Sunflowers & Toe Rags

I though I would start this post off with a cheery bright picture of my Sunflower - the one of two that survived. She is over 5ft tall. I am definately going to grow LOADS of these beauties next year as they don't take much ground space and look fabulous!

This is my plot number - which we have to have by Lotty Law - especially as our Open Day is just around the corner. So I dug out my old rusty milk urn, which my Uncle John painted years ago with little daisies that you can just make out, and painted 144 on it! When I took it to the Lotty, Nigel was impressed and Derek was equally admiring. However the advice was to fill it with stones, which Derek kindly did for me. I was then advised to move it away from the corner of my plot, which is by the gate, as some one would pinch it!!! So to my dismay, I moved it to the other end, for now, where my shed will eventually go.

I think I will have to get a temporary sign on the go for now, and just put 144 milk urn in place for the open day, and then put it back next to the shed (once it arrives) as a more permanent position. Like Doug said - we don't want the Toe Rags getting hold of it!

Doug told me that him and his Mrs. were admiring my Hilda Scarecrow, and wasn't it a shame that the Sutton in Bloom competition, didn't have a "Best Scarecrow" catagory!!

Derek then offered to spend an hour or two getting rid of my every growing mound of brambles - how could I say no? You guessed it - I couldn't!! I rushed home in search of a can of Ginger Beer and some biscuits to keep him refreshed & ran back down to the Lotty again after a quick cup of tea and a few words with Hubby who was busy perfecting his lawn.

I then set about helping Derek who was already busily swinging his mattock around!

I was in charge of metal, bricks, large stones and rubbish - and there was alot of this!

The metal had to be taken down to the shop area - the rubbish had to be sorted - some of this was rotting garden waste, so that went on the compost, in one bag there was a dead fox, and in another there was lots of crawling things to which I let out a really girlie scream and jumped backwards!

Despite all the girliness, I got on with things and Derek carried on swinging his mattock. I just over 1 hour, he manged top achieve so much - I was amazed.

We are going to give it another go tomorrow - Derek is like a godsend - he really is. Nothing seems to daunt him.

Now, one last mention. On visiting the lotty today, I was so excited to discover that some of my tomatoes had started to produce little green fruits (on the vine) - look at those little lovelies. Ah.

That is one thing I LOVE about the allotment - it's the excitement it delivers to you on every visit, it's the community spirit that seems to have gone from our normal every day lives, it's the fact that you can pick what you have grown and have it fresh on your plate within hours or even minutes and it's the satisfaction of watching that tiny speck of a seed grow and grow and give you so much pleasure......

Right - off to the lotty now for a few hours whilst the weather promises to be good to us all.

Toodle Pip.