11. Are we nearly there yet?

The mornings and evenings are getting lighter, but it is still really cold and there is no sun.

My visits to the allotment have been few and far between at the moment, mainly because of the weather. I went a week ago with good intentions of putting another row of wine bottles in (I am getting over-run with the things, thanks to donations from various people). However, the ground was frozen so no digging could be done. I spent an hour tidying the greenhouse and moving the onion seedlings to the other end of the greenhouse away from the couple of broken panes. This was in preparation for the manure, as I read that if you put a small pile of fresh manure in the corner of the greenhouse, it will radiate heat. I was hoping this would keep the frost out so I could start growing things.

About three weeks ago I made some seed pots from newspaper and put them in my old juice carton seed trays. I planted tomatilloes, carrots, aubergine and a couple of types of flowers. I have been watering them regularly, but not too much and not one of the trays has the even the tinyest of shoots pushing through! They currently reside on a small table next to the window in the dining room. This window gets the most amount of light in the house, but still nothing.

However, in the bathroom window (which is downstairs and doesn't get good light), some bulbs that I bought on offer in B&Q, and never got round to planting, have sprung into life on their own accord - I just left them there over winter thinking they would sprout in March/April time. I may move a tray of seeds into the bathroom and see if they prefer it there. It is a bit warmer and very damp in there.

I am a bit behind with my potatoes as well, which is a bit annoying. I decided to order some from a magazine instead of going to the garden centre, as there was an offer for less potatoes but more varieties. However, I am still waiting for delivery and I know my parents and brother already have some happily chitting!

So, if you see Spring on your travels, send it my way, I have been waiting for ages!

10. Oh my God has it been that long?!

So, finally, I have got round to updating my blog. I knew it had been a while, but 2 months! That is slack!

I have also finally got round to putting my allotment photos onto the computer from the camera, so I have had a look at them to see just what I have been doing for the last two months!

By the looks of it, there has been digging, weeding, and not much else! The digging is finally complete! I just need to mark out the beds properly. The first row of wine bottles has been completed:

A little on the wobbly side, but I have about 7 more rows to do. By the end of that lot, they will be perfect...and I will be an alcoholic!

As you can also see, the leeks are coming on well. Unfortunately, though with the freezing temperatures and little sunshine, growing has come to a stand still, so I fear these may have to stay in til Spring.

As well as work at the allotment, I did a little work at home. Planning! I love planning almost as much as the work itself - but not quite as much as the shopping for seeds etc!

I have planned what will go into each bed in the spring on a little diagram of the plot, and I also have an A4 sheet for each month of the year, with what should be planted that month. To do this planning, I went through all my seeds that I had been collecting in the last few months, as well as some that I had left over from when I was only planting in the garden.

I noticed that I have become something of a seed hoarder! I have about 5 types of tomato seeds, 3 or 4 pepper seeds, 3 chilli seeds as well as four plants that didn't go too well last year, that I am going to try and grow again this year. The only things I actually need to buy next season are seed potatoes and shallot bulbs!

I will try and take a picture of the plan for my next posting (which should be a bit earlier than February!).

Now this is a bit soppy for me, but I had to add this picture of the greenhouse, as it is amazing how much crisper the sun makes the colours seem. And as the sun is in short supply at the moment, I thought this might brighten up a cold December day!

9. Alone again

Unfortunately the volunteers have gone. Only went and got themselves an allotment didn't they? They are only round the corner though, so I am sure there will be seed swopping etc going on in the future. In fact, Dickon has already been round to borrow a few bricks for a fire pit.



The foxes haven't deserted us yet though. Despite us shutting the door to the greenhouse now, they manage to squeeze through a broken window at ground level. This time they took a fancy to Mark's plastic seed container, taking it half way up the allotment before giving up with trying to open it! A couple of my onions have been upturned as well, but I did plant 100 so a couple of losses is hardly worth worrying about.

The birds seem to have forgiven us as well. They are now racing through the seed we put out. I think the main reason they didn't eat any for a few weeks was more to do with the fact that there were loads of juicy berries in the hedges. Now it is getting more wintery, the berries are disappearing, so they are having to live on our boring cheapo bird seed!

Quite a lot of planting has been going on since my last post. I put some white onions in for overwintering and I had some carrots that I had grown from seed at home. I put some in the greenhouse in a planter and the rest in the ground. It was quite a cold day when I planted them, so I made a kind of fleece tent over them in case a frost gets them. Mark had also bought onions and as we had a hundred each, we swapped half red for half white. I also decided to experiment with some red onion seeds for overwintering. So far two have sprouted. I am keeping them in the greenhouse for now.

I also bought some garlic. I have some at home that I have been replanting every year, that came from supermarket bought garlic. But I thought I would try some different varieties this year, especially as it is so good at keeping bugs off other plants. I can plant my old garlic in among the other plants. I didn't quite calculate how much I would end up with though. I bought 6 globes and each had about 12 bulbs. As each bulb will give me a complete globe, I am glad that it stores well. I think I will be adding garlic to every meal and accompanying everything with garlic bread!

8. Wino's

Whilst browsing various gardening forums, I came across a brilliant idea for boardering the beds - used wine bottles. You just turn them upside down and half bury them in a nice straight line on the edges of the beds. We had a few at home as it had been a while since the recycling had been taken to the collection site, and I asked everyone I know to donate any that they use.

I collected loads and took them up the allotment on Saturday. Jo was also with me, delivering some broken up wood that we could use to fuel the next fire. Jo dug a narrow trench and I put the bottles in and packed the soil around them. I used all the bottles and only managed to fill half a row! Later that evening we met up again, and with the help of Matt and Dickon added another three bottles to the collection!

Finally some more good news. Head of procurement, Matt has come good and managed to get us a wheelbarrow from the builders at work, that would have otherwise ended up in a skip. The tire's a bit flat, but that should be fixable. I think the worst part of it, was not going round begging, but walking home with a wheelbarrow whilst wearing a smart shirt and suit trousers! A few comments were made!

7. Water Water Everywhere, But Not A Drop To Drink

It's been a while since my last post. I keep meaning to update it at home where I can add photo's but never seem to get round to it.

Plenty of work has been done. We replaced the top half of the water pump and it worked...for a week of so. The bolts that hold it in place at the base have very little thread left, and quickly worked loose. Currently, the water pump is lying in the greenhouse, feeling sorry for itself until someone comes up with an idea to fix it!

Luckily on the same day as fitting the water pump, we also put some guttering on the side of the outhouse and set up a water butt. So for now, nothing is going to die of thirst. Obviously, the rain is also helping with that situation!

Finally after three years or so of doing various voluntary work, I had my own volunteers. Our friends Jo and Dickon helped out a couple of saturdays ago. They were hooked before they even stepped into our allotment, having a bit of a nose around first and picking out a vacant allotment that they would like to work on. I thought we would never get them to leave, and we would have squatters at the site!

Once they got in our allotment though, there was no stopping them. Dickon managed to dig in an afternoon, the same amount that I had done in about two months! Jo busied herself weeding and made sure Matt had enough cuttings to keep the fire going.

Yes, we had our second fire, it seemed a good idea as there was five of us at the allotment all afternoon. The pile of cuttings did go down, but there is still enough for about 10 more fires! The fire was also a good way to get Matt to the allotment. I have struggled to get him interested in the allotment for a couple of weeks, (mainly due to my nagging everyone about digging!) but mention of a fire and he is straight there! It's a man thing, I believe.

The digging began on Mark's section of the allotment, but progress was hampered a little due to the smoke from the fire blowing into his eyes. For the time being the fire pit is on Mark's side of the allotment!

6. Heat Wave

Progress was slow last week. I have been checking and watering the strawberries regularly, but that is about all to be honest!

The row of already dug weeds has been sorted and thrown on the heap to decompose. I say heap as we have three composters made of pallets that were already here. We have filled them. Then there is the pile of the strimmed weeds which is about 10 ft by 4ft! (I may be exaggerating here, I am useless at judging distances etc). And finally the heap of dug weeds and roots which is a mini mountain next to the raised bed. Soon we will have more space covered by decomposing waste than beds for planting!

Me and Matt did make it on Saturday afternoon to deliver more bottles of water for the strawberries to save me carrying them from work on my bike. It was so hot though, we couldn't even contemplate working.

Yesterday I was all ready to dig another trench when I realised I had the thin soled trainers on. Getting to be a common excuse that one!

Tomorrow is my day off so I am planning a proper digging session...just got to put some good music on my phone!

5. Be prepared

Having never been in the scouts, I didn't learn the importance of being prepared...until last week!

I had changed my hours at work on Monday which meant I could cycle to work. The cycling gardener was due to live up to her name on Monday! It started off well, my mountain bike is much more suited the pot holed drive than my car. However, once I tried to start on the digging, I realised that my thin soled trainers were not best for the job of stamping the shovel into the ground.

I had also forgotten the earphones for my mobile, so had to listen to music music with the phone turned up loud and placed on the floor next to me. It was tinny and even on full volume, still pretty quiet.Not quiet enough, it appeared. Our neighbour shouted hello through the hedge and when I went out, asked if I minded if he had a fire. He was going to burn the clippings that he had taken off our hedge and left at the side of the driveway. I had no problems, until he lit it. I had assumed he would take the clippings to his allotment for the fire, but instead he had it right in the driveway. As the smoke came through the hedge, I had visions of the whole allotment going up!

I managed to dig two squares of a new trench before hunger set in. With a 15 minute cycle still to do before I even arrived home, never mind ate, I decided to give it up as a bad job. I left my neighbour to his fire. If the allotment did go up in flames, I could deny I was even there!

On Thursday I was relieved to find the allotment still intact. I had come armed with cheese salad wraps, a banana, earphones, and sturdy trainers. I picked some motivational music and managed to dig a complete trench in 45 mins! I was so pleased with my progress I almost sorted the roots from soil then and there. But a song came on my phone with the lyrics "all I want is to be home". I put my shovel down, locked up and cycled home, flushed with success!

Saturday I arrived just after Mark, having had a bit of a shopping spree with the vouchers my parents kindly gave me to give us a kick start at the allotment. I had 12 strawberry plants, some weed stopper (material that you lie on the ground) and 2 drip feeders. My dad had also grown too many leeks to put in his garden, so had donated about 50 to me and Mark. Mark planted his in the raised bed, and I took mine home to go in the garden - having not quite dug enough over to have room at the allotment. We have been promised more from his second later batch of leeks in a few weeks, so I am aiming to dig enough to be able to plant them in the allotment.

I planted my strawberries in a pop up bin I had spare at home, cutting a few holes in the sides to make it look like a proper strawberry planter...quite a bit of soil fell out of said holes, but I am hoping it will settle! I tried out a drip feeder with them as well, in case there is no rain before I next visit.

Now we have a couple of things growing, it is looking on it's way to being a proper allotment, rather than a patch of thistle infested grass!