Rome wasn't built in a day, but.......

....the shed almost was!

What a lucky boy I am. Nice sunny day to erect the shed. After dropping Tom off at his football, I stopped off at a house on the way home to recycle some of the wood they had in their skips from the roof extension they are having done. I then dropped this off at the allotment and drove home to let Karen have the car and pick Tom up later.

So with my trusty Ikea bag full of all the tools I thought I'd need I set off down to 94a and began the Grand Design. The base was quite rotten, so having replaced some of it and used some of the wood to reinforce it, I then repaired some of the panels and then man handled it all up. As you can see from the photo below, I ended up with 2 ends with space for doors!

Then it was a case of screwing the roof panels on, using the felt Michael gave me to cover it and then use all the bits of wood I had to fix that on. Thankfully, I had just enough of the felt and pieces to finish it off. Also, I did have one door and screwed this into place...


Almost looks like new from this side! Ellie was making us all lunch today, so I had to dash off to make sure I wasn't late. In the afternoon, Ellie and Tom decided to come down and have an explore about as it was such a lovely day. I carried on with the fixing and also sawing and screwing into place some supports to fill in the other door space...and so this is how I left it on Saturday.



Just in time for the 'Inspectors' arriving on Sunday afternoon after our Mother's Day lunch!!

So, quite a productive Saturday and now I need to finish that end of the shed off next week, stain the wood and then set to putting the raised bed in by the shed too. I think I'll have to revisit those skips to get some more wood first! Also, I think I'll try sowing some carrots and maybe some of the potatoes that have been happily chitting away, before we go away for Easter. Plenty to do, but oh what fun!!!! Happy Springtime.

Sheds and bases

Just a short update today after a great British Spring weekend of weather, with some of it spent down at the allotments, including the official opening of the Trading Hut by the mayor on Sunday afternoon in the warm sunshine.

I mentioned last time about the shed and the base, well Ali, my neighbour had a double shed she managed to get from that brilliant website,'freecycle' and decided to only use half and have a greenhouse as well, so she very kindly offered all the other bits she wouldn't need, to me. As a result, her good friend Jo agreed to come with his mixer and do both of the shed bases and also construct Ali's shed and greenhouse, with some help from everyone on the allotments.

I offered my limited services for some of the time, but Jo was an absolute trooper and with his two boys sorted out the shed bases on the Saturday and then on Sunday got Ali's shed up in no time and then started with the many pieces of the greenhouse. I was on hand in the morning, but had to leave him with lots of labelled pieces and plenty of nuts and bolts. What a job that is going to be. Ali's plot is really starting to take shape now as you can see from the photo's.

Please click on the link on the side of the blog, where you see Ali's allotment blog for Plot 144 and she has lots of photo's of the two days with all the activity.

Here's a photo of Karen, Ellie and Tom on Sunday afternoon at the 'official' opening with the shed parts piled up at the back....oh and my homemade cloches warming the soil before some early carrot planting.




..and here's the base with the bottom of the shed drying out on it....PPHHHEWWW..it fits!


So you can guess what the next job is going to be! I'm hoping to sort this all out soon , get the shed up and put a raised bed area next to it, as well as planting the potatoes sometime in April as they are happily chitting in the spare room at the moment...a few more beautiful weekends like this and we'll be sorted.

FINISHED !

Well this weekend saw the completion of the digging, so after a full 4 months since my first visit to the plot, I have managed to clear it, mark it out and double dig it (with help from Mike of course). HOOOORRRRAAAAYYY. Here's the way 94a looks now.



I also found an old photo I took on the first visit and you can see how much it has changed from the next 2 photo's.

BEFORE


AFTER

It was a final push this weekend, with Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning, just to get it done and also make some preparations for the shed too. I now have a clear plot and can look forward to the next test...the plants and seeds!

I've got a pretty good idea what I'm going to grow, but now need to get all the information together, to make sure I'm clear on when, how and where to sow, plant, etc each vegetable. So that's my next job.

In the meantime, with a little bit of luck, I'll be able to get rid of all the bags of rubbish and old carpet I don't need, down to the local recycle centre and then see about the shed, but more on that later. Here's the base for it anyway.

GOOD OLD BLIGHTY

Now imagine it, the sun is going down after warming the countryside, you've been hard at work on the land, the Sports Report music is playing at 5pm on Radio 5, you've got a cup of tea in your hand standing in front of a fire.....and you hear Swindon have come back from 2 nil down at half time to win 4-2 (well of course, it doesn't have to be Swindon, but you get the idea)..Could there be anything more quintessentially British than that? What a nice finish to the day.

Another beautiful afternoon at the allotment on Saturday, with two worm hunters in tow again, enjoying the freedom of exploring the allotments, having worm races and generally mucking about with mud and water. So you can imagine the state they were in after an hour and a half or so when Karen came to take them home, dry them out and clean them up. Straight into a bath for them!

Unfortunately, my 3 prong fork (it did start with 4) soon became a 2 prong fork not long after starting, so it was a little laboured working with that and my spade. (I bought a new one on Sunday to replace it). But, I still managed to finish the final rotating bed and start on the 'strawberry' bed to finish all the digging. As you'll see from the photo's, I'm now about half way through the last one...so round the final bend and just about across the finishing line. PHeeewwwwwww.

I also bashed one of the old corrugated iron sheets into a protective 'brazier' type thing to start to burn away the roots I have been drying out and fully expect to keep this going until the huge pile of discarded mud/roots/weeds/grass, etc has been cleared.

So, now I need to finish off the digging, use the carpet for the paths and get rid of all the old rubbish down to the recycle centre...then we move on to the shed and getting ready for planting...All in all a great day. Nice one, good old Blighty!!!

So here we are from atop the pile of roots, etc looking East back up with the Sun setting behind me.


and here's looking back to the West, with the Sun going down and it starting to get dark.


...and finally the last bed to be finished off. You can see the section left to dig, so not too far to go now.

Two little helpers

All geared up and ready for action........


' Have you found any more worms?'


Thanks to the US holiday on Monday and following our attempts at emulating the celebrities on Dancing on Ice at the ice rink in Guildford, the kids came with me to the plot as it wasn't freezing for once.

I'd managed a little bit of digging on Sunday morning, before we went to my Mum and Dad's as I wanted to see if I could get Dad's seed potatoes and let him have them. Unfortunately due to the snow recently, most of them were delayed, but I did get one lot for Dad from the new shop. However, at least I managed to finish off the bed Mike was doing and just dig the first 'spit' in the final rotational bed, before the shop opened.

Now on Monday, with my intrepid worm hunters/stone collectors I managed to get a fair bit done and think that on my next visit, I'll be able to finish this bed off and then just have the last permanent one to go...so about 75-80% of the way there in total I think.

Karen came to collect the children after an hour and a half or so and then I carried on until dusk, so here's the photo as I finished as it began to get a little gloomy. Just need to finish the one off on this side to make it level with the other one.



All in all, good to get a bit more done and over the next few weeks, I hope to complete the digging, then I can sort out the rolls and rolls of carpet, take all the bags of rubbish to the refuse centre and prepare a spot for the shed....before I need to get ready for planting.

At Dusk in the snow....

Due to the amount of snow we'd had, all the trains around us had been cancelled. Having part hitched and got a different train from East Croydon on the way to work, I knew I'd be in for more of the same on the way home. So I made my way via East Croydon, then a bus to Wallington and walked the rest of the way home. As I was passing, I thought I'd stop off at the allotment to get a photo of it in the snow. I don't suppose I'd get too many of them.

It was getting dark by the time I got there, but here they are........

You can just see the tops of the raspberry canes in the foreground.

My double digging 'spit' full of snow, in one of the remaining beds left to dig.

Brothers in Arms !

What a day, What a day. Michael offered to come and help me dig and thankfully the weather looked to be promising, so not long after 9am, a fit brother arrived for a day of digging!

We set to work on the rotational beds and figured we get plenty of digging done before lunch (with the odd cup of tea to keep us going) , then in the afternoon we'd do a bit more, but also burn the big pile of grass/brambles, etc I'd collected and also have a go with the Kelly Kettle.

It was a perfect day, cold but sunny and the ground had dried out, so it was better for pulling the roots up. Here we are both hard at work.



Ali and Gerty came to say hello and it did seem as if the good weather had got plenty of people out on their allotments.

Anyway, after lunch we drudged back with all our 'equipment' and the following photo's give you an idea of what we got up to !!!

Mike chopping the wood and getting the fire going before we put that big pile to his right on it.

A little bit of smoke(oops) and in the foreground, the Kelly Kettle almost ready to give us each a cup of tea!

Up close. The Kelly Kettle, so thank you to Karen's parents for the Christmas present.

Here we are taking it easy, admiring all our hard work and of course, making sure the fire burns down safely.

So after a great day's effort, the plot is now two thirds completed, which is superb. Here's the final photo's of the work. Well done to us.


Both taken from the West side of the plot, from each corner looking up to the East.

With luck the weather will give me a chance to complete all the digging during February, but if the last 2 days is anything to go by, after all the snow we've had, I'm not so sure. Anyway, fingers crossed...and THANKS MIKE !!