True, we had some beautiful weather during May and driving through Pendleside on my way to work was a joy.

Despite our best endeavours, however, barbecue weather it has not been. Opportunities to sit out and enjoy the garden have been few and far between, as all to often it has been cold and windy.

In fact, during June it has often been chilly. My eldest daughter hosted a party last Friday night. She worked all day baking and cooking to be ready for the big event, but chilly gusting winds battered the garden and ruined her plans for a barbecue party with her friends.

As heavy rain lashed against the conservatory roof and the garden was bombarded with foliage from the chestnut and sycamore trees, she conceded defeat and moved indoors.

As it happens, her guests were a lovely group of young people and for about four hours the house resounded to the sound of thump, thump music and laughter and my daughter had a great time.

Perhaps not as memorable as chatting into the early hours staring into the dying embers of the chiminea, but pleasant nevertheless.

As dawn broke, we awoke to signs of carnage and devastation.

The winds had blown buckets full of leaves into the pond, ripped plants out of the hanging baskets and blown over a couple of containers.

No real problem. It was as nothing compared with the kitchen, which looked like it had been hit by a tornado. Bin bags brimmed over with tins and bottles. Whilst my daughter recovered with customary beauty sleep, dad drafted in the dishwasher for a marathon session and toiled to restore order.

That night it was our turn to party and we, too, went to a barbecue.
As the wind whipped through the trees, I dutifully turned sausages on the griddle (actually I was keeping warm) while the dedicated party stoics grimly chomped their way through my cremated offerings and weighed down their lettuce leaves lest they took flight, as they huddled under the patio heater.

As the rain returned, we all retreated indoors for what turned out to be a thoroughly pleasant evening.

Sunday morning broke and this time the house was pristine, but out-of-doors was devastation. All day the wind gusted and battered the garden and, wisely in retrospect, we stayed inside. There were reports of winds gusting to 63 m.p.h.

My poor geraniums heavy with buds and flowers, were broken. Roses in full bloom lost their petals, scattered like confetti in the wind.

Over in the vegetable garden, the potato plants were flattened by the blast, the grass was strewn with windfall leaves and the broad beans looked like they had encountered a steamroller. All over the driveway a million baby conkers littered the ground. More significantly, it was cold and in truth it still is.

At the bottom of my garden I have an Inula. It is a six foot high shaggy daisy. I first saw some growing at Chatsworth years ago and I simply had to have one. Since then, I have staked and supported it, caned it, tied it, and always it takes on all the refined characteristics of a bag of spanners.

Every year it seems to be on the brink of magnificence and then summer gales batter it, bend it and break it, leaving it only a shadow of its potential glory.

It was in anticipation of the usual disaster that I went down to the bottom of the garden to pick up the pieces and clear up the mess. My Chinese dogwood had blown over. A limb had broken off the beech tree and leaves littered the paving.

Strangely, the Inula stood proud and unmarked. I had not staked or supported it, but left it to its fate. Falling branches had not touched it and it must have simply bent like a willow and come out unscathed. A rare highlight of a grim couple of weeks weather.

It is at times like this that a greenhouse, so long as it is still standing, comes into its own.

Sliding the door behind me, the chilly wet winds seem much more distant. The warm air is full of the scent of tomato plants. The first fruits are swelling now and we should be cropping in about three weeks time.

The cucumbers too are racing up their supports and the first flowers have appeared. Our sweet peppers have started forming fruits. I feed the lot with tomato food, but I never leave the peppers with their feet in water.

All in all, things seem to be coming on nicely. I keep things thoroughly watered, but not waterlogged. Every time I water, I feed with tomato food. The result is rich dark healthy looking foliage and plants that freely flower, and flowers mean fruit. So long as you pinch out the "side shoots" on the tomato plants as they form, you can look forward to reliable crops all summer. Other than that, you just have to ventilate on hot days and keep an eye open for whitefly, which are easily sorted with yellow sticky traps or with a spray of Provado.
In the greenhouse it is warm, humid and exotic. Strangely my eldest daughter rarely comes in for a nosey.., she prefers the real thing.

Six weeks trekking in Thailand and scrubbing elephants is more to her taste.

For her father, tending his greenhouse crops whatever the weather, until she gets back it looks like being a miserable summer.