A phone call

I'm not going to start with the phone call,  first a little Lottie update - It is cold and everything is frozen solid!

This morning the Lottie looked like this;-

I did try to hammer in the tall poles for the bean frame - the Portuguese Housekeeper was with me this morning and she was laughing at me as the pole really is too tall to hammer in without standing on something!!  I won't be defeated though and soon found something  to stand on!

After a few minutes of hammering with the pole only going into the ground by about 2 inches - I gave up!
Reluctant as I was, I did admit defeat today and knew that really there wasn't really very much I was going to be able to do.   I pottered in the shed for a while and put up the numbers on both sheds - they look great!  The clock now has a battery in it and is ticking away nicely.   Some new hooks have been hung in the metal shed and there is a new addition in the window of the green shed - can you see??

Apart from the numbers there is nothing attractive about this shed........
  I might have to do something about that!

I really needed some kind of path along the length of the plot - the long term plan in for grass but until that can be sown there is little structure to the plot and it is muddy!  Yesterday I was on a mission to make a path - I had seen something on another Blog that I liked and thought would work,  with Mr Milly laid up for the time being any construction work is down to me.   I have spent many many years working alongside Mr Milly as a 'builders mate' watching him, fetching and carrying and having a go now and again, so I did feel reasonable confident that I could muddle through, do things my own way and maybe achieve something.

I started with a pallet, my goodness they are incredible difficult to split down into usable pieces of wood,   so I found a different route!   I wanted slats about 40cm long,   with saw to the ready  I cut each of the slats off the pallet,  next my sister-in-law had given me the slats from the base of a single bed which has been replaced,  these were easier to saw.   Finally the wooden slats were laid in a line,  weed suppressant fabric stapled to the back and hey presto - a roll up path!  I'm quite chuffed with it and I have to say a little pleased with myself too!!

Anyway - lets go back to the phone call.   This weekend on my beloved Freecyle an item came up that I was really interested in,   my email was sent and I waited, and waited and waited.  Eventually an email was received

Hi Alison,

Well I have offered it to someone, but if they don't reply or don't want it, I'll let you know. It belonged to the old lady I bought my new house from, and she was a keen gardener who'd lived here since 1948... so I'm sure she'd like it to go to a good home where it was going to be useful.
I was disappointed, but not really surprised.  I politely replied to the email to thank the lady for letting me know and to confirm that I was still interested if anything changed - I sent her my telephone numbers - just in case!    This morning she phoned, the other people had not replied to her emails and looked like they were no longer interested - did I still want the item......  YES PLEASE was the reply.   I couldn't collect today,  you will see why, but was able to go and see it and take some pictures.

Here it is...........................

A 6ft x 8ft Greenhouse - Woohoo!!!!!!!!!!!  How exciting is that!!

  Well that's enough for today - I'm off to have a little glass of wine to celebrate and try and calm by brain which is now in overdrive trying to work out a zillion different things starting with......  how am I going to collect it!!

Alison x

Thank You

To Colin - Thank you!!

To Dearest Father In Law - Thank you!

I have had a couple of lovely gifts.  The first was delivered by my brother,  it is a gift from his friend Colin.   What a lovely and thoughful thing to do!   From this post How Annoying - and in particular my smashed Lottie Clock,  Colin has sent me a new one, and very smart it is too with both a clock and a thermometer - I do find it interesting to watch the temperature through the year and this will be brilliant!  The clock is now proudly sitting on the front of the shed.   I am trying to work out a way to fix it more securely as I will be really upset if anything happens to this one.  

Colin - thank you for my lovely clock,  I am really really pleased and delighted with it and very touched by your gift.  Alison x

Yesterday I received a letter delivered by the Postie,  the letter was addressed to the Lottie Lady -  inside was a letter signed by DFIL and some numbers plaques - initially I did think it was a number 5 and three number 9s   ........

 ......a quick switch round of the numbers and I was holding 95 and 96 - the numbers of my Lottie plots - how cool!!   As I now have 2 sheds, each one can proudly display their own plot numbers and as they are matching it will be announcement to all that the 2 plots belong to me!!  A little gift that I am really thrilled with!

DFIL - Thank you for my delightful number plaques - they will look lovely on the Plots - photos  in situ to follow!!  DDIL x 

No Lottie time for me today - this prevented it!  Hopefully the weather  will be good tonight then I will be off to the Lottie in the morning.  Alison x

A little helper

Firstly, thank you for the emails and comments I have had following the break in at the lottie - I have really appreciated your thoughts and humour too!

On a positive note - I am now feeling motivated to get to the lottie and start sorting it out ready for the spring,  both Mr Milly and the Portuguese Housekeeper have pledged time this week end to come with me and make a start - I expect the work will be down to me,  but the company will be extremely welcome.

I have had another offer of help today - from my oldest nephew,  he is 9 and often when he visits I will show him the recent photos I have taken and we talk about them.   He spotted the fox in the tree in a nano second!  Today we were discussing the lottie and  I duly showed him the pictures of the damaged door,  we discussed in detail what might of happened, he studied the broken door with great interest.  He has assured me he has some wood from his old bed that will help to fix the lottie door.  He asked his mum what he was doing at the weekend as he wanted to come and help me.   We talked about some of the other jobs that need doing,   planting the raspberries and building their frame,  pulling up the Brussel sprouts and clearing that bed,  a general little tidy up where the recent high winds have blown things around and whilst there is no new growth I would really like to cut down some more of the brambles at the back of the plot.   Now my nephew weigh all this up,  he established that he has some gardening gloves - and wanted to know how prickly the brambles were!

Anyway I have a lovely little list of jobs that he could do he was happy with that.    I'm not sure if he will make it to the lottie this weekend and as he was leaving I told that it would be great to see him this weekend,  but if he can't make it, then not to worry as there will be lots more weekends!  He did seem quite happy with this as he kissed me goodbye today.

Tonight I am sitting with some seed catalogues and trusty Google trying to decide what goodies I am going to attempt to grow this year.   Already there are things to be done - now is the time to be chitting seed potatoes ready for planting.   Which ones to choose - there are zillions of the things on offer and it is confusing and before even choosing  the type a decision to be made on which sort of crop - did you have any idea that the crop list was this long??????

Extra Earlies

Earlies

Second Earlies

Main crop

Late Crop

Pen and paper to the ready, trying to work out the whole thing out - how complicated for the humble little potato!

How annoying

This morning I had a phone call from the John the site manager of the allotments  - what was the phone call for?  My little lottie shed had been broken into!  

I had to wait until my lunch break today to go and see for myself what had happened.  To my relief nothing had been taken - but isn't that odd?  There isn't anything of any value in there as we did know of previous break-ins at the site and dire warnings from the other plot holders made sure nothing valuable was left there.  Having said that everything in my shed is valuable to me and it is mine!  I was most worried about my lawn mower (a second hand one) and my spade and fork - I did pay a reasonable sum for these (about £20 each so not a fortune),  BUT that is not the point - it would be annoying and inconvenient and costly to have to replace them and THEY ARE MINE!

It does look as if it was completely mindless, pointless vandalism and nothing else.  The door is damaged and the lock is broken,  my freebie freecycle clock is smashed and most strange of all - MY chairs were out of the shed, on the patio area as if someone had been sitting on them (Goldilocks - whose been sitting in my chair, springs to mind),  my scarecrow too had been taken out of the shed and thrown on the floor.  So it looks like some small minded person or people unknown have broken my shed to take the chairs out to sit on!  How very very stupid is that!    At least nothing is gone and some repair work will be required at the weekend.  Just keeping my fingers crossed that we don't have any rain between now and Saturday as the shed is definately not water tight at the moment.

Broken shed door

What a strange thing to do

Smashed clock on the patio

Considering it is the winter and the plot is seriously unloved at the moment and even with the broken door - No 95 is still looking neat and tidy - that does make me feel a little better!