Update for August

The building of the shed has started. Nick and Matt laid the base exactly to measure wit6h a nice little patio outside the door and window. When I say started, I mean that the bit are laid all over the lawn and painted. I am not sure which has the most paint on it, the shed or the lawn!





The beans that I planted for drying are ready to shell and I was surprised to find that I had one plant of 'Ying Ylang' kidney beans. I am going to keep them to sow next year and hopefully increase my supply year on year. They look fantastic.




A selection of other beans are 'Butter Beans' 'Bellotta Beans' and what ever you call the beans that come from dwarf french beans. I have also shelled some runner beans that had got too big and they tasted great as well. At this stage it is OK to cook them as they are but I have a load that I am hanging to dry and store to use over the winter.


These do look good hanging in the kitchen especially as the pods are so different. They will lose their colour as they dry and I am a bit worried that the beans will start dropping all over the kitchen floor but I will overcome that problem if it happens.






We don't seem to have as good a crop of onions as last year but it has been very dry and they do like a lot of water. I realise that I don't have anywhere to store then as the beans have taken all the room on the bottom of the wine rack where the onions hung last year. I have asked Nick to make a rack to hang over the kitchen table but I think it is fairly low on the list of jobs that I keep adding, and the shed has priority.


The elephant garlic looks fantastic and I am saving a couple to plant for more next year. It has a really mild flavour, more like leeks than garlic (that reminds me, I must photograph the leeks to show you next time).



In my mission to be organic and to save my own seed, I have gone a bit mad and am even saving seed from the passion flower that is fruiting like made in the garden. Unfortunately the fruit seem to be more seed that fruit so I really don't fancy eating them altough they do look lovely.



Another one of my missions is to make more of the hedgerows and our hedge at Churchill Way includes the hazel that I cut for bean poles and elder. So, having missed the elderflowers, I couldn't miss the change of the berries. After wine last year, I decided that 2007 was the year of the chutney - elderberry chutney that is. Surprisingly it is not a very strong taste and in my opinion ideal for cold meats. I will be circulating jars shortly for the taste test.


Back to the shed, or rather the bus stop. I think the telegraph pole is what gives it its name.






Now an update from the bowls green. I was in the final of the novice singles against Lyn. At this point of the game, we had completed 10 ends and she was beating me 9 points to 3 and the game is the first to 21 points. I now have the reputation as the come-back queen as it got to the point where she needed 1 point to win and I needed five. I got one, then another one and then three - so you can work out who won. Another cup to match those of last year.

I came a very close second in the ladies pairs and a not very close second in the ladies two woods singles but at least I get runners up medals for them.

Remember the giant apple. It has grown so big that it looks as though it is bigger than Nick's head. He was determined not to pick it except one day last week we arrived at the allotment to find that it had harvested itself and was sitting on the ground.