You've Been Framed

I achieved my goals yesterday.

Another 15 or so loads of topsoil, with some help from Penny, added into f-t-b-t-b and at last I was happy with its level. The freecycle topsoil pile is now more like a pimple.

Paul cut up the remaining pallets for my veggie patch paths.

And then the ceremonial carrying out of the seed potatoes from the utility room window sill.

Paul brought the scaffolding planks up from the side of the sheds so that I could dig my trenches and plant them with minimal compaction of my beautiful bed. The King Edwards are filling half the space - 5 rows with one left over all on its own. Then I planted the first earlies at the other end. I still have some room in the middle to see if my sprouting 2nd earlies from last year prove to be even better value.

Unfortunately today has not been anywhere near as successful despite a good start.

Paul came out to start building my cloches. We now have one frame, 1.56m by 0.83m, which fits inside the raised beds where I don't have rocks sticking out of the wall. Dowels cut and holes drilled. Various pipes have been tested for flexibility. The smaller blue piping and black piping has been passed as suitable for cloche hoops. The larger blue piping is not bendy enough. However, it is has now had several lengths cut off it and hooped directly into one of my raised planters and covered with my fleece. The rest will be used similarly for one of the beds in the veggie patch.

I made a couple of wigwams for my runner beans. And then constructed one of the (four) Aldi obelisks that have been stored (and the boxes gnawed) in my shed. If you zoom in you can see the rhubarb is thriving at the back of the steps to nowhere. Paul is already asking when will it be ready to pick...

It clouded over at lunchtime, threatening rain, so that is as far as we got. The wind got up and it was decidedly chilly.

With the re-designation of the fleece I now needed to get something else to cover the cloches with. Penny had mentioned she had a large roll of polythene that she had got for waterproofing her garage and if I wanted any... I skyped her and she said she would bring it over. It was only when she opened the boot that I realised that it was black :)

So I spent the afternoon on the web and found this site that sells all kinds of garden fleece/netting etc. at what I considered very reasonable prices. I have now ordered some horticultural polyethylene, butterfly netting, enviromesh and hessian potato sacks.

The weather looks better for tomorrow so I may actually get around to start sowing seeds... It would be a shame to have all the infrastructure in place but no plants :)