Drawings from last week!

Still forgetting my camera, but I've been sketching while having breaks. It's SO beautiful out, about 20 degrees last weekend! The flowers are all in bloom, lovely black tulips have all come up, garlic is going well, more digging but now the ground is rock hard.

A peek at the garlic.


One of the black tulips.


And a view over into the back half of the front half, now covered in black sheeting. There's a funny old frame made out of metal bars and then in the bramble I found the remnants of the steel frame from an old shed.

Catch Up: About 6 weeks ago, part II

More catch up photos. :) On the Monday my friend Leila came along to help chop bramble while I got on with digging. Jo (Oakley) popped along later with a lighter and we had a nice bonfire with the bramble! It burned really nicely in the old compost bin. A nice 'safe' holder so that I didn't complete lose it. I was slightly convinced we were going to burn down all of Eltham! So I stood by with bucket at the ready the whole time.

Second length of bed dug:


A couple "sculptures" found in the bramble, now in the flower bed. (These photos are very out of date now, the bed is filled with flowers now!)


The base of the shed is down, took a lot of digging, levelling, sand and paving stones. It'll do anyway.


My new 'tool'. A pram. Can you believe it? ME? With a pram? Haha! Very good for moving bags of sand though.


And another view of the plot with Leila over by the bramble.

Dry at last!

Thanks gods January is gone. And we seem to be having spring days, though I'm sure the frost will be back to haunt us. (We've only had a few nights frost last week, that's been it all winter.)

Wonderful day out...
Planted a bit more garlic. 'Hoed' (with my hands) my 3 beds and it's wonderful how the cold really has broken up the clay soil! One of those things I just didn't believe but I have lovely smooth(ish) soil to putter about with. I smoothed things out and weeded the flower beds. Put in a few more bulbs. Dug out a few bramble roots in order to make a little herb corner - just teensy little parsley plants in now.

Friend Leila bought me 6 primrose plants at the Manor House Gardens farmers market yesterday so I put them in a little row at the front of the flower bed. They look quite cheery!

I also put out 3 ceramic pots, made as birdbaths by my friend Shelagh, on the ground as either birdbaths or little ponds for frogs. Whatever wildlife might like them. Sunk them a bit and made sure there was earth banked up around them, tried to have one a bit hidden in grass.

Also chatted to Hamish next to me and decided to put my shed up at the top of the plot. There's a space I've already cleared, fairly flat and ready to go. So if I can get to the plot tomorrow I'm going to move the sand and paving slabs up to the top. That's a bit of a task in and of itself since I can only carry one slab at a time.

Light out until about 5.15pm. Will get some photos tomorrow.

Day 25 - catching up!

Things got a bit busy with my Open Studios and the preparation so didn't get to the allotment last week. Back in on Monday (day 24, technically) and played with my new azada! Whew, hard work! I'm told it's meant to be easier on the back but the overarm swinging isn't something my body is used to. Biceps are achy, a good thing. But back is achier, bad thing. (I have a bad back anyway.) But I'm sure I'll get into the 'swing' of things with time. *grin* Anyway, it cleared out a huge bramble root so I'm very happy! Not as sure about it's efficiency with clearing the couch grass topsoil vs the fork but will keep trying. The bramble root was the last thing in the way of the shed area so now that's cleared out and hopefully somewhat level. Hoping to nick some old paving stones from a skip down the road, but if all else fails there's actually a building merchant at the top of the road the allotment is on so I'll go ask for leftovers or maybe chipped slabs they can't use. Pic is of the cleared space for the shed.


Today I made the mistake of going to the allotment even with painful back. Nevermind. I did get all my bulbs in! So hopefully I'll have a lovely colourful spring bloom! They're spread about randomly, going for a natural look with about 250 bulbs.