An Abundance of Fruit

I've been a lazy gardener this year. The greenhouse is usually full of tomatoes, peppers, aubergines, basil and salad leaves. This year it is full of old tables and chairs, a lawnmower, a child's bike and a heap of glass around the point of impact from a firework. As the greenhouse was broken I didn't really have the incentive to grow plants in there so it became a place for storage instead (as does any empty place around here.)

I was feeling quite despondent that I hadn't made the effort to grow any fruit or veg this year and then good old mother nature provided me with an abundance of fruit from my own garden.

Firstly I noticed the (unripened) plums bending the boughs on the plum tree (see picture above). This is quite a feat in itself as usually by this stage they have been ravaged by slugs.




Next up I was aware that one of my blueberry plants was yielding fruit. Yum yum blueberry muffins will soon be gracing the breakfast table.

Clusters of tiny pearl-like grapes were hanging down all over the grapevine. These will be a deep purple colour by the end of summer.

Apples have cropped up all over the apple tree. The leaves are wizened and brown but I have apples. They will swell to double their size by the autumn time and will be sharing crumbles and pies with the berries below.

Oh the joy of blackberry picking! Especially when they are collected at the bottom of the garden. The blackberries seem especially early this year or perhaps I am always late in going to pick them. We usually have to make a special trip to pick them in the wild but this year I can pick them from the comfort of my garden.

This last picture is of the blackberries I collected this morning. I arranged them in a shallow dish with the blackberry leaves and my son artfully arranged his gardening gloves on the side of the dish. I think he has been watching me a bit too much.

Last but not least I would like to thank Sal from Sal's Snippets and Carol from Katherine's Dream for awarding me the 'Brilliante Weblog Award'.