Carrots 1 Me Nil

See me waving my hands in the air? That's me, conceding defeat.

Yep, the carrots have won. Don't want to grow this year on the allotment? Fine. Only one brave seedling breaking the Great Carrot Seed Strike 2008 and showing up for work? Great.

That's perfectly OK with me, you deserters. I have dozens of carrot seedlings, pots of them, partying down in containers at home.

And no, I won't look at the wonderful, incredibly straight rows of carrots growing just a few yards away, sown by Lovely Plot Lady.

Instead I shall brandish my fork and confine you to a dim and distant memory, soon, fingers crossed, to be replaced with lovely rows of my own. Last night, while being eaten by midgies, I sowed a rainbow selection of carrots.

Carrot tape was my number one choice but, and it's hard not to feel there's a Carrot Conspiracy going on, it's disappeared - poof! - off the face of the earth.

When I got home I then sowed some spring onions, another plot no show, with some Parmex carrots in a beautiful wooden container. The children will probably refuse to eat these orange marbles but they're apparently great in pots and 'suitable for clay soils where growing carrots can be a problem'.

Hear that my little orange friends? You may have won the battle but I'm going to win the war!

Grow Baby, Grow

I think the Gardening Magic is starting to rub off on my three-year-old. Maybe it's because I've started her young.

"I want to," she imperiously told me this afternoon, "plant some carrots."

So that is what we did. I was at my 'potting table' sowing another plot of coriander and a tray of petunia, marvelling at how absolutely minuscule the flower seeds were and crossing my fingers that they would germinate although I was planting them late according to the packet.

We filled a pot I found under the table and laid rows of carrot seed tapes. These are supposed to be child friendly and they were obviously easier for little hands to sow than tiny seeds. I'm going to use them at my school gardening club's inaugural meeting next Tuesday (eek! I'll put that out of my mind. For now).

I have high hopes for them. I haven't thought so far as what I shall do if they don't germinate. And in our garden that's a distinct possibility. There should be a warning on the packet that reads: "Do not let nearly two-year-olds near the seeds when finished especially when they're all mixed in with compost because they will crumple up like used tissue and will be hard to get flat again."

My little gardener also helped me to sow a pot of carrots using seeds. I tried to get her to sprinkle but most ended in clumps so when she lost interest I sort of realigned them. I'm not sure if it'll make any difference but it does make the experiment - seed tape v seeds - that fairer. I shall be watching their progress closely.

Sunshine and Showers

"What a fearless magician is Spring -

you really can't teach her a thing!
In she sneaks on a breeze,
draws the leaves from the trees....
just when Winter thought he was still King!"
-Judith Nicholls

Time is squeezed for every one of us, I imagine, except perhaps the super rich who have no need to work or the retired. But add children to the mix and it's not just time but your head that is feeling a little under siege.

And so when I can't get up to the allotment I've started (and 'started' is the relevant word here) veggie gardening a little more intensely at home and I've been surprised at what you can fit in!

Of course, you still have to be organised and sometimes if I have a little more spare time I'll three-quarters fill a couple of pots and earmark them for some salad or herbs when I have a little more time.

Yesterday, while dodging the showers, I managed to sow some salad leaves in a large pot which had been kindly donated by my Dad.


"I sowed the seeds in a nice spiral," I told Hubby.
"That's lovely," he replied, "is that so it looks pretty for the slugs?"
Humph.

I cannot, however, claim success for putting up the mini grow house (and I think I'm rather pushing it claiming success for the salads but I'm optimistic). Frustrating barely covers it.

Instructions remained unread (Mummy, I need a weeeeeee...), the wrong poles were slotted in (Juice Mummy, juice...) and the correct poles wouldn't stay in place (Mummmmyyyy, he took my spade....). There it remains, half erected, installed in the wrong place, devoid of shelves, poles falling out of holes, listing slightly.

But, y'know, I'll take these (admittedly small) successes where I can find them.

At Last.....

Yesterday I finally felt that spring was here. Lately it's been a bit tricky remembering which season we're in, what with the snow, rain, cold, rain, hailstones and rain. But yesterday, ah - warmth and sunshine. I sat in my garden, typing this, surrounded by the sounds of chatty birds, lawnmowers and the odd drone of a bumblebee. I watched (I can touch type) a butterfly sunning itself on our slide and next door's frothy blossom gently doing a little dance in the breeze. Bliss.

So what's a girl to do with time, and a toddler, on her hands? No, no prizes for guessing. I remembered to take everything I needed, which in itself is a minor miracle, and packed a bribe (or as I described it, a picnic) for the little one and we headed to our patch.


I can't say I wasn't feeling a little concerned that it would be one Stress Fess from Hell as I haven't been up to the allotment with anyone under the age of three on my own for a looooong time.

But I needn't have worried. The toddler was absolutely fine, actually better than fine. He stuck next to me, didn't take the opportunity to wander when I wasn't looking, kept off others' plots and dug away on various bits of earth.



I'll just gloss over the time he walked over my newly emerging carrots and just-planted peas. Or how he plonked himself down in the patch that I'd just dug over for my broad beans. Nope, he was a star.

We stayed for nearly two hours and I managed to sow three more rows of carrots. I had meant to do it last time but didn't. Tiny little shoots are now poking their head out of the soft bed of compost I made for the first lot I sowed, so I felt encouraged to sow some more.

My carrots are never prolific growers so last year I decided to sow them in rows filled with compost and then covered them with it before giving them a water. But still, not much grew. I think it got warmer and the wet compost baked a nice, hard crust so this year I did the same without the watering.

Today I ran out of compost so I sowed one row directly into the soil. I'm sure it won't be successful but it'll be interesting to find out if my cossetting way does make a difference. I also managed to sow a double row of sugar snap and another of broad beans. I'm not holding out much hope for these - I'm sure a mouse is sharing our plot.

There is still much to do, but I'm feeling happier and ever so slightly green-fingered, if only a delicate shade of a hint-of-apple. Then again, it could, of course, just be because sun was at last shining!

April Showers and April Planting

It was a day of two halves. Thank goodness. My Dad reckons extreme weather in April is not a portent of environmental doom and is not unusual (and he knows A Lot) but it was fun to wake to two inches of snow this morning. Either way, I have to say, it was the most perfect snow. Just right for snowman-making and gone by the afternoon. Just in time to go up the allotment! Yay snow!

The bad bit of the day was discovering my tin of seeds was not watertight and although stored in my "greenhouse" (plastic covered frame thingy) they were ruined. And smelly. But every cloud and all that so me and today's Under Gardener, seven-year-old Marigold, nipped to our local garden centre to stock up.

Today's haul included a special bag of seed, soil-based compost, spring onions White Lisbon, carrots Amsterdam Forcing 3 and Early Nantes 5, squash Butternut Hunter, mixed lettuce, broad beans Red Epicure and mangetout Oregon Sugar Pod. Phew.

I have to remember that taking any of the older three Under Gardeners slows things down considerably. Taking the youngest two practically brings everything to a standstill. But even the eldest three need help (Is this a weed Mummy? I can't pull it out! Is that OK for the seeds.....). Then there are the loo breaks (can you come and stand guard?), stops for hot chocolate (could you just hold the cups for me), and the seemingly endless but very important debates about watching the Dr Who repeat or the I'd Do Anything sing-off (Dr Who won).



So what did I do? A spot of weeding, four rows of spring onions, one and half of red onions (finishing the bag off), four rows of carrots and the four pots of peas (bit worried about the last ones. I'm sure they'll die). I also covered the peas with hazel sticks, covered a row of the children's broccoli with fleece to deter the pest chomping it and covered the carrots with fleece. I am never very successful with carrots so I'm hoping the fleece will keep them warm and protected. Ah!

My mantra is Be Patient, which is pretty handy for gardening generally, and that anything I get done is better than nothing, and heaps better to do it with a child in tow.