After a week of sun and heat, we finally got some of the wet stuff over the weekend. Our weekend started on Friday with a visit from my father in law. He has always been an avid gardener and came to see how I’ve been getting on down on the plot. He was really impressed and also gave me some tips. He told me to take the excess grass cuttings and other trimmings from the lot that won’t fit in the compost bin and dig it into the clods of mud and grass I got from creating the beds.
Later on that day, we went to an allotment get together that my wife had arranged. It was a good evening having a few drinks and meeting other allotmenteers. It really highlighted the community and I met some really good people.
The next day I had a quick trip to the plot to put up some more brassica nets and my mate fixed the missing windows in the kids’ shed. I also then started to dig out the flower bed at the top of the plot. Hoping to get some companion flowers in there to help the veg and some perennials including foxglove.
I’ve started the foxglove off in my propagator on the window sill but have now realised I have sown them wrong. Apparently the seeds need to sit on top of the soil as they need sunlight to germinate but I covered them in a light layer of compost. So that’s a lesson learnt.
On Sunday, me and the family went to a couple of garden centres I had heard were good. The first was just outside of Luton and was called Bridge Valley Nursery. It’s a small nursery and it appears that the current global bastard has had an effect on this business. We were greeted by the owners as soon as we arrived and they were quick to apologise for the lack of pots they had because they were in lockdown when they were due a delivery. But the stock they did have was lovely and we ended up leaving with some beautiful dahlias and a few other nice plants all for a reasonable price. Definitely will visit here again.
Next stop was Vanstones in Codicote. Bigger place with a bigger selection but also bigger prices. I do really like this place because the grounds are nice with a big pond, ducks, geese and a miniature train for the kids to ride. Obviously the train is not on at the moment and the bridge over the pond is closed because of the pandemic.
All the bits I got were for the garden at home. I had started doing it up at the beginning of lockdown and got distracted once I was offered my plot on the allotment. I was also a bit pissed off with the fact that after I put in a lot of hard work, it was quickly ruined by my cats. The bottom part of my garden was an overgrown mess. I dug it over and took out as many weed roots as possible, then I put down a weed suppressing membrane and covered it in slate chippings. Finally I placed some pots with flowers in on top. My feature piece was to be my kids old wooden sandpit that was repainted and turned into a big planter. I then filled it with flowers and I was happy. Then came my cats and turned my new garden into a really expensive litter tray; they dug up all of the plants in the planter and crapped everywhere. I hate my cats! I hope they don’t touch my new stuff or I might have to turn them into slippers.
Allotment Life 