Another day, another frog rescue... Plus harvesting and DIY!

Hi,

First thing's first, the frog rescue op.  Here is the lucky escapee:

Isn't he/she cute??! Although it's also in total shock here as it's just going through the same realisation as yesterday's lucky ones that there is a world out there.  And poor thing looked so skinny from surviving all its life so far in a compost bin half-filled with water, and possibly being the only survivor of its clan.  So not only is it in shock and seriously under nourished, but its also in mourning probably.  Anyway he/she is out and about now, who knows how long they'll survive out in the big bad world, but at least they will have lived a little. And met me, which of course is an added bonus. Although on second thoughts I probably seemed like some sort of giant alien to them and who knows maybe they wanted to stay where they were.  Hopefully not though.

So, frogs aside, had a good few hours at the allotment today.  Did my usual trick of taking about two hours to leave the flat, having faffed about and done loads of other necessary and unnecessary jobs in the meantime... Anyway, got there at 130pm, having got there on foot today as B's bike is out of action so he borrowed mine to get to work.  It took 25 minutes to walk there which ain't bad at all. I loved arriving at the site and wandering past everyone else's plots- like M said to me on our way out today "You can see everyone's personalities reflected in them".  I just like seeing how people make use of their space and seeing different sorts of environments everywhere.

Oh one more thing on the frogs- after taking out Froggy, I had to make an escape route for any others who were lurking under the surface who I didn't spot.  And this was harder than you might imagine due to the shape of the bin and the fact that I don't have the most logical brain, but I got there in the end with the use of an old bit of a branch and bits of plank.  I wasn't sure if this would mean critters entering as well but, anyway it's done now.

I'd been to good ol' Wickes this morning to exchange the padlock and hasp and staple (no I didn't know they were called that and I'll probably never remember that again) for better ones than I got yesterday.  Jeez, I never imagined it would be so hard to decide on what lock and hasp and staple (!) to get for a shed, although I am incredibly indecisive and have limited tools-and-stuff knowledge so that might have been why.  I was all set anyway to fit it all on.  And away I went, though I kind of, well maybe 'did it wrong' isn't accurate, more that I didn't quite do it the way most people do it.  But the point is it's on now and who cares if it took me three times as long as it should have?

Here is me feeling overjoyed that I managed to saw through a piece of wood, so that I had a piece to attach to the inside of the door so that the screws I was screwing in from the outside had something to screw into:

I look a bit happier than the frog don't I?

Sawing isn't something I've really done before, so that took a little while to figure out how to do it most effectively! I also didn't have any nails with me so I looked through the dusty old toolbox from the shed and what did I find in amongst hundreds of screw and bolts and spanners?  Two nails! So I attempted to bash them in to fix the wood on.  Let's just say it's not perfect, but then what (or who) is? It is now a shed with a lock on and that's all that matters. Plus I feel a massive sense of achievement.  And due to my errors and timewasting, I was able to pass on my new-found padlock fitting knowledge onto M who arrived just as I was finishing, and he was very grateful indeed.

I sorted out some more of the stuff from the shed as well.  I just had one more box to go through so that's done now. Yay.  And I half sorted the tool box which I was going to let B do as I'm pretty sure he loves to empty and refill toolboxes, well there's half left if he wants it. 

Harvesting!! We saw yesterday that there is some kale and chard growing in one of the beds.  So I started to pick the kale.  But it was totally covered in these little white flies.  I just looked them up and they are indeed called white flies. So I left the kale and we can deal with that later.  I went to look at the chard and it was white fly free so picked some (which we'll be having for dinner, lovingly cooked by B) and then decided I should weed all around the chard and also take off any dead leaves, as well as thin them out a little because down one end there were loads clumped together.  Here are the before and after pics:

There were a lot of prickly weeds! Not nice when you haven't got gloves on. Whilst I was doing that, a guy came over and chatted to me who has a plot about 20 down from me.  He was really friendly and he gave me some tips.  F suggested we plant some mustard seeds, as they're a green fertiliser, and if I wanted any seeds he can get them for me at a good rate.  I was thinking of sowing something that would be a green fertiliser- when I was on a recent food growing course in Brighton I learnt about doing this and we saw some rye being grown for this reason.  So that's something we need to sort out too...

I've printed off some stuff to read up on from a vegan organic website so that's what I'll be looking at tonight.  I'm also trying to get hold of some onion and garlic sets, though I learnt the other week that you can just buy healthy looking bulbs from a shop and plant them, but either way we need to get them in soon.  People keep saying "broad beans and peas!" but they're pretty much my least favourite vegetables so I don't have much enthusiasm for sowing any.  However, B does love peas and the poor guy doesn't ever get to eat them because of my weird aversion to them, so we really should put some in.

Ok that's me done.  Thanks again for reading.
xx

oh lastly here is my wood in the process of being sawed in half: