So Long

I'm so happy that September has brought the heat and sunshine with it - aah, it's so welcome!

The cosmos flowers are doing weird things, as you can see. They started out with normal petals, but now they have something like an angry frill-necked lizard! Still looking beautiful though.

We emptied one of the potato bags yesterday - the haulms were chopped down a few weeks ago because of the blight. These are Nicola potatoes (2 plants). A quick rummage in the top showed that it could be a good haul.

Look at that lovely lot! Delicious small potatoes. They're very good as salad potatoes but we've enjoyed them mashed and roasted too. A couple had a bit of blight so they won't keep, but we don't intend to store them for long anyway. Talking of blight, here are the tomatoes that we saved from the blighted crop.

Lizzano are such a tasty tomato, such a shame that the growth was cut short. We're pleased that all of these semi-ripe fruits reddened up under our grow-lamp at home. Unlike the peppers which just went rotten! Clearly a fruit will only ripen if it's ready to. I'm having to make do with purchased peppers while ours are being mostly eaten by slugs in the polytunnel 😔

This lovely dish is roasted peppers, garlic and onions with olive oil and a bit of chilly with basil to make it look pretty. It's so delicious with a salad or in sandwiches and lasts for 2-3 days. I'm having it with a potato salad for lunch today, mmm, I'm looking forward to it already and it's only breakfast time 😋

We have started our first sweetcorn now. We plucked two large cobs. One was rather better pollinated than the other but still plenty of tasty kernels covered in butter. These are Early Bird. I don't think they're as tasty as the Lark that we usually grow but they are still good.

I'm back working from home after a few days off. More of my colleagues are returning to the lab but still in fairly small numbers - so many of us have found working from home to be beneficial to our work and home-life, as well as reducing our carbon footprints. I'm expecting a 3rd COVID jab to be offered in the next few weeks which could improve the immunity for immunosuppressed people. For now we're relying on other people to have the jab and take the test every now and then. Thank goodness for the allotment so I'm not desperate to travel further afield.

There's me with our longest tromboncino squash and it's still growing! I may have to enter it into our Horticultural Show just because it's so amazing 😏 There were 4 of us standing around talking about it the other day, it certainly draws attention! And that's the reason for this song title by Maya Hawke.

Back to Life

We had a lovely afternoon on the plot - we were so pleased (and surprised) when we got there and found that most of the broad beans had recovered from their frosty battering last week. We were ready to pull them up and re-sow. Instead, Jamie added a sprinkling of lime to encourage growth and alkaline the soil.

I think today was the first dry day we’ve had in weeks and the Sun even tried to make an appearance. We avoided treading on the soil as it’s still really wet, though nowhere near as bad as some parts of the country. The air was warm and positively Spring-like so, although I shared this to the Marsh Lane Allotments Facebook page last week.....

Well, as the saying goes, don’t do as I do, do as I say... I sowed a row of Boltardy beetroot and perpetual spinach into the raised bed with the garlic. I retrieved our old cold frame, which was rather abandoned and harbouring loads of snails, slugs and a mouse nest, to give the seeds a bit of protection, as I’m sure we’ve not seen the last of the cold weather! That section of the raised bed was under cardboard for the last few months so was weed-free and, maybe, a little warmer than uncovered soil.

Jamie sowed some marigold seeds and put them in a bag in the polytunnel. I sowed some Shiraz mangetout into a piece of guttering, they can stay in the polytunnel to germinate and grow a bit. If successful, and the mice don’t find them, they should produce pods early enough to avoid pea moth larvae. 🤞 

Jamie planted 24 Mikor shallots on Plot3. We haven’t netted them, so the birds may disturb some of them, but they normally survive being pushed back into the ground if that happens. The blue tit and robins were singing happily today, another sign of Spring being on its way.

And our wallflowers are full of buds.

Aah, nearly March, not really Spring but time is moving on. I got another letter from the Government advising me to continue shielding until 31st March, but getting a bit of exercise is ok and visiting the allotment is so welcome. It’s good to see a few fellow plotholders, particularly as Ivan gave us some lovely fresh leeks. It seems that there will be some reduction in lockdown rules quite soon, so we may be able to start leasing plots again - our waiting list is looking healthy, which helps our cause for keeping the site.

The song title is, of course, referring to the broad beans and is by Soul II Soul. Nice.

Reviewing the Situation

On Friday night we had our Take-2 of Chinese New Year. So now it really is the Year of the Metal Ox. We added some star croutons and Spring onions to the Miso soup starter and had mushroom chow mein for the main.

 This weekend we had a plan... to get the shallots planted because the freezing weather of last week is moving on. And I thought I’d risk sowing a few seeds under a cloche - mangetout, beetroot and perpetual spinach, because they should be reasonably hardy.

Well, that plan changed when we got to the plot and found the ground still frozen and then we saw our broad beans 🥺

Oh dear! We’ve never seen such a thing. But it has been extremely cold, with an added windchill taking the temperature even lower than the thermometer recorded.

The globe artichoke looks sad too; I’m sure that will recover, though I’m not convinced that the beans will.

Although it was horribly cold, with some rain, we decided to stick it out for a bit so we tidied and moved some weed suppressant to make space for the potatoes.

Moving the Grow Bags was harder than it seems because they were heavy, wet and frozen. We got muddy and frozen ourselves!

We sat and had a coffee, then wandered round the site but it was too cold to think about doing anything else. Our watering cans full of rain water appear to have completely solidified and look how thick the ice was in a bucket!

I sympathise with the workmen who have recently been working on the site’s water system in the icy weather. Looks good doesn’t it? Better than the pallets which were starting to rot after being leaked onto for a few years.

I actually did a bit of HAHA admin this weekend too - long overdue, but I have enough of spreadsheets (much as I love them) during the working week at the moment. We did have a trip out last week though - to get my first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine at Newbury racecourse. What a treat 😄

And I drove Jamie to Hungerford Tesco - all the COVID-precautions have passed me by so I was interested to see the traffic light system on the doors!

We have the 2m distancing signs at the allotment, but social distancing has certainly not been a problem on site so far in 2021!

The song is from the musical, Oliver! and is certainly what we’re doing. Reviewing and waiting...for so many things to get better.

This is How it Feels

 Brrr, that’s cold! 

It was tempting not to go out today as the weather forecast extremely chilling winds, but we have our shallots that need to be planted and it was actually dry. The top of the site was really windy but Plot3 is quite protected so we got on with some work and I even needed to take my coat off whilst digging the caged area. It’s the brassica cage, but this is the only plant in there - you can’t really see how small it is, but I’m determined to try and get one serving from it!

It was good to be working and Jamie took time to properly dig and add 6X to the patch where the shallots will go. I just turned the soil with a spade, rather than carefully working it like Jamie did. We’ll probably cover it to stop the weeds re-emerging before the brassica planting will happen.

And he weeded round the rhubarb, which is just showing signs of life.

The sky went very dark and we got some sleet but it stayed dry. We’ve started noticing the daylight lasting a little longer each day and Spring flowers are emerging, which are such a welcome sight.

All the purples so far.

We’ve drawn up the planting plan for Plot7, really itching to get started, but all in good time... Really must try to stop wishing the weeks away!

I went up the road in the week and enjoyed a bit of sunshine while Jamie went shopping. It was just me and the swans. I upset that swan and he hissed at me quite soon after getting that shot - clearly not socially distanced!

We celebrated Chinese New Year on Friday night, but discovered on Saturday that it’s not actually till next Friday 🙄 Oh well, it was a tasty meal of tofu chow mein, which I just about managed to eat with chopsticks 🙂

So, that’s how February has begun and the REALLY GOOD NEWS is that I have my vaccine booked for Tuesday! Hooray! I hope the weather doesn’t scupper that plan, more on that next week, I’m sure. The song by Inspiral Carpets is sad, but for this blogpost the title is referring to the weather - I haven’t warmed through yet. I need a bath to remove the chill from my bones! Brrr.

Everybodys Got to Learn Sometime

I took a day off work last Tuesday, I’m determined to have at least one day off a month to break the monotony and it’s quite nice having a random mid-week day. We visited the allotment. Too wet to do anything constructive but I did get to play with some ice.

It looks so pure and I love the frozen bubbles.

I found three frozen circles, but my hands were also frozen so this is as creative as I could be 🙄

The thermometer in the polytunnel showed a minimum of -5.2°

We celebrated Burns Night on Monday, which was why I took Tuesday off. It’s a good excuse for eating, drinking, listening to some different music and watching a film (Whisky Galore, 1949). We are increasingly finding that we’re the butt of the very funny Daily Mash articles but..whatever!

It warmed up a bit over the last few days but now it’s just rain, rain, rain and it apparently feels cold so I’m staying indoors. It’s a shame, as I really feel like getting to the plot to do some clearing, but I don’t feel like getting cold, wet and dirty. Our shallots have been delivered; we ordered a long variety, Jermore, but COVID-19 is taking its toll everywhere and so they were unavailable and we’ve been sent these, Mikor.

The allotments lease is unfortunately a newsworthy subject again, but the date we’re ‘safe’ to is actually 31st December 2022 so it’s not quite as bad as it reads, but bad enough. For our amazing site to ever be at risk of development is a disgrace!

And there was a further mention of allotments in this week’s Newbury Weekly News... at a time when Growing Your Own has had a new lease of life. It is appalling that developers can use words to help win a purchase but then simply remove it at planning stage and still be granted permission. We’d rather stay at Marsh Lane (obviously) but permanent allotment provision should have been included in this development. And don’t get me started on the affordable housing aspect...! 😡

Sad... it may seem at times like the world is changing, but in fact it’s not.

Today’s song title is by The Corgis and it’s referring to my crochet plans... it’s a rather slow process, but I’ll get there... I hope.

That is what I achieved in 3 hours, following Bella Coco on YouTube... luckily I have some time on my hands..!

Blue Monday

Aah, the sky was blue this morning and the sun was shining - that made a welcome change. There are many fewer planes flying nowadays but the contrails were in full view this morning which shows the air was cold up there, but not so cold at ground level as it has been recently.

I was looking forward to being outside after pretty much sitting still all week inside. We drove to the allotment and were the only people on site for a while. I weeded the garlic in the raised bed.

Jamie took the covers off the broad beans and weeded that area and I dug the area behind, though I didn’t manage it all. It was nice to be outside and digging. Several of our plot neighbours arrived but we were all well socially distanced. We were pleased to hear that Ivan has had his first COVID-19 vaccination - I’m expecting mine in February if all goes to plan.

Jamie cleared the rhubarb and surrounded the huge plant with a ring of manure to give it a boost after it was left to its own devices last year. We really need to divide the plant later in the year.

The larger birds were active today mostly gulls from over the Marsh, magpies and buzzards being quite noisy overhead. We saw a couple of robins but they weren’t as busy or inquisitive as they usually are.

We left as the sunshine had gone and it started to get chilly. We’re expecting a lot of rain this week. The plot was already very wet. So the question is... do I read a book or carry on practising crochet before I embark on extending the sleeves of my beautiful cardigan..? Or maybe I’ll make some onion soup as Ivan gave us these lovely veg as we left the site. The onion is huge, it weighs 472grams!

The song is by New Order - I used to hate this song, but quite like it now. Tomorrow is known as ‘blue Monday’, but try not to feel blue - we’re moving closer to Spring and vaccination so it’s best to stay positive. Take care and stay safe x

Shield

Welcoming 2021 ... and I return to shielding as the whole of England is locked down with COVID infections and deaths hitting the not unexpected peaks as a result of at least one new strain, Christmas gatherings and general Winter health. Oh dear, not a great start to the new year 😔

That photo is from when we visited the plot last weekend to get some fresh (a bit too fresh for me) air, drop some green waste into the compost bin and feed the birds.

We haven’t had snow, but we’ve had plenty of frost and freezing temperatures. Look at the frozen rain gauge! We really need to buy a new one but that can wait. The anemone flowers aren’t meant to flower till May, I don’t think, so I don’t know what they’re up to!

I made a tasty chunky soup with swede, carrots, onion and Brussels sprouts - it made for a very tasty working-from-home lunchtime meal. Yes, I’ve been ‘back’ to work for a week after a most enjoyable Christmas break. It got busy rather quickly though!

Today we drove to site to put some COVID information signs up on the allotment notice board. We didn’t go to our plot as we had stuff to do at home and I’m not sure that sitting having a coffee in our polytunnel can really count as exercise! I had to do some HAHA (Hungerford Allotment Holders Association) admin yesterday; updating the allotment registers and waiting list before emailing all the plotholders to remind them of the restrictions. (I still need to update the website, but thought I’d write this instead). As per the previous lockdowns the site will stay open, unless the restrictions are tightened. I hope to have a bit more time on the allotment this year so that I get out of the flat a bit more - we’ll just need to time it to avoid busy times.

I had some good news in the week. Thompson & Morgan listed my little blog as one of their Vibrant Veg Growing Blogs 😊 I hope to include much more growing in it this year! We ordered some seed potatoes, tomato and pepper plants this weekend, so that’s a start... but we got that far last year...We need to work out which of the unused seeds from last year will still be viable and then we can start planning...

So that’s how the year has begun. I hope soon these posts will include more good news - like a vaccine date and our next site gathering - won’t that be great when the day comes!! In the meantime, here’s the title song by Deep Purple to enjoy.