20 tonnes of sand need to be moved!, originally uploaded by malyousif.

I’m changing a part of the garden and adding a flower bed, the area is about 25 square meters and I intend to make a mound or two in it, so I ordered this pile of sand, all 20 tonnes of it and also 10x 40kgs bags of cow manure for the vegetable patch in preparation for the forthcoming season.

All this needs to be moved inside, so Arif (my son) and I moved about a third of the mound already, and I moved 10 bags of manure to the veg patch, the ones remaining here I’m going to return to the vendor as I over-estimated my need for the good stuff.

Back-breaking work but immensely satisfying!

Just 4 days after sowing these seedlings, most have started to grow nicely!

click to view individual pictures

I’m so looking forward to this season.

With the turn of wind and the breaking of the temperature over the last few days, it leaves no doubt in any Bahraini gardener’s mind that the new growing season has almost started! What a wonderful time it is too.

This is the third year for us in our home and although the garden is far from being mature, I have certainly gained some experience in gardening, which means that I keep changing things around and for the most part, the changes are relatively good and the plants have a higher than average chance of survival.

This weekend has been very productive, gardening-wise; I’ve potted up 30 spider plant babies in small pots and I have planted 11 varieties of flower seeds and covered them to protect them form the sun. I’ve even put up a scarecrow made with one of Frances’ old abayas! I’ve also finally chopped the top 3 feet of the money-plant in the living room which was almost reaching the ceiling and potted that after smearing rooting gell over the bottom 6-inches. I’ve also potted the rooting money-plant which I have left simply in water in a vase.

This afternoon I cleared and cleaned the two pool planters, they look tremendously better now for the trim and cleaning they got. The huge ficus is now manageable and the devil backbone’s extra branches have been snapped and the plant generally been made a lot neater.

I re-positioned an Agave in the smaller breakfast-area planter to balance it out a bit and chopped off the 1.5m-high cypresses that grew there by themselves.

So all in all I am rather happy with what I got up to this weekend. Hopefully in the next few weeks I shall update you with the progress of the nursery.

For the record, the “nursery” now has - as seeded on Friday 21 Sept, ‘07:

• Calendula - Pacific Beauty Mix - Calendula officinalis - English Marigold - other ref
• Poppy Venus
• Iceland Poppy Mixed
• Wilde Flower - Field Poppy
• Antirrhinum - Monarch Mixed
• Cornflower - Blackberry Fizz
• Cerinthe - Blue Kiwi
• Gypsophila - Covent Garden
• Godetia - Unwins Taffeta
• Scabious - Scarlet Empress

I’ve also planted Sweet Pea in a large pot which I equipped with a circular trellis.

All of the above should flower next Feb - July. I’ve got a few areas in the garden earmarked to receive them. I’ve got plenty of other seeds and am planning at least 2 more flower beds (eating away at the lawn!) to be planted this season.

More back-breaking work, but very much enjoyed and hopefully worth it.