Winter veg and Granddad

The day of Sammy's 3rd birthday party and whilst Louis and I baked and iced cakes back at the ranch, Neil and Granddad took Sammy up the allotment to plant out some winter veg in place of our now finished courgettes and carrots.

They planted out Leeks, Brussel Sprouts and Cabbages. They put the Cabbages under our cage to protect them but the poor Brussels! On our visit today (only planted them yesterday) some of them had been nibbled to death by slugs, I guess and snails already!

On his return Sammy said he was a bit bored but sucked his thumb and stroked Ratty (for those of you who don't live with Sammy day in day out Ratty is his friend du jour and has a particularly long label for him to stroke whilst sucking his thumb). I will get them interested in growing, I will, I will!

In other allotment related news, we received a letter from Salisbury City Council today stating that due to the high number of entries this year for the Scarecrow competition, even though they thought "our little white man was very cute" we had sadly failed to win anything this time around. You can judge for yourselves from the photograph -please be kind we have had a lot of rain and he is made out of straw!!

Gourd Blimey and Good Gourd!

Up the allotment today after heavy rain and sunshine, we found the most enormous Gourd and pumpkin to boot. The boys even asked the girls (Ruby and Grace) from over the way to come and see it, we were just so amazed! We now have four or five pumpkins on the go but surely the big fella has to be on our doorstep cut out for Halloween. It is fab!

We were also pleased with the size of the sweetcorn, towering over the boys heads now and we picked the last remaining carrots and spring onions too. The beans had to go, failing to produce anything we wanted to eat really. The tomatoes are trying but still very much green. We spoke to a neighbour who suggested planting leeks and winter cabbages now as some of our beds are looking a bit bare for this time of year.

The boys weren't too fussed today so Neil took them home in the car to play cricket. I stayed for another hour weeding the beds and cutting the grass. A walk home eating some Blackberries on the way, dirty and tired as the evening was full of glorious sunshine. Absolutely wonderful.

the end of the best part of summer

Went up today and the allotment still looks great on little maintenance here and there. The brocolli and Cauliflower had to officially go today as it had flowered and wilted. The courgettes have given up after many weeks of feeding us veg each supper. They were fab and delicious. The gourd thing is still going and producing enormous ones now!

No photos to show but Louis enjoyed using the shears to attack the courgette leaves as we got rid of them into the compost. He roared at them and snapped angrily - a good job for Louis! - whilst Sammy helped Neil weed around the sweetcorn which is looking good. The pumpkins are huge and the boys are excited about that for Halloween.

We found a dead dragon fly with just the outer shell of it's wings which the boys enjoyed and many creatures as we disturbed the soil, slugs, snails, spiders and woodlice.
I found 12 plums and the rest are either on the ground rotten or miles too high in the tree. I think maybe my pruning in February (KATE!) was a bit too rough and harsh! Not sure I will be making my Christmas presents of Bugs and My Robot Top plum jam with just 12 plums. Hey ho.

Lovely sunny day and we can plan our next growing season, starting with looking at books to find out what likes to be planted in September.

big veg a-plenty

We have been away for the weekend camping with the Blackford boys so haven't been up for a few days. It rained heavily one day and sunshine the rest. Everything has expanded and we had a pretty impressive selection of squash/courgette.

Neil had the idea of snipping the top off the squash and filling them with meat. They are a really pretty balloon shape and would look great on the plate. The pumpkin is huge after only 6 days since we last took a pic and more are coming from the long trailing stems. The broccoli and cauliflower are over and we didn't actually get a cauliflower without disease which is a shame. Always next year....

The plum trees are full of fruit and dropping it before we can get to all of it, so the wasps are loving it. The corn is as big as Sammy now and we are pretty happy with that.

We did a bit of watering and harvesting and will have to return very soon for some weeding and tidying and general maintenance before it all gets out of hand!

Hot and dry but productive!

Grandma has been here looking after the boys whilst we spent a weekend away in London town. Not only has she looked after them and done everything she has also been up the allotment too. I went up today, the first time in a while (the dreaded tonsilitus came back but has buggered off again thank goodness).

It has been a very hot and sticky day but various trips up in the last 10 days to water, by various people, has ensured that we are still getting a beautiful crop of veg to eat every other day. It is so lovely to go and pick your supper. Tonight I picked courgettes (including one which grew together as a weird fat double veg which Louis cackled with laughter at), onions, carrot and gourd/squash things (we still don't know what they are but we're eating them!) The pumpkins are really staking their claim and trailing all over the place. The brocolli is still coming, a random self-seeding tomato and spring onions. The corn is looking great (thanks Grandma for weeding so it stands tall from bare soil). We have lots of plums so my aim is to try and make some jam. I mainly tidied up the dead leaves and diseased cauliflowers and watered. A beautiful evening to do so. The boys aren't really into it at the moment but I can't blame them, today the heat was pretty fierce for them.

Squarecrow Jack STILL needs some love and the scarecrow competition is ever looming. A week to go, must sort it out! We are off camping this weekend so I must do my best to keep everything alive before we go, so as I can do some serious work when we get back.