Introduction

My name is Kayleigh, I live in Solihull, a small town by Birmingham ( want to know Solihulls claim to fame? Richard Hammond the hamster was born and raised here! Oh and we have the land rover factory.
I live with my husband Damien, my two children (who are growing up to fast) Jack 10 and Ellie 9. We also live with our border collie Lulu and our two cats George and Charlotte.
Last year I got the growing bug. I used to hate gardening and my garden reflects that, I have a large garden but 30% has been taken over by overgrown stinging nettles.
I was given some tomato seeds last spring for my daughter and this started off my love of veggies.
I grew cabbages, about 30 tomato plants and onions. I grew everything in containers, I did no research whatsoever and pretty much neglected the plants and still managed to produce some ok vegetables.
This made me actually want to do it properly and see what results I can get.
I have spent the last 8 months researching different growing methods, different species of veg ect and in October I dug out all of the stinging nettles with some help from the kids and the dog and I levelled off the earth and dug in a lot of well rotted manure. I now have a respectable veggie patch 20ftx18ft and a medium sized greenhouse. I know this is very ambitious for a first timer but I'm not a person to do things by half measures .
I wanted to write this blog mainly for my own record keeping and learning experience but if any experienced or not gardeners want to pass on any advice in the comments they would be appreciated.