Gras!!/Grass!

Vart gras har landat!! Hurra! Med lite tur fran min sida och massa hart arbete fran Rich's sida sa ligger det pa plats nar jag kommer hem idag!
The turf has landed! With a bit of luck from my side and a lot of hard work from Rich's side it will all be in place when I get home today!

Overlevare/Survivors

Hurra! De sma liven har overlevt forsta natten utomhus. Och idag ar det altanbygge och grasmatte laggning for min man som ar ledig fran jobbet. Det blir nog inte vila for honom dock....
Hurrah! The little things survived their first night outside. And today is decking and lawn day! Husband is home from work to get it all sorted. Not a very restful day off for the poor thing...

Tomater o paprika/Tomatoes and peppers

Har ar eventuellt nagra avskedsbilder pa mina tomat och paprika plantor som jag fott upp fran fron. De har statt pa fonsterbradorna inomhus och vaxt sig ganska stora och fina. Men imorse bestamde jag mig for att stalla ut dem. Tydligen ska man vanja dem lite forsiktigt vid kylan och definitivt ta in dem nagonstans svalt pa natten, men jag orkar inte bara dem till skjulet och inomhus ar det for varmt. Just nu ar det 10 grader ute och det ar nastan midnatt sa jag tror inte det blir nan frost... Hall tummarna!
Here's possibly some goodbye photos of my tomato and pepper plants that I've grown from seed. They've been standing on the windowsills indoors until this morning when I decided it was time for them to face the real world. I know this "hardening off" business is meant to be done carefully and that I should bring them somewhere indoors during the night but I really can't be bothered. At the moment it's around 10 degreees outside and it's almost midnight so there shouldn't be any frost tonight....Fingers crossed!

Det ar korsbarstomater jag har satt och nagon slags paprika.
It's cherry tomatoes and some kind of pepper I'm growing.

More topsoil/Mer topp jord

Man trodde ju kanske att 15 ton topp jord skulle racka.....men icke. Det spo regnade i helgen och det blev tva polar pa "grasmattan". Sa det var bara att aka ivag och kopa nagra sackar till.... Vi far val se om det racker. Mannen ska vara ledig pa fredag och ska fixa till altanen och med lite tur stracker sig entusiasmen till att lagga gras pa lordag....Fast vi har favorit gaster fran Sverige pa besok sa vi ska nog bara sitta pa den da forhoppningsvis fardiga altanen och ata laaaang frukost och mysa istallet. Hurra!!!
You would have thought that 15 tons of topsoil would be eonugh....but no. It was pouring down this weekend and there were two pools on the lawn for two days after so the only option was to go to Homebase and get a few more bags... I hope this will be enough. My man is having a day off work on Friday to finish the decking and with a bit of luck there'll be enough enthusiasm left to maybe put down the lawn on Saturday... But we've got lovely, lovely friends coming from Sweden over the weekend so I think a better option is to sit on the then hopefully finished decking and have a looong breakfast instead! Hurrah!

Testing, testing

Har problem med bloggen, sa detta ar bara ett test. Har redan forlorat tva inlagg! Inte glad.
The blog programisn't working! So this is a test, I've already lost two posts! Not happy.

Tomtar och kattgras/Catgrass!

Har ar nagra av alla sma figurer som bodde i var tradgard nar vi flyttade in. Fina, eller hur? Fattar inte att inte fler manniskor har hela tradgardana fulla med sana har smakfulla saker! Den farg glada figuren i bakgrunden har vi sjalva inforskaffat. Hon ar inte till salu, men de andra ar. Eller, ni kan fa dem forresten. Alldeles gratis!
Here's some of all the little people and animals that were already living in our garden when we've moved in. The coulourful thing in the background were brought in a bit later, by us. She's not for sale, but if anyone wants to give a home to the others - feel free to come and grab them!

Har har jag satt lite froer som jag fick med en tradgardstidning for ett tag sedan. Sadde dem forra helgen och ar lite otalig pa att se om de kommer titta fram eller inte. Det ar Calendula "Art shades" som ska vara oranga och gula, Nigella "persian Jewles mixed" som ar bla och vita och Eschcholzia "Singel Mixed" som ar i alla mojliga farger. Vi far val se om det tar sig.

I've used some seeds I got from a gardening magazine in the spot above. I did it last weekend and I'm very inpatient, waiting for something to show. It's Calendula "Art shades", orange and yellow flowers, Nigella "Persian Jewel Mixed", blue and white and Eschcholzia "Single Mixed" in all different colours. Fingers crossed something will survive the clay!

Hurra!! Antligen har mitt kattgras borjat gro!

Hurra! My catgrass has finally started to grow!

Hemmafru tack!/Housewife? Yes please!

Har nu varit tillbaka pa jobbet i lite over 4 timmar, (har lunch nu ifall nagon nitisk person undrar) efter att ha varit hemma i en och en halv vecka. Det racker nu tycker jag, jag ar redo att ga hem. Jag vill bli hemmafru!! Fasen vad skont att degar runt hemma och greja lite i tradgarden, kolla pa fantastisk daytime television och ata godis. Synd att man inte far nan lon for sant.
Have been back at work for about 4 hours (am having lunch at the moment, so no complaints about me writing here please..) after having been at home for over a week. 4 hours is enough, I'm ready to go home now. I want to be a housewife! How lovely to lounge around at home, potter in the garden if the weather is nice, watch amazing daytime tv and eat sweets. Shame you don't get paid for that.

Medelalders/middleaged

Nu ar jag officiellt medelalders! I dag spenderade jag over en timma i ett tradgardscenter alldeles sjalv och gick runt och kollade pa olika vaxter och funderade pa om det fanns nagonting som kan trivas i lerjord av var kaliber. En timma!!!! Och jag tyckte inte ens det var trakigt. For att gora det hela annu varre kan jag meddela att jag inte kopte nagot. Iallafall inte nan vaxt. Bara enzymer till komposten och koppar tejp som ska avskracka sniglar. Herregud.
I'm officially middleaged now! Today I spent over an hour in a gardencentre looking at plants and trying to figure out what might grow in our clay soil. And I wasn't even bored. To make the whole thing even worse I ended up bying nothing, which took quite a lot of self control. Well, I did buy something, but no plants. Enzymes for the compost to hopefully help it on its way and copper tape to scare slugs off. Oh dear.

Monster katt/cat

Har ar Leela monster katten med lysande ogon. Hon gillar att ligga pa den har platsen for varmvatten ledningen ar under sa det ar alltid varmt och skont. Fast med all den palsen kan man ju undra om hon verkligen behover mer varme.
Here's Leela the monster cat with shining eyes. She likes this spot due to the hot water pipes being underneath. Can't help but wonder why she thinks she needs more warmth with all that fur.

Trappa och hall/Stairs and landing

Sa har sag var hall ut nar vi flyttade in. Har har vi tagit bort den obiligatoriska heltackningsmattan och slipat trappan vilket tog en evighet!
This is what the hall looked like when we moved in. In this photo we've already removed the carpet and sanded the stairs which took an eternity.
Detta ar hallen pa overvaningen efter matt borttagning och golv slipning.
This is the landing upstairs after removal of the carpet and sanding of the floor.
Nymalade vaggar i hallen och lackad trappa.
Newly painted walls and varnished stairs.
Och har ar fondtapeten som tacker ena vaggen pa overvaningen i hallen.
And here's the wallpaper that covers one wall on the upstairs landing.

Altan bygge/decking

Har ar grunden till altanen som vi borjade med forra helgen. Resten av materialet ska bli levererat idag, sen far vi se nar vi (dvs Rich) har tid att gora klart det. Observera att roren fran badrummet ar pa utsidan av huset i god, smakfull engelsk stil!
Here's the foundation to the decking area that we started to build last weekend. The rest of the material will be delivered today, we'll have to wait and see when we've (strictly speaking Rich, I'm not that great at building stuff) got time to finish it off. But apparantly the foundation is the tricky part, the rest should be easy.

Pots and baskets/Krukor och korgar

Har ar en korg med hangpeligonia och nat annat i som jag och mamma planterade nar hon var har och halsade pa helgen innan pask. Krukan pa marken ar Rosmarin som jag hoppas vaxer till sig, den ska sta pa altanen och lukta gott i sommar har jag tankt.

Here's one of the baskets me and mum planted when she was visiting us the weekend before Easter. The pot on the ground is Rosemary which hopefully will grow big and smell nice during the summer.

Kolla in Forsynthian (tror jag det ar..) som ar till vanster om korgen. Den vaxer pa grannens sida av planket men har kommit igenom till oss. Bonus blomma!
Check out the Forsynthia to the left of the basket. It's growing in the neighbours garden but has decided to come through to us!
Min handige man blev glad for en ursakt att anvanda borrmaskinen och satte upp den har spaljen sa att klatter rosen har nat att luta sig mot.
My handy husband was glad to get an excuse to use his powertools and put this trellis up so the climbing rose has some support.
En till kruka med lite blommor som far sta pa grillen tills vi har grasmatta igen. Kolla in vara sma rabarber till hoger som overlevde chocken av att fa massa topp jord over sig.
Another pot with flowers which will live under the BBQ until we've got a lawn again. Check out our little rhubarbs to the right, they seem to have survived the chock of getting loads of topsoil over them!

Clay soil/Ler jord

The reason for the 15 tons of topsoil being spread over our garden (with great help from kind father-in-law) is that we've got pure clay instead of something resembling normal soil. I'm pretty sure I could dig it up and sell it to some art college close by for them to use in pottery, at least that's what it feels like when I'm trying to dig it. So this means that the lawn has been waterlogged constantly since September last year. The good news are that the topsoil seems to be doing the trick - the water sinks away instead of turning the whole place to a bog garden. My point with all this is to say that I found some plant labels from plants I bought last year when we'd just moved in. On all three of them it very clearly states that those plants prefer well drained soil. Do I need to say none of them survived? Won't be making that mistake again!
Anledningen till att vi har lagt 15 ton topp jord over grasmattan ar att hela tradgarden ar ren lerjord. Sa detta innebar att hela tradgarden har varit som ett trask sedan september och forstas som betong under sommaren nar det var torrt. Tack och lov verkar det som om topp jorden fungerar som det ar tankt och nu sjunker vattnet undan efter regn. Nar vi just hade flyttat in forra aret sa var jag saklart over-entusiastisk och over-optimistisk i mitt inhandlande av plantor. Jag hittade tre plant instruktioner fran inkop under denna period och alla tre var valdigt tydliga med att dessa plantor behovde val dranerad jord for att trivas. Eller for att overleva visade det sig. Ska inte gora samma misstag i ar!

Fran grasmatta till aker/From lawn to mudfield

Sa har sag tradgarden ut i somras nar vi flyttade in.
This is what the garden looked like last summer when we move into the house.

I borjan av aret borjade lyfta bort alla plattor och bryta upp betongen som fanns under.
We started to remove all the slabs and breaking up the concrete underneath in the beginning of this year.

Och har har vi blivit av med lekstugan!
And in this picture we've finally got rid of the wendy house!

And this is what the garden looks like now....
Och sa har ser tradgarden ut nu..

After seeing other garden blogs and becoming obsessed by them in order to see what happened in other people's gardens I thought I'd give it a go myself. We moved into this house in June 2005 to a quite nice but plain garden. At the moment the garden is still plain, very plain, but not so nice anymore. We've just had 15 tons of topsoil put on our lawn, broken up loads of concrete, got rid of a wendy house and started to build a decking area. Hopefully it will all fall in place at some point in the future. Just to explain the English/Swedish bit..... I'm from Gothenburg in Sweden but have ended up in Surrey in England due to what have happened to many people from Sweden who are going to London for a year.... you meet a nice English man and stay. I've decided to write in Swedish too so my family can read without having to struggle.
Efter att ha hittat andra tradgards bloggar pa natet och blivit besatt av att folja vad som hander i andras tradgardar sa tankte jag nu gora ett forsok sjalv. Vi flyttade in i vart hus i juni 2005. Med huset foljde en liten, ganska prydlig, men lite trakig tradgard. Nu ar den inte langre prydlig utan bara valdigt trakig - men det ska bli andring pa det forhoppningsvis. De sista veckorna har vi hallt pa 15 ton topp jord, brutit upp betong, gjort oss av med en lekstuga och borjat bygga en altan. Forhoppningsvis kommer allt falla pa plats sa smaningom.