Do you dig it?

Hi Everyone!  Soz for the two week hiatus!  WOW how busy have I been - let me count the ways.

I went for an interview last Thursday for a Maternity Cover position with a FAB sounding company in Uxbridge... I get the warm fuzzies about this one so keep those fingers crossed (YES again!)  You know when you get on well with someone when you start saying the same things at the same time and laugh about it... Well that's how it went so.... They have one more person to see today and then they will let me know.

I have done loooooooooooads at the allotment (digging and I have the blisters to prove it!)  As the weather has been really fantastic for the past week or so I quickly booked off Friday and Monday so I could get stuck right in.  Mum and I had dug out the Beanery area (to our horror FULL of bindweed roots).  So I redug over this on Friday and buried some newspapers under the area where the beans will be planted (hopefully will be able to water less this way)  I also put up the poles and even tied most of them up... Spotted a couple the next day that I missed!  I also grabbed the communal mower and got three quarters of the way up one path before stalling it.  So not too shabby.  Saturday and Sunday consisted of me digging over three new beds in a slight revision to the plan. I also planted out my first few broad beans - Although my Mum and I got very confused in one of those conversations that went ....

"How do you plant broad beans?", "What Runner Beans?", "No Broad beans", "do you know the difference" "Errrr, yes of course I do, now do they need a support or not", "yes"  .... Later Mum says "were they runner beans you planted...?", "No Mum Broad beans", "why did you plant them by a pole then?" !!!

Monday I went to visit a pal and got some interesting bits from poundland (gardening fleece and a minitunnel cloche system) and some herbs from Wilkinsons!  Went back to the plot and planted them straight away in front of the beanery.  Oregano and Thyme - my favourites. 

I also picked more Rhubarb... MORE RHUBARB... I currently have some Rhubarb wine fermenting, Rhubarb and Ginger Ice-cream - Ive given some away... I will open freeze this batch.. Or maybe some more wine... Hmmmmm.  I have picked about 8lb - Yes Eight..  That's Nearly £10 worth...  Rhubarb Schnapps... LOVELY.

My brilliant seedlings are coming along a treat at home in the conservatory and looking really healthy although I havent potted any up yet - naughty mummy.  I have stumbled upon the brilliant idea of putting them under the coffee table and covering the coffee table with newspapers for some shade... Brilliant eh!  Up here for thinkin', down there for dancin'.  I haven't lost a plant yet - which is a revelation as I make a mean frispy seedling and have to run out and buy plants most years!  A thing I just can't afford to do with the allotment and no real job to call my own...

Anyway I now estimate that I have about a half of the allotment in shape with a third being dug over and the other bit being fruit bushes and perennials.  I have dug a bit of the top beds but they are now covered in dandelions, which as pretty as they are - can not stay!  I made a few new allotment friends this weekend and think I will have gone up in the "old guys" estimation since being there at 8ish on Friday morning and working alllll day.  I have never slept so well.  I'm still tired now - back to work for a rest.

I must go I've been gabbing on for aaaages, thanks for reading this far!  Chat soon X

Edit 28/04/11

This is the SECOND digging out of the Beanery area.  The bindweed roots filled the wheelbarrow several times the first digging through - Sadly the weed is still growing in this bed!