be honest, I expected casualties left right and centre, especially as I was germinating them in seed trays covered with cling film on window sills - how wrong I was!

Chillies:



Tomatoes after being potted on (and these are just a few - I ended up with over 70!):




Sweet peppers and coleus:




That's me at the limit for pics already - will come back and post more later (assuming I haven't bored you to death already!)

 

As promised (or threatened, depending on your perspective!), here are more of my efforts grown from seed this year, and filling up the house rapidly!

Here are the tomatoes (some of them) when they were still small;



They've matured significantly now:




The pot on the right is one of my chilli pots, with the other one on another windowsill keeping a cucumber company




The rest of the cucumbers are currently at the back of the living room (going to be re-potted into their final pots tonight):



Behind them there are coleus seedlings, with more of them hiding in the porch, alongside sweet pepper seedlings:

 

Thanks

Our old house was in Feltham - Hamilton Road to be exact; be a bit quieter in Essex without Heathrow to put up with?