A picture is worth a thousand words...

Well, kind of.

So this is my progress so far. Under my craftily erected (*snigger*) pigeon defence there is kale and more kale. I had hoped to plant a bit more, but The Great Manure Delivery has been somewhat delayed and so the soil isn't really fit for planting.

This kale went in after I spotted a local stable selling some manure so I managed to get a bag in the ground last Saturday. Helped by my lovely friend Liz too, which always makes going to the plot a bit more enjoyable.

I have been assured that the black stuff will be delivered on Friday afternoon, so today Project Manager Chops and I will be going up this afternoon (and probably tomorrow too) to dig over the bed for the leeks and spinach to go in, ready for manoo'erin and planting up on Sunday. Probably a bit late for both really, but here's hoping for some beginner's luck!

Slow progress is better than no progress.

Hello from sunny South Cambridgeshire... well actually its raining today, but I'm not going to complain!

I was all set to post a few photos of the 'progress' that we've made on the plot, until the Yorkshireman came home at lunchtime and took the camera to work for the afternoon, so I'll have to add those later.

What we have been up to is mostly weeding and hoeing and more weeding and more hoeing and so on and so forth. I have now managed to clear half the plot and mark out the 4 winter veg beds and the Christmas potatoes. I took the Yorkshireman up with me last weekend and he kindly dug over the bed for the potatoes and we have now planted them, so at least we can same something is growing!
On Tuesday I went up to the plot and the plot manager Jim kindly strimmed down all of the weeds on the other half of the plot with an old fashioned scythe. It was a pretty nifty tool too as it was far quicker than me fannying about with a petrol strimmer and a darn sight safer too (being that someone else was doing it!). I had planned to photograph this wonder of bygone technology, but unfortunately I had forgotten to put the memory card in the camera and now my iphone is playing silly buggers and won't let me download the few pictures I did manage to snap. Technology, who'd have it eh?!

So while I have nothing to show you, I can assure you something has been done since my last post... And hopefully if it stops raining, I'll be able to get up there this afternoon for a spot of digging in preparating for The Great Manure Delivery, which should happen any day now.

On that note, I'd better be off as Project Manager Chops has awoken from his nap and I need to dig out my wellies for this afternoon's digging.

A whole lotta 'Lotment

It's official, we are Allotmenteers! A bit like Musketeers, but without the silly hats and swords.... Ok, so its not really the same thing... but its a good title isn't it?

So we have managed to secure ourselves a 5 pole plot on the village allotments and on Tuesday I decided I'd better get myself down there and start clearing the weeds. I loaded up The Pram (handy wheely thing for carting compost and small children about in, although not at the same time!) and popped Charlie in the sling and we headed down to the bus stop, decked out in sunhats and shorts and suitably coated in factor 50. And we waited. And waited. Aaaaaaand waited. Half an hour in the hot afternoon sunshine and much cursing and muttering about how it would have been quicker to walk and the bus finally turned up. According to the driver the normal bus had broken down, so an older replacement had been sent out to ferry the passengers to their destinations. The only problem being was that it had steps and that odd pole thing that they used to have on buses (obviously before they let disabled people on buses!) so getting on with a pram laden with gardening tools and a hot and sweaty child in a sling wasn't the easiest task. Fortunately the driver took pity on me and got out to help me carry everything on and off, and ten minutes later we were stood outside the allotments.

There was much huffing and puffing as I then had to lift everything over the gate and down to our little plot which is actually the back half of a plot. The front is rented by a lovely Finnish lady called Lisa, who took on her half back in May and is also fairly new to Allotmenteering. Fortunately for us she has tackled some of the weeds on our plot to stop them spreading to hers, so half of the work has been done and made things a lot easier when it came to clearing weeds with the push hoe.

The push how was lent to me by the plot manager Jim, and with much tooing and froing up and down the plot for about 2 hours I managed to clear about 6 metres of weeds. That was pretty much all I could achieve on Tuesday as Charlie was beginning to protest about being stuck in the pram with nothing to do. So we toddled off home along the bumpy stony path that runs between the two halves of the village. Its about 1.3 miles from the front door to the plot so only takes about 2o minutes to walk and hopefully after my birthday, we'll be cycling to and fro on the days where we don't need to carry heavy forks and spades.

Keen to crack on with weeding and digging I decided we'd go back on Wednesday as well, but in the morning this time to try and keep a little cooler. As it happened Eldest Brother was at a loose end so I invited him to come down and help out. The idea didn't fill him with joy but being the good sport that he is, he came along anyway and lo and behold he's quite handy with a spade! We stayed for about n hour and a half and managed to dig and turn over the first area to be planted with the Christmas potatoes. We also did a fair bit of chatting and eating biscuits as well and it was handy to have someone there to entertain Charlie. Hopefully he'll be able to come along every few weeks and help out... The joy of free labour!

Today our plans to go to the plot have been scuppered as its been raining all morning, but I have plenty to be doing at home so its probably a good thing. The Yorkshirman's brother and his girlfriend will be visiting this weekend, so in all likelihood (and weather permitting) we'll drag them up to the plot to plant the aforementioned Christmas spuds and clear more weeks. I have drawn up The Plan for where everything will be planted next year, so I should imagine The Yorshireman will be getting busy with string and marker pegs to make sure everything in the right place... He does like things to be precise!

I'll try and get a copy of the plan on here some time soon and fingers crossed the rain will ease off this afternoon as we need to venture out for milk and eggs!

Grow my pretties... Grow!

Yes, there is finally life a'growin in our little garden! I have planted out a few potatoes, the late runner beans and some spinach in the muddy patch and have been watering them generously as its not rained in about a week now. I repotted the cavolo nero kale and perpetual spinach ready for planting out in a few weeks as they were all beginning to look a bit overcrowded in their little pots. Must remember to invest in some of those little sowing modules next year as I'm sure that will make repotting a less fiddly affair.

The exciting thing about the kale and perpetual spinach (and the chitting spuds) is that they will be (fingers crossed) planted in our new allotment. I finally tracked down the plot manager and they have a half plot ready to be planted which he is happy to offer us for minimal rent. We shall be going down there on Saturday afternoon to have a look and hopefully return Allotmenteers! While I don't think we'll quite be living The Good Life just yet, it should give us a small amount of leafy green foodstuffs over the autumn and winter until we get properly growing in 2012.

Theres not much else to report on the growing front so I'll be off and hopefully have some photos of the new plot to show off next time :)

Gardening Misadventures.

I really should make more of an effort to blog a bit more frequently .... So in an effort to keep track of my horticultural misadventures I shall be using blogger to keep track of how and what I'm growing.

As you can see, I've not got very far. Since taking this photo I've double dug and added compost to this little brown patch at the bottom of the garden and am waiting for The Yorkshireman to build me a raised planter to help keep the mud from spreading!

In all likelihood this wont happen for several weeks (Him being a super busy Web Developaaah) so I may well just plant the winter veg straight in the ground and hope it doesn't all go tits up!

Talking of veg, so far I have (waiting to be planted) perpetual spinach, kale, kavolo nero, runner beans and christmas day potatoes... Well the latter is still waiting to be put in their pots. Not much, but plans are afoot for us to be eating mostly home grown veg next year so I promise to be more organised... Honest!

So, this week I shall be bothering our local allotment manager in the hope there is a spare plot we can rent as this will help greatly on the space for growing/volume of produce front. Sadly our garden is pretty small and like most newbuild has 3 inches of turf roots and then nothing but clay and rubble underneath. Fine if all you want is grass but pants for veg!

Finally I'd better update of the progress of our most successful seedling. Charlie the perpetually growing Bambino..

He's now a proper Little Person, albeit not quite walking and talking, he does try and rule the roost and make his views known (especially about nappy changes and being told no). Hopefully he will become Interested in growing things as he gets older but for now I just try and keep an eye on him as he eats compost while I'm digging.

And so as Charlie is now a'sleepin I have a two hour window to get all the washing, cleaning, planting, cooking and tidying done I'd better be off.

Fingers crossed I'll be back soon with something to talk about!