Saturday 6th October 2007

Tim was up the plot at 11am and I put in an appearance a little later because I was feeling shattered. Tim dug the section of the plot that had had the cabbages growing in them to turn the soil over once again. He also uprooted the bottom two bean wigwams because they had died back. He removed all of the beans left growing up the wigwams and put them in the greenhouse to dry out. We will have a load of bean seeds to sell on ebay by the looks of things. He also went round the plot, picking all of the veg that was growing. We had a few courgettes, raspberries and parsnips that looked like balls with lots of roots on the bottom. Parnsips don't look or taste that nice at th best of times but these really were fairly ugly.

Tim spent the majority of the afternoon shifting wheelbarrows of woodchip mulch from the nearby car park to the plot he'd just dug. He hopes that the mulch will keep the weeds down, then rot down and we can dig the organic matter back into the ground. The earth was still a bit clay-based but by around 2012, after spending £423 on manure, wood chip and chicken poo, it should be perfect. Tim must have gone back and forth around fifty times. I was just glad that I was on shed duties...
                       
 
                                             
 
                                             
  Last week I had nearly finished the shed but with the cordless drill running out of battery I had a few panels missing. I had Suey up to help me and I even had Sam as an extra helper. Sam and I cut the floorboards to size so that they fit in the slots that were left while Suey painted the wood panels I screwed into the spaces. She painted the inside of the shed white and as soon as all of the panels had been fitted into place she painted the outside brown.

As soon as the panels had been cut and painted, the only thing left to do was sort out some shelves and put the roof and door on. Seeing as I hadn't prepared a door or shelves, Suey and I sorted out the roof. Cutting the bituminous roofing sheets was ridiculous because it gunked up the teeth of the saw I was using. Suey helped me put the roofing in place and we hammered the sheets into the beams. Because I'm such a short arse I found it hard to hammer some of the nails in at the right angle. It all worked out okay in the end, though. I also put some guttering and drainpipe on the shed in order to catch all of the rain from the roof into our water butt.
                       
 
                                             
 
                                             
  With the shed nearly finished and some of the plot dug we are finally on our way to getting our act together for next year. The year 2007 seemed to be quite disorganised, with lots of weeding and not as much reaping as we'd hoped. Perhaps 2008 might bring us more balanced weather. In the meantime we need to dig the rest of the plot and get a fruit cage sorted on the second plot sorted. Oh, and I suppose we had better finish the shed too!