First Plantings For Next Year

Off For A Drive

After a bit of a late start this morning we were off to Homebase to pick up some potting compost and have a look at what seeds we could get our hands on. The Blur saw some cat grass seeds and decided she'd like to plant some for our cat Toby, whilst John and I chose onions, Italian Purple tomatoes, carrots, peas, squash, parsnips and sprouts. The teacher from the schools allotment told us that parsnips are hard to grow and that he'd so far not managed to produce any so its made me determined to grow some next year. Apparently cauliflowers are hard to grow too so theres another challenge for me. With the seeds paid for we hoped we could get to McDonalds within five minutes before they stopped serving breakfast, and we were just in time.

And So To Lotty

John had to do a bit of bumpy driving up the lane as a van had parked right in front of one of the gates and he said he couldnt reverse up the lane. So John had to drive into the retainer plot so the other man could drive down through the gate and let us past. But we got there in the end and unloaded the car. As we were going to start planting I thought id rake the greenhouse floor as the chickens made their dust baths in there and it was full of small ditches. Next time I'll remember to shut the door as id only turned my back for a few minutes and they were back in there making new holes.

John meanwhile was taking the backs off of some pallets so that he could make a new compost bin. He started off by the original bin and put all the excess wood in the wheelbarrow until the Blur and I took it so we could clean out the chicken coop. We came back up to find him with a pallet, hammer, axe and crowbar. They're not the easiest things to take apart, but at least he didnt hit himself in the wrist with the hammer. When he'd got the pallets how he wanted them John fixed them together and transferred the top layer of compost from the existing bin into the new one, revealing a chickens buffet worth of worms and some lovely compost ready to be used.

Once those jobs were done and we had a good fire going we decided what seeds we were going to plant and where. Most of the seeds were to go into pots in the greenhouse, but a few have to go straight out. So whilst the Blur and I were in the greenhouse planting cat grass, chilis, peppers, aubergines and onions, John was outside digging over soil and adding compost to where we are going to be planting our carrots and parsnips in a few weeks time.

It seems like a long time ago since the three of us last spent so much time at lotty together, so it has been lovely to spend the day there with them today. John said that last year he didnt plant anything as early as he probably should have so im hoping that the work we've put in today will make our crops even better. Thank you for a lovely day John and Blur.