HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN GROW?

If there is one thing we English are good at, it's talking about the weather. Incase you missed it since mid April it has been raining. Not just a sprinkling here and there but a downpour on a daily basis. 

Having spent three years living in Manchester I quickly adapted to the northern weather, generally dreary and drizzly so one had never to be sans umbrella. I indulged my passion for thick tights and dresses teamed with quirky welly boots and a fabulous parasol umbrella. Sounds lovely I know, but this weather had its draw backs. In Manchester we had a lovely flat in the city centre with a balcony and, always one to plant roots wherever I am in the world, I set about making our house a home and this included our 'garden' (balcony). It was a simple affair of shrubs and grasses but the main attraction was the thought of growing lettuces; pulling back the french doors to pick fresh leaves for each day's meals. 

Rain is good - good for the plants but also because it saves me from remembering to water them every day. But rain every single day is not good and in Manchester this is exactly what happened. For the eighteen months that we lived in that balconyed flat it rained, probably no more or no less than it normally does but enough rain for there not to be enough sun for my plants. Slowly lettuce died (we got one crop and no regrowth) and then the shrubs and grasses eventually followed. Green fingered I obviously was not.

Now we have relocated back to the south of England, the sunny sunny south, where childhoods are spent outdoors from early May til late September. It was all going so well, March was glorious and so with a spring in my step the boyfriend and I took a trip to the garden centre. Forty-four pounds  later (I thought this was meant to be the cheaper alternative to cash hungry supermarkets?) we had a huge bounty of seeds and bulbs. In sunny March we planted the first of our vegetables, maybe a little earlier than some gardeners would recommend but it was 20 degrees outside what could possibly go wrong? Needless to say two weeks later and the weather turned, cold lightly frosted mornings were followed with a day of rainy weather. It's OK, I tell myself, plants need water and remember it saves you from trudging up the garden with a watering can (ironically within a few days of the government issuing its hose pipe ban the downpours began!)

When a few days of rain began to turn into weeks a feeling of deja vu set in. Was I doomed never to grow anything of my own?

However two weeks ago the rain stopped and then sure enough the sun came out (and boy did my vegetables need the sun). I have had to wait months to be able to share my veg patch with you, thus far all I have had is weedy little shoots but now thanks to Mother Nature things our blooming...

Sadly the question is will my efforts have been in vain; with my summer vacation just over a week away who is going to shoulder the responsibility of watering my plants?