Saturday took me away to London for a conference, hot and noisy, so when I returned on Sunday afternoon, after forty winks on the settee I was out in the garden, just sitting and looking at my vegetables.

All I could hear was the sound of birds in the trees behind me and it felt absolutely wonderful. It was all I could do, to sit and stare at the beauty and tranquility which surrounded me. Boy I love living in Dorset.

The donkey work has been done in the garden for now, so it's a matter of keeping a vigilant eye on growth, pests and diseases, although I keep thinking to myself I must have missed something, I'm not used to this pootling around the garden.

Although the strawberries are now over (and this year has been a bumper crop) I have started to pick my raspberries and I can see the blueberries ripening in the sunshine we have had this week.

In the greenhouse, everything is growing at an incredible rate of knots. This year, although I say this every year, I am learning from last years mistakes and keeping a closer eye on my bush tomatoes. Last years fruit was so big and heavy, that the weight was too much for some of the stems, so this year, with my help of my trusty ex boy scout boyfriend, (he's good with knots) we have built a frame of bamboo canes, to tie the stems into place and give them some support.

As well as vegetables, I have sown some flower seeds in trays in the greenhouse. hesperis matronal (sweet rocket) honesty and verbena bonariensis, which I hope to plant out in the autumn or over winter in pots to plant out next spring. They are coming along, slowly but surely but not nearly as well as my cerinthe, which has self seeded all over the vegetable bed. I am carefully digging the seedlings up and potting them up individually, to grow on out of the way of the vegetables.

It's amazing how nature does so much better, than when we intervene. I have a great big soil heap in the garden which is covered in the most gorgeous grasses, which have self seeded. You could never call these weeds, they are far too beautiful.

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