A loveliness of Ladybirds

It's Tuesday and I'm still feeling a bit anxious with leftover panic from Sunday's visit to the Allotment. Don't get me wrong, nothing horrendous happened...there were no clowns nor a plague of locusts, a twister did not lift up my shed and deposit me in Oz etc. No, I simply took the worst panic attack and it didn't go away until, sort of, this morning.

As an advocate for Ecotherapy and in my own made up word of Allotmentherapy, I find this quite the let down. But as I remind others, so I must remind myself.... Ecotherapy is not a panacea for mental health problems.

I believe my panic began with me getting just what I wanted....new allotment members in a big friends and family gathering getting an over run plot back into order. I mean, really, it was a joy to see. However it also put me on high alert...I had to talk and be friendly and it was all too much. I went into overdrive to make these (somewhat glorious warriors) feel a community spirit existed, and it was just too much.

Reminder this bed? I worked really hard to get it finished and cleared then realised I hadn't been breathing and nearly fainted.

Andrew managed quite a bit with clearing our soon to be squash/asparagus area and got pooped too. Our trip home for coffee ended me shaking and terrified to go back.

The vast population of ladybirds couldn't even draw me back. There are so many this year, this is just 2 out of approx 8 I saw without searching for them! Pure joy :)

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Today is beautiful so I'm going to take photos of how gloriously well the seedlings are doing, all over the place and share that joy with you. Plus I have designs on making a sweet rhubarb compote later.

* For now it's all about remembering to breathe and ordering my hay fever medication- why??!, cruel, merciless, sadistic pollen, why do you torture me so!???

Love and hugs
Your Carrie x

De-Shaming complete :)

Hello dear lovely reader :) Hope you are feeling fabulous and starting to notice the nights getting shorter - oh SPRING is on her way!!!

So this weekend I was at the lottie both Saturday and Sunday - I know - shock! I shouldn't have been there on the Sunday as I wasn't well enough but I pushed as I usually do and it present yours truly is just emerging from yet another quite bad nervous meltdown. I couldn't even talk these past days never mind type. Silly girl. I really can't seem to see the signs until it's too late.

Anyhow - Let me show off what we did on Saturday - I was feeling pretty good for a change :)

Andrew worked so hard on gossipping with a new member of the lottie, hahaha. But he did get a lot of work done too *blush* I'll have to get him to tell me again a little about his new friend, he sounded very nice but my brain is a mess and I can't remember much other than he cheerfully joined the search for my misplaced camera at the end of afternoon....I'll tell you that story in a while.

So here is the 'Corner of Shame' now - looking better I think you will agree. We now have the 2 cold frames over from 14b and have the area blocked off. We are going to use this area as a nursery and as the potting up area is just round the corner it all makes better sense of the space. I doubt it will stay carpeted, hahaha and no we aren't getting a couple of chairs and a coffee table! Once the grass underneath is dead we'll probably put down bark mulch or some such thing :)

I concentrated on de-weeding (yes it's a word!) the rest of the asparagus/strawberry bed and uncovered our path under the fruit arch. It's growing really well - I'll have to get Andrew to tie those branches in.

Then I tackled the 'coffin', haha, I still call it that, it looks like a coffin - sorry Andrew. Look Rhubarb :) I forgot to put that forcer on top after weeding the area but I'll do it next week. This whole area hadn't being looked at for a while - eek!

And so I took some before photos and went to take some after photos an hour later and NO camera!!! I searched on my own for half an hour, getting more and more frustrated and upset, then Andrew and his new friend helped for another half hour, no sign of it :( We were everywhere and looking through rubbish and on our hands and knees going through the long grass (the blasted camera was in a GREEN case *rolls eyes*). I was starting to get rather dark and Andrew's friend had to leave and I just felt so sad I started to cry (just a wee bit), Andrew gave me a big hug and said nice things. Thing is he was really hurting my boob hugging me......the camera was in my gillet, way up on top of my boob!!!! The pocket stretches all over inside, you could fit Maggie in there!

So I had been walking around with a rectangular right boob for an hour - it was really noticeable! What sweet gents they were - never once did they look at that area at me say 'is that not it in your top?' Unless Andrew's new friend thinks I have very odd boobs - hahahahaha.

Frosty lotties

I was so cold, as I've mentioned, hopefully these photos will give a better indication of that, oh, and the knowledge that was wearing 2 pairs of socks and still had cold feet!

So, some frosty photos.....





By the time the last one was taken the sun was going down, as you can tell from the red glow on Maggie's face. Even with her clothes on she needed that blanket wrapped round her. Poor thing.

Unfortunately there really wasn't much happening around the plots, we were there almost on our own and I suppose the sane people were all at home, warm cosy home, with tea and coffee and sofas...

However there was one other hardy fellow, whose name I totally forgot to ask (duh!) working away, very hard indeed - I suppose we all were that day; stand in the one spot too long and you'd freeze. He had worked miracles on these 2 areas, digging over the soil, tidying the edges and getting rid of plants that had given up the ghost.



So after our mammoth task, of Turf Stack Destroying was completed and we had had a done a little looking and weeding around, it was time to go. At home, Maggie's body warmed up just fine but her ears!.....they took a bit longer and needed some assistance......



By the way, I'm still not too good today again, but head up and fighting on.

New people

It's an exciting time, we have new blood arriving on the plots, some people have obviously realised that a whole plot for instance is too much and now we are getting people in who will take that unwanted half, gladly. One of them is Leslie, a nice friendly chap who came over to say Hello. He has just received his keys and will be in Field C. So Welcome to him! Good Luck too, we all remember what it's like to start a fresh!

I have also seen a few other new faces and a new name on the Allotment Forum. Welcome, welcome. The new plots in Field C are also being marked out in preparation of handing over to more brand new tenants. We're growing FAST!

This is John from Field C - he's our youngest lottie holder, I think he's 15 and he is a very passionate allotmenteer. He's somewhat of a wee celebrity - interviewed in local and national papers and on the radio as one of the representatives of the scheme. This was the first time we had said hello.