The first of the pea flowers !

 Yipeeee...!! The first of the pea flowers are blooming in my new green patch ! Surprisingly the plants in the containers are doing better than the one’s I transplanted in the ground. Well, whatever... I'm super excited to see the first blooms. I had always wanted to grow peas in my garden, but somehow couldn't. It was the lack of space that made me prioritize with the greens and vegetables I grew in my balcony. And unfortunately, peas never seemed to feature on my priority list. And after we shifted to this new space and settled down, one of the first to get sowed was peas. That was about a month back and this morning I spotted a couple of blooms.

It's like a dream come true for me... It's the turn of these pretty little pea flowers to add their delicate charm to my green patch. Looking forward to seeing some fresh green peas in my garden. I'd be the happiest, even if I got to harvest just a handful...

Excited about my volunteer patch !

Feeling super excited with my volunteer Amaranthus and Tomato patch !!
I was happy to see so many of the tomatoes having grown nice and plump and absolutely blemish-free. And then as I was harvesting the four-and-a-half foot tall amaranthus, I was taken by excited surprise to find many many more tomatoes hidden in the thicket.

Today's bumper Amaranthus harvest gets shared by the staff at Mum's school. Waiting to share the tomatoes too...

Fun with my volunteer Amaranthus patch !

Oh wow ! I am having so much fun with my volunteer Amaranthus patch!
Eight harvests and the plants just don't seem to want to give up. The more I trim the tops and leaves, the more they grow lateral shoots... and right now, most of the older plants are huge bushes in their own. And believe me, even the largest and most mature leaves are so tender, succulent and tasty ! Loads of new ones are catching up and forming new patches of their own. And hopefully, a few red one's should pop up sometime soon. For I recently scattered a handful of red amaranthus seeds all around this patch.


Here's to my brilliant volunteer amaranthus patch and here's to nature's amazing spirit of magnanimity !

Grasshoppers !!

"Everything you see exists together in a delicate balance. As king, you need to understand that balance and respect all the creatures, from the crawling ant to the leaping antelope." ...and the flitting grasshoppers too !!
Mufasa to Simba- The lion kings. One of my favourite stories for my story telling sessions.

Well, well, the beautiful quote aside, my garden is now going to be filled with these little green lean and mean hoppers flitting all over, gnawing away at my precious vegetable leaves...!!

Hmmm... on second thoughts, the respect is there and has to be there ! The spirit of "live and let live" is strong enough to let these elegant green hoppers have a ball and enjoy their short life while it lasts. For in comparison, don’t I have a long life and enough of days to grow back food for myself... And every time they chance to flit across into my LGP (Which I doubt they will. As the volunteer patch where they are now, is lush and thick enough to last them for four lifetimes of food !), I can, pick them and deposit them back to the volunteer patch.

Digging with Disco on Yugaadi...

March 21

An awesome Yugaadi day spent digging with Disco...

Dug up one bed, cleared it of stones, crumbled the lumps of soil, added the vermi compost (That I'd gotten last week from Suman Sangam- Dr. Sanjeev Kulkarni's forest farm), and prepared one bed. Later in the evening and night, after dinner, I transplanted yard long beans, peas, bhendi and capsicum saplings.

Wow folks, That was an awesome feeling of achievement !

Now, I just hope they settle down well and take off. Fingers crossed please...

And well, I even had my first creepy crawly visitor ! This morning when I opened the window to check on my newly transplanted saplings, I saw this green fella (A green keelback) lying right in the middle of my new bed, in the process of swallowing a frog almost five times larger than it's head ! I have learnt to handle to snakes at Baala Balaga (The eco-friendly school I train at), but am not brave enough yet to catch one... I called up Sharath, one of my old students from Baala Balaga, and he was there with Vinay and Navneet his friends in fifteen minutes. Thankfully, since the snake was trying to swallow the frog, it was in the bed itself. But the moment we stepped in and came close, it spat out the frog and began to slowly crawl away. Sharath, caught him gently by the tail and slid him into a soft drink bottle and later left him in the woods near Baala Balaga. 

Psssst... don't miss the A P J Abdul Kal am hairstyle !! It's even thinned out to APJ perfection..!

Sharath, gently catching the snake by the tail...

Sharath, Navneet and Vinay... Thanks guys !!

Three cheers for my volunteer tomatoes...!!!

March 20

Three cheers for my volunteer tomatoes...!!!

More volunteers...

March 18

And here's presenting more volunteers that have popped up in my compound... Apart from the edible greens, there are some interesting weeds and wild flowering plants like Horse herb, Ecbolium viride and Canna lilly plants that are putting their heads out. And with the rains, there's going to be more vibrant greenery all over. I wonder what else my yard is going to gift me...?

Happy to the core and thrilled with the cloak of green blessings...

 Basella alba/Basale soppu/Malabar spinach/Creeping spinach/Ceylon spinach

 A small leaved variety of Amaranthus. We call it Haravi soppu locally

 Talinum triangulare/fruticosum/Nela basale

Solanum nigrum/Black nightshade/Manthakaali