Sunday 3rd November, 2002
Working outside in shirt sleeves - in November? Take the kids up for a quick wander round and find ourselves staying for 5 hours - just because the day is so nice? There's summat odd going on!
A flurry of long-tailed tits are scuttering around the hedges. A band of wonderfully agile and acrobatic fliers, nipping in and out, through and around the brambles.
No doubt the cold, grey, dreich November of memory will be along soon. Meanwhile, we just enjoy the autumn colours - the trees are holding their leaves really well this year, and there are still blazing yellows and richly glowing reds around.
I'd taken the children up to Harlow Carr, (part of my City and Guilds Gardening course). Now, I have to live with their enthusiasms - they've spent the week since working out their ideas for a "den-bed".
Imagine a rectangle, 4 x 6 feet, for sitting and playing, covered probably in bark, surrounded by a "square-C-shaped" flower bed. Two cheap arches have to go in, with the opening of the C between them; a Russian vine will grow up and over the north arch. Sunflowers and a lavender or annual border will go along the east and west sides. We'll fill the gap between the arches on the east side with sticks and have annual climbers covering that bit.
Today, we started a herb bed, for the south bit of the den-bed, at the open end of the planned arches - rosemary, thymes, chives, and mint. If it works, it could look stunning - and give the kids just the sort of private hiding place they enjoy.
We'd wanted to move the old bath and sink it in to make a pond - but we've found out it performs an essential public service. A lot of the older lads use it to wash their vegetables before taking them home!
Lifted a magnificent swede, some of the turnips, and a couple of mouli (the Japanese white radish. And we're still picking romanesco! Brussels sprouts will soon be ready to start harvesting - I have three varieties this year, so we should be able to pick fresh right through to January or February perhaps.
And we've planted eight or nine crowns of the rhubarb salvaged from last week's newly reclaimed beds. In 18 months, they should be prodcuing enough of a crop for me to lift and divide our existing rhubarb patch under the sycamore tree.
It is a very special thing to see a youngster "move on" - it looks like 7-year old Halla has got a bad case of the gardening bug! Sunflowers and annuals are "easy" - now she's planning a serious veggie bed. She's so pleased to see her autumn sown peas have come through - untouched by mouse, bird or slug.
Getting the herb plants for the children's new bed meant lifting and dividing their old (boring and square!) herb patch. Halla spent much of the afternoon making sure none of the odd bits of herbs we'd transplanted would be wasted. She's been popping the odd off-cuts with roots into pots. She wants to start her own herb beds, one here in the allotment, and one in her mum's garden.
The rest of the time we've spent wandering round, planning and dreaming about next year - what will go where. A pleasant way to spend a November afternoon - especially in shirt-sleeves!
Sunday 10th November, 2002
Too good to last! Not only cold, grey and dreich, but we had that soft November rain which seems to soak into everything really well. So a trip to the garden centre to buy the kids' flower seeds - and a spade so that they can help dig in the manure (assuming the council deliver some this year).
And then down town to buy roast chestnuts on the street, and visit the French market!
Sunday 17th November, 2002
Another fine November day. I'm sitting here typing away, looking at a silver birch. It hasn't dropped a leaf yet - when the sun catches the pale yellow-gold foliage, the whole tree lights up like a blown ember.
We had a quick walk up to the plot - a friend has just delivered 12 bags of well-rotted mushroom compost. Beautiful stuff - and far too good to put into the beds just now. So far, I've hidden the bags around the plot, squirrel-like - and will probably dig it in in spring time.
Time to chase the council again for their delivery of horse-manure!
As I come off the phone, fog has settled - and still the silver birch glows!