Any Colour You Like

Finally something vaguely allotment-y to post about now that it’s February, though we haven’t actually made it to the plot yet mostly because of the incessant rain.

Having said that we did venture out to Marlborough to a plant-based market - it’s the first one they’ve held (I think) and our favourite Vegan Street Diner hot dog man was there so we couldn’t resist. We had a few snacks and bought some vegan soap as well as cakes to take home.

It was very cold and wet but we had a nice walk through the Priory Garden and enjoyed seeing the squirrels scurrying amongst the snow drops and watched (water?) rats in the river.

On Saturday we visited Pewsey for their Potato Day. There was a good turnout and loads of spuds to choose from - in the rubber buckets - as well as a large selection of seeds and herbs. 

It’s always tempting to buy too many seed potatoes as each tuber was 50p but we were quite restrained as we don’t need many and having done no prep (yet) I decided against buying any plants. These are the potatoes we selected.

Desiree and Orla we’ve grown before but Paris and Baby Lou are new to us. They’re all chitting under a grow light in the hall now so we have till April to prepare the ground, though some will be planted into bags - looking back it seems that Orla are a slug-favourite 😖

We also bought some Yellow Moon shallots to plant in the raised bed again - they did well last year (though that doesn’t mean much) and were good to use as spring onions as well as for cooking and pickling later in the year.

I received some treats from my Hastings cousins for my retirement. It’s always fun to get an unexpected delivery from the postman!

Some fabulous cosmic-styled gloves, fairies and lovely scatter seeds for the plot from Jen - if the flowers are as successful as last year’s hollyhocks I’ll be very happy!

I’ve been keeping myself busy in retirement by doing some clearing and I’m painting the bathroom door. The man in the shop thought I was nuts when I asked for a pink paint to be mixed then abruptly changed my mind to blue after he showed me the available shades of pink. It wasn’t till I started painting that I realised, from the whole selection, I’d unwittingly selected a perfect match for our car 🤭 

Stirring stick/car comparison

Talking of lovely colours - I filtered the sloe gin that we made using sloes from the allotment hedge in September last year - it’s so sweet and delicious! We have another jar to filter after this one.

We have another full day of rain expected so I’ll finish my painting and maybe will check on the plot at the weekend - there may be some parsnips to pick (she said hopefully).

Pink Floyd provide the title track - enjoy ☺️