I am just a little bit in love with the backyard farm at the moment.

Everything is growing beautifully- the tomatoes are setting their first fruit, the zucchini and beetroots are already producing crops, the leafy greens are still producing and the first crop of corn is starting to show flowers. We have had a few weeks of rain showers and thunderstorms after a long dry spell, and the plants are absolutely loving it. The border flowers (nasturtiums, lavender, cosmos, sunflowers and salvia) are well and truly established, and are starting to bloom.

There is a whole universe of insect activity, including bees (both European and native), hoverflies, wasps, butterflies and ladybugs. And of course, birds and lizards to eat the insects and caterpillars.

I can just stand in the garden for whole stretches of time watching what is happening, using chopsticks to pluck the destructive caterpillars off my plants or "assisting" my zucchini to pollinate each other.

I also love that this blog allows me to look back at the first photos of the freshly dug plot - just this winter- and see how much everything has grown and changed. The contrast between this latest photo and the first is pretty satisfying!