Not about plants this time.

Heylo there.

It's been a while since the winter post.  A lot has happened and I have lots of new pictures that haven't got much to do with plants, so hey-ho...LET'S GO!

So my last post was about winter, snow and whatnot.  There's a picture on there of my brother speeding down the hill on a sled.  Just after that photo was taken, I was speeding down the hill on a different sled with my brother standing on the back.  I don't know if it's obvious but what seemed like a great idea at the time really wasn't.  By the time we had finished rolling to the bottom I had ruptured a ligament in my right knee.  The last couple of months have been in preparation of my big knee surgery.  

I've never had to have surgery.  I haven't even ever had to have stitches or broken anything so it was a little bit scary and in a weird way kind of exciting to be having to go to the hospital.  The excitement turned to dread when I got there and was waiting in my hospital room for the nurses to pick me up to wheel me into the operation room.  I was ready to bolt, but the nurses strapped me onto the operating table, and wheeled me into the anesthetic room.  There I was, strapped onto the operating table totally in the nude under a warm blanket.  They were preparing my right leg for the surgery.  The nurse was super nice.  But I felt like if this was normal life I would kind of be annoying because I just kept asking her the same questions over and over.  She gave me the "calm down" juice straight in the veins and then everything started moving a little bit.  Like when I drink one and a half glasses of wine... oh yeah I'm a real lightweight.  The anesthetic doctor came in and started talking to me about Berlin (I had my surgery in Munich so that my family could look after me) and I remember saying something about 4 flights of stairs.  For some reason, even though I could only see these people's eyes, I felt a deep and meaningful connection with each and every one of them.  Not only a connection but I kind of fell in love with them all.  There was a younger assistant doctor that came in to check on my blood pressure and stuff and I just remember thinking, oh he's got wonderful eyes.  I felt like these guys were gonna be my new friends.  My knee was in their hands.  They were going to fix it...hopefully...and then we could be best friends.

They knocked me out with two big canisters of full anesthetic with the nurse saying "think of something nice".  I panicked because I couldn't think of anything nice and just as I was going to tell her that I couldn't think of anything nice I was out like a light, in another world until I woke up...naked under a blanket...in a dark room full of hospital beds.  Everything felt weird and a little hazy.  I asked one of the nurses why I was naked but everyone else was already wearing their hospital gowns?  She told me that she wasn't able to dress me because I was rioting when she tried to.  I threw my arms up in the air and kept saying "I don't want another operation!!  No more operations!"  So she left me to calm down and for the anesthetic to wear off so that she wouldn't get a black eye!  I told her that I was very hungry at which point she said that the nurses had kept my food for me and were going to bring it to me later.

When I was picked up by the nurses to be brought back to my room we ran into my surgeon in the hallway.  I was still VERY loopy.   He said that everything went well and that I should go and rest now.  I just said "thank you" a thousand times and then took his hand (I can't remember if he went to shake my hand of if I just took his hand into mine) and just kept saying thank you.  I felt utterly star struck to be around him, he seemed like god to me at that point. 

 Anyway, everything a bit blurry after that.  My room had lots of people in it.  The girl that had already had her operation was there with a visitor.  Then I had a visitor.  Then the old lady with the new hip got wheeled in.  It was super busy, and throughout I kept getting phone calls from my family.  My brother said that he called and halfway through I just stopped talking because someone came in the room but I didn't hang up on him so he was just left listening to people speaking in the background.  He said he could hear in my voice that I was still away with the fairies.  Yes I was...and I hadn't eaten in nearly 24 hours.  

Everything that comes after that is the usual hospital recovery story.  I was in the hospital for 3 days.  I had tubes coming out of my leg for blood drainage.  So when I went to the toilet I had to take my blood bottles with me.  They got taken out on day two.  Weirdest feeling ever.  But loads of pressure was released and I felt a lot better.  Every part of my body hurt.  Not just my right leg.  I was uncomfortable because I was compensating for having a gammy leg.  I was sleeping so much.  Even a trip to the toilet would make me feel exhausted.  Then I thought to myself.  I am so freaking lucky.  I'm so glad that this was the first time I've ever had to go to the hospital in all of my 26 years of living.  I have an injury and the doctors have done their best to fix it so that I can continue living an active life.  I am recovering and healthy in every other way.  Thank god.  And thank you to the doctors who have fixed my injury.  Hopefully soon I will be able to do all the sport EVER!

Wow.  What a long winded essay up there.  I've been wanting to write it down for a while.  Now comes the less dry wordy part of the post, some photos taken during my recovery time here in Bavaria.  I've been lucky to have such a wonderful recovery station.

2nd of March, just before I was discharged from the hospital.

2nd of March, looking at my knee after my first shower at home.  (WARNING: not for a weak stomach)

8th of March, blue sky, green fields!!!

10th of March, helping out in my mom's bee house is one thing I could do with a bad leg.

10th of March, cleaning out old frames.

19th of March, went to celebrate my dad's birthday in Passau in the sunshine!

19th of March, walking through the English Garden with a friend in Munich we saw the surfers on the Isar.

20th of March, my little sister working on her stamp for our Papergirl Bristol http://papergirl-bristol.blogspot.de/ submissions.

20th of March, sun drying our submissions on eclipse day!

I have finally come to an end to this post.  Thanks to anyone that had the patience to read all the way through my very long winded and quite sappy essay!  I hope you are all healthy and bursting into spring with refreshed open minds and hearts.

..love..

All shades of snow.

It is winter.

It is also the start of a new year.

My plants aren't doing anything new or exciting so I will post pictures of my snowy Christmas and New Years adventures with my family, in Bavaria.

-  My Mutti's bees in a snowy forest.

-  A winter wonderland.

-  My brother hurtling down a snowy hill.

 -  Fireworks on new years eve.

 -  Snowy trees, foggy blue skies.

-  Fog, fog, fog again...and a hidden steeple.

Enjoy your winter!
..love..

The forest and the ladybug apocalypse.

It's been a wonderfully outdoorsy weekend!  Lots of walks and really feeling the autumn right now.  Not much has happened with my plants at the moment.  The seasonals are on their way out and my chili pepper plants are just growing along fine.  In fact I have discovered a little pepper on one of my serrano chili plants!  Photos to come soon!  But right now I just want to share some pictures of my weekend.

-  On Saturday, we got on a bus out to East Berlin.  We went to Müggelheim which is where the Müggelsee is.  We walked in an impressive forest, which from the top looks out over one of the lakes.  The day started out really foggy.  It was crisp but not that cold.  The colour pallet of the day was mainly brown, yellow and grey.  It was beautiful.  I know I have been totally overusing the word autumnal, but it was super autumnal.  That's the only way I can describe it.  Here's the view on the way up through the forest.  There is a downhill mountain biking course through it!  There were some guys mountain biking down the course.  They were pretty fast and were jumping off ramps and stuff.  I was impressed.

Once we had made it to the top of the "hill", this was the stunning view we had over the smaller Müggelsee.  (It's called the smaller lake although it is mahoosive!)

-  Sunday, the weather was completely the opposite to the weather on Saturday.  I woke up to the sun shining and a cloudless blue sky!  We went to the Hasenheide, which is a park in Neukölln just across from Templehof.  Over the course of the day it got really warm and people were sitting in the park topless!  Really crazy when you think that it's already the end of October!  There was one thing that was really bizarre about today...there were soooooo many ladybugs flying around EVERYWHERE!  Every minute there was one landing on me after another one had just flown off.  I wonder if this is a common thing for October and that just like there is that one flying ant day, where ALL the flying ants EVER come out, that there is also a flying ladybug day.  I really enjoyed the ladybugs' company though and I managed to take this really cool photo of one about to take flight!

And here is a photo of two ladybugs flying in the blue sky!  It just looks like there are two black dots in the air, but they are ladybugs!  I promise!

-  After the Hasenheide I continued my journey home and popped by the Comenius Garden which was buzzing with people enjoying the sun.  The trees were just über-vibrant and full of colour!

Anyway, it was a perfect day for soaking up some autumn sun.  The paths were covered in crispy orange and yellow leaves and accompanied by the leaf crunching sound of my feet, it was just glorious.
Thanks for reading and I hope you all have had similar autumnal experiences!
..love..

Seasonal changes.

I'd like to welcome autumn to da house!!  The skies are blue, the sun is shining, and the wind is blowing!  With this change my bedroom gardening season is rearing to end for my summer plants.

- I still have some tomatoes that are staying strong with fruits ripening up.  Some of the tomato plants would look really really naked if it wasn't for a couple of wilting leaves and a few ripening tomatoes.  But that is all part of its course, plants grow, ripen and die to make space for next season's plants.  Here are some tomatoes I harvested a couple of days ago.  Kumato (top left), cherry (top and bottom right) and tiger stripe (bottom left).

- There are a couple of plants that are not rearing to an end.  Those are my serrano chili plants.  One is even starting to flower and everyone knows what that means!!!  Potential chili peppers!!!!

- Even my kohlrabi's are still holding on!  They didn't end up growing into actual kohlrabi's.  I think it's because I haven't put them in a pot big enough.  They are in a hanging basket and the stems are a beautiful foggy purple colour, and that's why I won't get rid of them...because they are pretty!

- Here is a distant view of my garden window.  You can see I have significantly less plants.  One of the reasons gardening is so wonderful is that you really can see and feel the seasons changing with your fingers if you don't otherwise. 

- For a finishing touch, here's a picture of me in my favourite place.  Of course you know it...Tempelhof!  A couple of weeks ago there were hay bails all over the field.  They had stacked some of them into pyramids, which we used as jumping platforms!!!  It was so much fun at the time...until I got home and my whole body was an itchy mess!!

Anyways, thanks for reading...and I wish you all the very best of the start of autumn.

Autumnal ..love..

Summer greens.

Hello everyone!  I finally have some time to write after a busy summer!  And my oh my have I got a lot of pictures to post.  I will put a caption above each photo saying when, where, and what!!

21.07.2014 - My grandmother's colourful bin.  Bits and pieces snipped off or fallen from plants on her balcony.  (Bavaria)

 23.07.2014 - My first yellow pear tomato of the season.  I don't think I will grow this sort anymore, as even last year the yield I got was very little.  They are however very pretty tomatoes when they do grow!

  27.07.2014 - New Serrano chili plants.  These were packed as if they were matches from a Mexican eatery called "Wahaca" in London.  This little packet was found and gifted to me.  How very cool to give your guests seeds instead of matches to remember your restaurant by.  I got really emotional when I was given them because I thought it was such a wonderful idea!

 27.07.2014 - After the third attempt my Jalapeno pepper plant is finally growing!

27.07.2014 - I bought a tiger stripe tomato plantling from the market, and it has grown really really tall and here are the first little tiger stripes making an appearance!

31.07.2014 - Harvested and ate my kumato tomato, that I grew from a tomato that I bought in the store.  I don't think it was ripe yet when I ate it.  The skin was still a little hard but I was just so impatient!

07.08.2014 - My other grandmother's garden (in Bavaria) in it's peak.  This is a view of her vegetable garden from her shed/summer house outside.  Although my grandmother doesn't like the second picture because it makes her garden look so empty, it shows more of the vegetable side of things that she grows.  (ginkgo, echinacea, rose, quince tree, chives, mangold/chard, plum tree, beans, zucchini, tomato, and many more that I have probably forgotten)

07.08.2014 - Look, some bees enjoying a zucchini flower!  (gran's garden)

07.08.2014 - This is the insane bursting with fruits wine/grape vine she has in the garden.  It is absolutely exploding with grapes which she will use to make jam.  Learned about Bachus the Greek wine god, that supposedly protects and encourages the grapes to grow.

12.08.2014 - Back in Berlin a sunset view over my beloved Tempelhofer Feld.

14.08.2014 - My tiger stripe tomato harvest.  Looking juicy on the vine and off.

16.08.2014 - Now comes our trip to Varazze in Liguria, Italy.  Such amazing plant life there.  So many succulents and cacti as well as citrus fruit trees.  Crazy.  It was a beautiful holiday in the warm warm sun.  There are so many rock dwelling plants it is unreal.

20.08.2014 - Gotta show you guys at least one picture of the sea!

Lemon and orange and lime trees were everywhere.  Although a lot of the lemons didn't seem to be ripe yet.  Apparently the weather hasn't been that great this summer, which could have something to do with it.

This tree is amazing, growing up the cracks of the rock, I have no idea how this happened.  It looks like a normal tree, but maybe it's actually a climber.  Who knows.  Maybe one of you knows?  If you know what kind of tree this is then let me know please!

Sighted on one of our evening strolls, the shop fronts in Liguria are just of many different types of succulents.  Beautiful.

21.08.2014 - As we were flying from our layover in Paris back to Berlin I got some great shots of the sun peaking through the clouds we were just flying through.  I love that space in between the clouds and the atmosphere.  It's magical.

So, after a really long picture post I say goodbye and goodnight.  I hope you have all had a brilliant summer wherever you were.  Thanks for reading, and I wish you all a great start into the week and into what feels like the start of late summer or the beginning of autumn.
..love..