April Showers

I know we needed the rain,  I don't know about you - but I am getting a little fed up of it now!   Typically I have 2 weeks off work and it looks like it will be raining virtually every one of those days.

I have managed sometime at the Lottie this week, dodged the showers sometimes,  been caught in down pours often and sat in the shed with a mug of coffee during some thunder storms - which was a tad scary!  Mr Milly is fed up now with all the muddy washing this week as I seem to have brought home a good part of the Lottie clinging to my clothes everyday!

Anyway - I had a plan of what I wanted to achieve and have worked hard this week,   by Friday though the new Plot 96 was looking a complete bomb site and I had to keep reminding myself that it is often this way to achieve the end result.

This week I have taken down the tatty pallet compost bins, cleared a corner of the plot, removing brambles along the way,  laid weed membrane and wood chips,  constructed a new compost bin with the best of the pallets and then dug all of the partially composted material from the old bins and moved it into the new bin.   Finally a cage to protect the peas has been made and what a difference this has made to Plot 96 - which is now looking heaps better!

Plot 96 In February 2012

Tatty compost bins 

New tidy Compost area

Plot 96 in April 2012

Pea Cage with little pea plants starting to appear

On Saturday I had a Lottie free day and we travelled to Kent to spend the day with My Girl.  It was lovely to see her and apart from her recently broken rib (as I have said often,  she is the most accident prone creature!)  she is looking healthy, well and happy - which is all you can wish for really.

We went into Canterbury for a little retail therapy and our lovely daughter cost me a fortune!  We did have fun though.  We haven't been into Canterbury before and what a lovely town it is,  next time we visit we are going to do the Cathedral tour.  I was a little shocked at the price of tickets for the Cathedral - £9.50 for an adult,  I hope it is worth that amount of money!

Cathedral Gate

A glimpse of the Cathedral

Mr Milly and My Girl

Look at that - our 2 favourite shops right next to each other!  How handy :)

 My Girl and Me

I hope you had a good weekend and haven't been washed away!
Alison x

An Eventful Weekend

Tonight I am going to chill in front of the TV and doing NOTHING!  I am really tired this evening and am looking forward to unwinding and relaxing before a busy week starts once again.

Saturday morning started with a bright and sunny morning,  rain was forecast for mid-day so I headed out early for the Lottie. it was a lovely bright and warm winter day  - the thermometer on the lovely new clock is working 11 degrees;-

 I had decided that I was going to concentrate on Plot 95 and really try and get as much as possible completed - it would be easy at this point to flit between the 2 plots doing a bit here and there, but I felt a purpose and a push on Plot 95 was the way to go.

The middle recently cleared bed had been 1/2 dug,  I spent a couple of hours digging this bed and levelling it out.  It sounds like a lot of time but it is slow progress.  Dig a bit,  sift out roots and weeks,  dig a bit more, sift out more roots and weeds and on it went.  Finally it was done,  I planted 3 bulbs of garlic and 24 shallots in a section of the newly dug bed and have temporarily covered them.   Hopefully the cover will be enough to stop the birds digging them out until they start to shoot.    I was chuffed to get this bed sorted - this is part of the bed which was been left since I took the plot over, so a real achievement to finally have it in some sort of shape.

A bit of tidying up and then a phone call came from My Boy - he and his friend Aaron were collecting the greenhouse frame for me and there was a problem - the frame was concreted down and they didn't think they would be able to remove it.    I collected a couple of drinks for them as requested and drove over to meet them.   I was delighted when I arrived to find this......

They had managed to remove the frame from its base and were in the middle of dismantling it!  Three young men, a big bag of tools and soon the partly dismantled Greenhouse was loaded into the the tipper truck and was on its way to the lottie.   I did enjoy watching them puzzling over the dismantling and loading into the truck - they all worked really well together and a massive slap in the face reminder of how grown up and clever my son is now and how ancient they made me feel!!

Anyway the adventure continued..   we arrived at the Lottie I rode in the tipper truck and it was a bit scary!!  The ground is very soft and muddy after the snow and rain recently - the truck didn't like it and slipped and slid all along the lane.   Finally we arrived,  it took me a few minutes to unclench my fingers from the grab rail and then  the greenhouse was unloaded and unceremoniously dumped on Plot 96 until next weekend.  The next challenge then arrived - the tipper truck was completely stuck in the mud and couldn't get out.   Me, with my  girlie mum head on, started to have a bit of a panic - the boys, didn't flap at all and just got on with it with me still panicking and standing around looking and feeling completely useless!!  The solution,  My Boy used his 4 wheel drive pick-up truck to tow the 2 wheel drive tipper truck all the way through the allotment site to the main gate - good job there was no-one else around!!  They all thought it was brilliant,  I was just glad it was sorted so easily and to be honest it was a bit of an adventure!!!

A distance blurry picture - can you see the greenhouse in bits!

Today has been different again - but fun!  My eldest nephew wanted to come to the Lottie with me,  I drove over to collect him and the youngest nephew decided to come too!  Off we set, parked up at the lottie gates and all carried bits and pieces to the plots.    I had stopped on the way and bought one of these;-

It is an exactly replica of my Joseph Bentley digging spade just in a smaller child friendly size.  The boys were delighted with it!!   It was put to good use - the eldest nephew dug out  the trench bed for the blueberries - virtually on his own!

Hard at work

Blueberry bed underway and perfect size digging spade. 

He is 9 and very clever and really enjoys manual activities - he got stuck in and took over!   The trench was soon dug, lined with pond liner which I then tried to puncture with a fork for drainage - the oldest nephew watched for a few minutes and then asked if I thought it would be easier to take the liner out of the trench to put the holes in - of course he was right, he is very good at telling me what to do and is always right too! The trench was lined with cardboard and the youngest nephew and I refilled it and planted the blueberries.  We all had time for hot chocolate and cakes!!  

Everyone gets a job!

Next the bean trench was dug - not by me!!  Another brilliant job by the eldest nephew,  the little one planted some more shallots and  next the cherry tree was planted on Plot 96,  I dug the hole,  we all had a go and hammering in the tree stake and the oldest nephew refilled the hole  a joint effort!   Just as we were having another hot chocolate the boys mum, my sister-in-law, arrived closely followed by their dad -  that is the most people working on the plot at one time ever!   Half of the soon-to-be potato bed was dug over and we started to clear the brambly bed between the 2 plots.    What a brilliant afternoon with so much getting done in a short space of time.    I expect there will be a few aching backs tonight though!    It was lovely having family with me today and I really appreciated the help and massive push the lottie has had.   In fact standing looking at it at the end of the afternoon Plot 95 is almost completely ready for the new growing season  and for the first time since I took it over there are no really major jobs to be done.   More pictures to follow as my camera ran out of battery before we did today!

Exciting News

This morning at 9.05 on I was on the phone to the council and the result - Plot 96 is still available and yes it was no problem for me to take that one over!  The tenancy agreement is on its way to me,  and that now means that I have a whole plot to play with!   My current plot - No 95 is a 5 rod plot which is 1/2 a plot.   No 96 is also a 5 rod plot -  with the 2 together  I am now a full plot holder!

I have had my eye on this plot for sometime now as it directly joins to mine,  it has been worked last year with 3 reasonable sized beds having been in production.  To get this one up and running will probably take a weekend - to actually have it how I would like to run the 2 plots will take much longer.   There are some of the dreaded brambles to be cleared, however these are at the very back of the plot and could be left for now, in fact they probably will be left for now!  There is also a very small tin shed I think these are the original sheds put up on the site as there are a few of them scattered here and there - this will be useful though as I can store the pots I have accumulated and a few other bits and pieces too,  these will clear my shed a little and the back of plot 95 which is a bit of a dumping ground.

Plot 95 on the left and Plot 96 on the right,  the over grown bit in the middle separates the 2 plots.

Good timing really for this one to come up - right at the start of the year so there is plenty of time to prep the existing beds ready for planting!   This weekend the Portuguese Housekeeper and I cleared the front of Plot 95 WooHoo!!!  A double celebration!!    This is the very last bit of my plot to be cleared,  it was a hard slog to get it done but massive sense of achievement once it was completed with the last barrow load of weeds and rubbish taken away.   The Portuguese Housekeeper was fed up yesterday - 'I'm bored with moving mud' she said at one point, but we were so nearly at the end she kept going.  It has taken 2 weekends to clear this bit and without her help it would have taken me 4 weekends probably to do - I am extremely grateful for her help and the company!

All cleared - ready for digging over and making new beds.
The picture makes my plot look empty - in reality this newly cleared section is about 1/3 of the total plot,  the perspective of the photo is just not quite right!.

Clearing the last section of the front of my plot.   It definately isn't glamorous work!!  LOL 

The Smurfs came to help.........  
The Portuguese Housekeeper was cold,  we teased her all day  as she looks like a Smurf!

Plans are now afoot to sort out the  whole big plot I now have - pen and paper will be out tonight!  I wonder if I have enough seeds!!

The end of a long week

This week was exhausting,  it ended on Friday evening collecting a bed for the Portuguese Housekeeper (PH) - my little car to collect a double bed.  That meant driving to collect the PH,  driving to collect the first half of the bed,  delivering it to her flat - which is a very long walk from where the car was parked,  driving back to get the second half of the bed and repeating the process.     Not much blogging from me this week, but with the hours and hours spent in the car, I really didn't have anything remotely interesting to say and I was tired beyond tired!

I couldn't wait to get out in the fresh air,  minimal driving and do something enjoyable.   An early start for me yesterday,  a little shopping for essentials (chicken and parrot food),  collected my bag of goodies and off to the Lottie.  It was cold - a hat, scarf and a few layers of clothing sorted out that challenge though.   I had a very sore shoulder - from spending so much time in the car I think - so didn't want to do anything too strenuous, I decided to paint the table!

It took a while to do, but I was well wrapped up,  a cup of tea or 2 on hand, paint brush to the ready and the table has had its first coat of paint.    It is a bit lighter than I thought it would be,  but I do like it!

Table Before

Table after

I had a very interesting chat to Barney from plot 102 with some exciting news - the lady from plot 96, this is the one directly next to mine - has now given up her plot.  If you remember this post We have been Busy you will know that I have been thinking of taking on another plot and this is the one that I wanted.    First thing on Monday morning I will be on the phone to the council to see, well beg and plead actually, if I can take this plot on too.

Now I am not going to talk about Plot 96 any more until I have had the conversation with the nice lady at the council - hopefully with fingers and toes crossed I will have some good news to share tomorrow!