On Monday, after we said goodbye to Relic, I wasn’t in any mood to work. I called in, but I still needed to do something with myself. I couldn’t just sit around and cry. So I went outside and soaked up the sun – Relic’s favourite thing to do.

And while I was out there, I decided I needed to attend to some of my seed snails. Several of them were getting quite overgrown – mostly the sunflowers.

Just look at all those roots coming out of the bottom.

I have three types of sunflowers (yellow, red and white), and they are all now happily potted on and doing great. It will be a few more weeks before I can put them in the ground, but I am thrilled with the results so far.

The tansy and seashell cosmos were also in a similar state

They are doing fantastic after their transplant.

I left the rest in the snails to grow on a bit more, but they should be ready to pot on in another week or so. And I’m calling this experiment a resounding success – as the seeds I planted in the regular seed pods haven’t germinated at all… it’s going to be seed snails from now on for me!

Elsewhere, I had planted the rest of my cosmos seeds directly in large pots.

And they are all starting to sprout. They should be ready to plant out into the gardens by July, providing amazing blooms right until the first frost.

My spinach is also doing well.

Though it will be a little while longer to make a nice salad with the lettuce I planted…

It’s growing much slower! But it’s still growing!

I also took the opportunity to plant up the few herbs I picked up

Thyme and Rosemary

Sage and Oregano

And two different types of parsley. (The pot on the left has been planted up with seeds so it will be a bit before it makes it’s debut.) In truth, I planted the parsley for the Swallowtail butterflies… it’s a host plant for their caterpillars.

I am absolutely thrilled with how the garden is going so far, and the season has only just begun!