First day on the allotment

 

Hello everyone.

Welcome to my new allotment!

My cutting garden at A Bunch Of Wild HQ was jam packed with blooms last year, so this year instead of digging up more of my garden, I decided to get myself a plot.

Today was my first day,

I felt incredibly nervous as I don't fall into text book allotment holders in my area, for a start I'm growing flowers!

Thankfully I don't have flowery wellies as I feel this may of also been a step to far.

And instead of a capable 4x4 to trek over muddy plots I have a cream mini convertible.

All I have to do now is paint my shed pink and I fear I may be setting myself up for quite a hard time.... I hope I'm proven wrong, though I may just hold back on that pink shed for a while.

I have this dream where I'm standing in the doorway of my shed drinking a flask full of tea and admiring all my beautiful flowers.... ahhhh bliss.

Ok daydreaming over.

My plot hasn't been worked for just over a year so it's actually not that bad, you can still make out the individual beds.

I love having proper individual beds as I find it much less daunting than having one huge stretch of earth, I'd advise anyone taking on an allotment for the first time to have beds with paths in between.

So I parked up my mini in a spot where I decided was safe enough not to sink in the mud and thank goodness it didn't actually sink because I didn't see a single allotment neighbor the whole time I was there.

I started digging my first bed, it's about 12ft x 4ft and very heavy soil, it took me two hours in total with a break in between.

I feel fantastic, I've done one! Only another seven to go, that's the beauty of beds, you can split time into chunks. Today I went saying I was going to work this particular bed and this one only, tomorrow I'll do another, right now I'm indulging in the hottest bubble bath ever with just one blister, I think today was a good day.

I'm still a long way off I know but I hope to have it completely under control by May when I'll be waiting for the frosts to finish so I can plant up my flowers.

This year I'm also going to try growing green manure for the first time, and my worst bed I'm doing a no dig method where I'll layer up cardboard, straw and compost and leave it for a year to naturally mulch down.

I can't wait to get going again!

Emma