On a rainy Bank Holiday

What better thing to do on a rainy bank holiday when you have poorly children than to sit planning your allotment! I have been playing around with a garden planner at GrowVeg.com

The full plan for our allotment can be found here

One of the biggest problems with the allotment is the shear amount of space I have available to plant things especially after being limited to a small back yard for the past few years. The planner shows me just how many of each plant I could put in the plot. This has been a real eye opener for a novice like me! I know we will probably not plant as many plants as the plan suggests.

The seeds are already being planted (at home in the mini greenhouse in the back yard) I am trying to remember to stagger the planting so the plants don't all bear fruit at the same time! That is a mistake I made last year with my cucumber plants that resulted in a glut (and no-one but me to eat them!) I did find a recipe for pickled cucumbers which is delicious though!

I will pin a copy of the plan to the shed door to inspire me while digging up bucket after bucket of weeds!

Week 24

Things have been busy down at the allotment for the past week, the unseasonably warm weather has meant I have been able to get a lot of work done!

One of the big jobs I have tackled is behind the shed. Over the years it appears soil and rubbish has just been piled behind the shed. This has meant that the soil was higher than the bottom of the shed, someone had placed wood against the shed to prevent the soil from touching it but they were damp too. This has resulted in bottom the shed being very wet and rotting.

I started by taking the wood out and started to remove the soil. In the process I disturbed lots of frogs! Most seem to have found a new home under the shed or on neighbours plots.

After half a days digging I managed to clear an area away from the shed to allow the wood to dry out enough to paint. I have now given it a quick coat of paint but need to go over it again.

After another half a day we have a more or else level area behind the shed! It was a lot of hard work and has taken at least 3 trips to the tip so far! We still have a little more levelling to do by the side of the shed so we can accommodate the water butt and compost bin.

Once the shed has been painted fully all over we can then put up the guttering ready for the water butt.

Not all the work has been going on around the shed, we have been slowly weeding some of the plot that was under the black plastic. This is where my potatoes are going hopefully!

The weeding is very hard work, it is a case of digging, digging and digging again to get all the little bits of roots out!

I am hoping the warm weather stays with us a bit longer so we can continue to make progress!