Happy New Year

The new year is always a time for making plans for me. I have been reflecting on the past year and making plans for this one. There isn't much going on in the garden, to be honest it looks a bit of a disaster area after loads of snow and now rain. It has a tendency to get very wet, a new bed that I had started to dig before the snow hit looks more like a pond at the moment! I am just shuffling out there to look after the chickens and coming straight back in.

I haven't been to the allotment since before christmas. I think we have decided not to continue with it when our year runs out in may. John now has access to free parking at another station and has been reluctant to leave his car parked at the allotment car park since it was broken into, even though this does add a little to his train fare. As the allotment is privately owned it is more expensive than council run ones, this was worth paying while we were using it for parking but is too much just for an allotment.

So I have started to dig up some of the lawn area and move some flower beds to make room in the garden for more veg, there are some drainage issues to contend with, I may have to create raised beds in some areas and dig in lots of sharp sand to try to combat that. We went over board on the potatoes last year, for the amount of work they involve and space they take up it is not worth growning more than a few earlies. Especially as I can buy a sack of local potatoes for the farm shop for about £7-8.

I have been a bit down on myself recently, as I felt that I hadn't been as successful in my endevors as I had hoped to be, but I have come to realise that I am on a learning curve and I'm not going to get it all right first time, I just need to learn from my mistakes and move on.

A Few Set Backs

I haven't posted for a while again, we have had a few set backs in the last few weeks.

Sadly our lovely ducks were taken by a fox, the latch on the run was broken, didn't fasten properly and we hadn't noticed. We were all very upset, especially Emma who had looked after them since they were babies. We have decided to beef up security over the winter and get some more in the spring, but we all miss them terribly.

I have had some health issues, which knocked me back but hopefully is now under control, John's car window was smashed while parked in the allotment car park and Tom (who only recently passed his test) had an accident, thankfully he wasn't badly hurt, but has been suffering from some back ache since the accident.

I am hoping that we are past the worst and am now preparing for christmas. Some of the gifts I will be giving this year will be homemade, so I have been busy making preserves and pickles as well as soaps. I made all our christmas cards as well. I have made the puddings (one for us and one to take to my parents house, where we will be spending christmas day) and the dried fruit is soaking in brandy ready for making the cake.

Ducklings

Introducing the latest addition to our menagerie, Willow and Amber, 2 khaki campbell ducklings. We got them at the Edenbridge and Oxted Show in August when they were just 2 weeks old.

They actually belong to Emma who has a thing for ducks! She did some research and Khaki Campbells were generally the breed recommended as good back garden ducks and good layers. We are looking forward to duck eggs in our future (they are both girls), I've heard that they are very good for cakes (the eggs not the ducks!). They are also very cute!(The ducklings not the eggs!)

They have grown at an amazing rate, there was only a week between when the first and second photos were taken. Now they have most their feathers they have moved outside into my old eglu. We shut them in at night to keep them warm and safe from foxes and have given them a large seed tray to paddle in. Eventually they will be put in the big pen where the chickens currently live and I am on the look out for a paddling pool for them.

Emma has been spending alot of time with them as she wants them to be tame this seems to be working well with Willow but Amber is a little more shy, they both however seem to recognise her voice and will start quacking if they hear her, they obviously think that she is their mummy!

Autumn

Can't believe that I haven't posted since July! The summer has gone really quickly and it is definitely starting to feel very autumnal outside. Things have been growing well on the allotment, including the weeds, and we have been harvesting things regularly. I need to grow more onions and carrots next year as these are the veg that we use the most and are going to run out soon. My sweetcorn, which was looking quite promising earlier in the year was eaten by something, I think rabbits, whilst we were away on holiday. We only managed to pick 4 unnibbled cobs, strangely they didn't touch the carrots.

I have been preserving as much as possible for the winter, our fruit trees are still very small and only produce a few fruit, but I was able to pick plenty of pears from a friends garden, which have been bottled, and my parents have given me lots of plums for jam and cooking apples which have been cooked and frozen to be used in crumbles and pies over the winter.

We also have added to our menagerie of animals over the summer but I will post about that another day.

Allotment Update

I feel like I am finally making progress with the allotment. I have either cleared or covered all of the weedy areas and am keeping on top any new weeds with the hoe. It is starting to look tidy, well tidier.

There has been a few failures, I had very patchy germination with my parsnips, there are a few growing but with big gaps in between. I've sewn some radishes in the gaps so as  not to waste space.

The borlotti beans, sweetcorn and butternut squash seem to be doing well.

And all the potatoes are thriving although I live in fear of the dreaded blight.

Most importantly I am able to take home buckets of vegetable for our evening meals.

Busy busy busy

Just thought I would post to say that I'm still here. The race for life went really well, it was a lovely warm day, the atmosphere was fantastic and best of all we raised loads of money for cancer research (thank you to everyone who sponsored me). I have already signed up for next year!

We have  now started to harvest some of our fruit and vegetables, we are harvesting potatoes and spinach from the allotment as well as salad leaves, cucumbers, french beans and loads of strawberries from the garden. On the allotment we have also planted pumpkins, sweetcorn, carrots, parsnips, beetroot and borlotti beans. It still isn't very pretty and there are areas with lots of weeds but I am gradually clearing it, it is very much a work in progress.

At home I've been trying to reorganise the garden with the help of Tom, who is a horticulture student (four months off! it's hard life being at uni isn't it!). I have also had my brother in law (who is a builder) here redoing the bathroom. We had a huge bathroom so we have basically cut it in half to make a smaller bathroom and a new bedroom, which I have claimed as my craft room. As you can imagine this has involved quite alot of work, many cups of tea and eggs on toast for lunch for my brother in law every day (I did try giving him something different but he likes eggs on toast).

With most of the building work finished, I am now decorating and organising the craft room and have plans to try and earn a little money from it, but I will post about that soon.

Race for Life

Just a short post to tell you that I will be taking part in the Race for Life on the 6th of June to raise funds for Cancer Research. I'm not a runner by nature (I'm aiming for a brisk walking pace) but it's a great cause and I would love to raise as much money as possible for them.

If you are able to sponsor me please use the link at the side of the page. Thank you!

Jayne x