Asparagus “fritaja”

Spring is (finally and seriously) here and with it a flurry of activity at Pruga. The “missed at Easter” asparagus frittata was enjoyed, there are spring blossoms galore, and we are finishing things, finishing things.

Spring

Three shades of yellow

At first, I thought I must work on the apartments inside first – there is so much detail still that needs to be finished. Like these chairs. I had the plan – encouraged by DIY bloggers who make it look oh so easy. I now am certain they are all paid by DIY shops to make it look so. While I have some experience and am pretty crafty and handy – geee, do these things take time.

Chairs before

I do now know that for one of the first projects, I prooobably chose the most complicated furniture shape (plus, the state of these chairs could have been better – wood have splintered in many places at these bends) – it seemed never-ending – cleaning, sanding, filling holes, sanding, re-filling holes, sanding…. Three days later I am at “first coat of primer” stage.

Chairs almost after

So another day’s work at least. If you feel like you want to attempt similar things – I like the way these guys explain the steps involved (of course, there are zillion different ways to do the same thing, so choosing one philosophy is quite important).

Initially I thought I will keep the chairs black, but they seemed too dark with the rather dark floor, so light grey it will be. So no promised pictures of interiors from my last post – some things were done – like all the light fixtures are now in – there was too much mess after the electricians and other trades that I didn’t have a chance sort out for taking good pictures.

The reason I didn’t finish the chairs and didn’t focus more on interiors (again) is that the weather this time was too nice and it just called for being outside and doing the outside projects (of which the number is endless).

Garlic and broad beans progress

It really is glorious there at this time (we are again in Zagreb for a few days, hence time for writing :).

New kaki/persimmon tree

Last autumn, we got a toonedaybeaverycoollooking kaki tree which waited at our friends’ P’s balcony until the other day to be planted – hopefully in its final happy location. It is a very pretty tree without the fruit but looks especially cool as the fruit ripens after the leaves fall out. “They are one of the last trees to leaf out in the spring, and do not flower until well after the leaves have formed, bypassing the threat of blossom loss to frosts. The fruit hangs on the branches long into the winter… A persimmon tree will be mature enough to bear fruit within 7–8 years.” Let’s wait and see…

Tomatoes are in

The tomato plants were successfully transported from Zagreb to Istria (in wine boxes – they were tall enough) and also planted. I do hope there will be no more frosts – the way it looks now, instead of the frost, too much sun and heat could do them damage as I am away…. I eagerly planted about 100 seedlings – realised that 20 in our garden will be plenty and have tons for giving away – they have reached half my windowsill and hopefully will all be planted in various gardens by the end of this week.

Tomato labels

A reminder of what is planted where is for tracking success or otherwise. The 8 on the right hand side are seeds I collected from the lady who farms for real in the village – it is to be expected that these will do the best… maybe.

Garden path progress

Garden paths are laid. Many more plants need to be planted – the idea is to have flowers and shrubs at the front.

House guests

Neighbour’s dogs (mom and son) have decided that while we are at the house, they will be as well. No need for going home. It is of course because we (well, Vanja, who, btw, has fully mastered the grass trimmer – there is so much to trim that he can happily spend an hour each day doing it and by the time the whole plot is finished, he can start again – so much fun ahead of us) feeds them treats. It is ideal for us for now – as we are still debating how to manage the two dogs we’d like to have when in the small flat on the 5th floor in the middle of the city.

Weeds before

The trimmer cannot do all the jobs with grass so another two days (well, afternoons) were spent clearing out the gravel driveway and pool surround. I sprayed them with vinegar first – which had partial effect – killed the easy ones to pull anyway, tough ones stayed tough. So, here I am – trying not to fall over on my back, being in apparently the best position for my spine while doing these sort of jobs

Weeds after

Ta daaaaaaaaaaa!

I had to put this one in – me with the wheelbarrow on my way to take said weeds to the weed dump. Only a day before, in roughly the same outfit, I was getting goat manure in this wheelbarrow (from the farmer lady neighbour) for the tomato plants. Such is my life now. Fascinating.

(The wheelbarrow is white and not brown – as one would expect if there was manure involed – because this day it was used for mixing lime and cement for finishing beautiful stone walls in front of the apartments of which, sadly, I’ve not taken any pictures yet.)

And finally, we saw two of these birds one morning as they were trying to fly into the house through closed windows. They survived the windows, we were very excited, they looked very exotic and then didn’t come back 🙁 I think birdwatching is next for us. And then, perhaps, trainspotting…

Pupavac (Upupa epops)