Lovely Rain

Hurray, we've just had 2 days of fairly solid rain. Our three water tanks are full but that doesn't mean we will stop saving grey water. It just gives some security at this time of the year. 
I have just read Depletion and Abundance - life on the new home front or, one woman's solutions to finding abundance for your family while coming to terms with peak oil, climate change and hard times.

I am grateful that we do not live in the USA after reading that in certain parts it is illegal to utilize your own rainwater off the roof, in some places citizens are not allowed to plant vegetables in their front yard, nor are many people permitted to hang washing outdoors. I know that apartment dwellers here can't do that either though. I think we have a lot more freedom here in New Zealand.
I am also reassured that we are already doing many of the things she suggests.
Harvest
So when the sun came out yesterday I zipped outside to pick things. Everything had grown so much in one day!
Here is a photo of my little harvest, although I added a few peaches to that after the photo. Mostly the strawberries are much better, but they didn't like the rain so much.

They are the first of our plums from a new tree and we are particularly delighted because we seem to have beaten the possums. They have left all our tree crops alone at this point.
There have been some failures in our garden though..the broadbeans are a disappointment with next to nothing in many of the pods, and the one garlic I sneaked out had no head - it looked more like a spring onion - this does not bode well for the rest of the crop. The peas did not germinate well so are patchy. But other veges are great..courgettes, spinach and silverbeet, lettuces, rhubarb (my heritage plant that I am very proud of), spring onions and beans, with tomatoes and cucumbers coming on.
Recycle
An old market umbrella has died so Derek has refashioned it into a frame for our climbing beans, although I have just realized I might need a ladder to pick them hmmm.

recycled umbrella frame for climbing beans 

These have been mighty producers last year - beans for months, unbelievable. They are McGregors Climbing Kentucky Pole Beans.
Potting Mix
Derek has told me that a colleague of his reported that his father made his own potting mix from grinding up desicated cow dung, and that everything grew amazingly. That's some legend worth considering.