Solstice and garlic

Yesterday was the shortest day here in NZ. So now we can look forward to the days getting a little bit longer, although winter is by no means over! However, here in the 'winterless north' it is pretty mild. This morning the sun is out and I had a quick wonder round the garden. The broad beans are doing well:

They are a dwarf variety so I'm hoping they won't need any support. They do need a bit of mulch, I've read seaweed works well, will have to go on a forage soon.

Now that Solstice has passed, it will soon be time to plant the garlic. There seem to various schools of thought on when to plant, but generally around Solstice is the norm. I probably could have put them in sooner since we are in a milder part of the country, but I wanted to make sure they had a few weeks in the fridge prior to planting as this is supposed to work well (not tried this before). Also I've read that it's a good idea to soak them overnight in a weak cow manure solution before planting out. Will let you know if I did this, now that we have the cows there will be manure!

Here are some of my pot plants, mainly succulents, a small bay tree on the left and some dwarf sweet peas to the right. In the middle of all these is a small clay dinosaur from G's aunt L and his late Uncle M. Also the barrow at the back is made by the same uncle and now resides with us. All of the jade plants and a lot of the succulents came from this uncle's garden, so it's lovely to keep them and it reminds us of him on a daily basis.