Hectic week

Quick update....

We decided we would rehome 4 ex battery chickens from Hen Rehomers UK http://www.henrehomers.net/. They are due to come to us next saturday. We bought a chicken coop off ebay and took it up to the allotment to build. Then the other day we went up to the plot to water the veggies and to our horror, the coop had been stolen! We were devastated and are pretty convinced it's a new man on the allotment who has pigeons and is up there all the time.

So plan B...we are still having the chickens but are going to keep them in our back yard (god bless our new landlord for letting us!). We have been skip raiding etc and have got pallets to build a chicken house and run. We're currently building it and will post pics of the finished product.

Aswell as all that, we are moving house at the end of next week and have not done any packing yet due to working. Thank god we are only moving down the road and i am having monday and friday off to do things.

As for the veggies, the onions are coming through well but the beans and peas are looking a bit pathetic and i think something's been eating the peas.

And on a happier note, yesterday Jilly and i have been together 18 months and she bought me a little 'anniversary' album and put photos and mementos in it. It is so lovely and the best present i've ever had. She really is the most wonderful girlfriend and partner you could ever wish for.






I love you so much Jilly.

Girls on film!

Our girls entered an easter bonnet parade on Easter Sunday and were photographed for the local paper. Here's what they wrote in it...

Sisters Jennifer, aged 11, and Emily Barclay, eight, on Blair Athol Road, Greystones, who both attend Greystones School, were up early yesterday morning to get cracking on their hats. Mum Jilly said: "They made their hats this morning, while eating Easter eggs of course."

Planting, Poles and Poultry!

We finally managed to get back onto the plot this afternoon and were pleased to see that the council had finished clearing the edges. Our real purpose for going up was to plant out some of the seedlings that were getting too large to stay in the seed trays and to get the early potatoes and onions out as they were more than ready.

We firstly prepared some trenches for the potatoes and added some horse manure and chicken pellets, before using some bricks to mark out the bed. The onions went in next, some of which were already sprouting.

Jilly had an ingenius idea (as usual) for how to grow the peas. We made wigwams out of seven canes tied at the top and planted a pea seedling at the bottom of each cane. They look really good.

The borlotti beans were a bit more of a challenge, but after some deliberation we decided to grow them up canes with some sticks weaved in between for support. Hopefully they will withstand the elements!

Lastly we got our fruit bushes in the ground. We have two raspberries and a redcurrent which have some foliage on already.

We've been offered our three ex battery chickens for collection on 2nd may, but we're moving house the same day so are not sure it's the best time. It would be great if we could get them tho, and free some ladies. We'll keep you updated on that one.

Lantern Festival

We all went out on sunday night to a lantern festival. We met up at a place called Mount Pleasant Park and once it got dark we all paraded through the streets. We had our very simple lanterns, but some of the others were absolutely amazing. It looked fantastic to see them all lit up, and the kids really enjoyed it (have to admit i did too). Here's a few pictures. Hope everyone has a happy easter.

Sowing our seeds

We have sown lots of seeds now and our dining room window sill is covered in seed trays. The peas have done a bit too well and we are swimming in them, the cabbages parsnips and sprouts are also doing very well. We're trying out borlotti beans and they are looking like little aliens, but very healthy!

As for the allotment, we went up last week and found that there is still work for the council to do. We hope we will be able to get on with re-marking out beds and planting out seedlings.

Here are some pictures of the peas and borlotti bean seedlings.

All you need is a JCB

We went upto the plot today to be greeted by a man from the council and a JCB.

We had planned a productive day after collecting some fantastic well rotten manure from a local farm to dig into the beds that we had marked out last weekend. Instead are plans were thwarted by a JCB digging up the large trees at the end of our plot.

I have to admit we were a little gutted. I know its going to save us a lot of time and hard work in the long run, but we have got so far clearing the plot ourselves that its a little disheartening to have a JCB come in and clear it in a day!

The council are going to chop down the hedges at the sides for us, pull up the large trees and rotervate the whole plot. Luckily we managed to save the strawberry plants that we had planted.

A Fruitful Day

Hi folks,

We've finally managed to get back on to the allotment today after all that snow, so thankfully it was a beautiful sunny day. We've had a very productive day with lots of digging out of weeds and roots (as demonstrated by me in the photo below).




We also marked out a bed for potatoes and one for fruit, the latter as a result of some neighbours offering us some strawberry plants. We also have some fruit bushes which we plan to plant in this bed aswell.

We had the opportunity to try out my new trangia stove today, which my dad sent me for my birthday. We heated soup on it for lunch and it worked fantastically!