Growing

We’ve been on babysitting duty again today. Last night’s lecture on organic gardening was very interesting, apparently, and I was again sorry to have missed it. The speaker, and his family, have had an organic smallholding for more than twenty years and now are completely self-sufficient in vegetables and eggs, and put on the garden only what is generated by the garden – that is, compost, chicken manure and leaf mould, with the addition of comfrey which is made into liquid manure and used as a mulch. Al said that the whole thing could only work if you dedicated your life to it; it was evidently hard work and constant endeavour, but is obviously very satisfying and effective. I asked if seed and potting compost had been mentioned. They have big builders’ 1-tonne containers which they fill with leaf mould and leave it to rot – the reason for the containers is to minimise seed infiltration – this is used as seed compost and is very similar in texture to peat; and then they add comfrey fertiliser for potting on.

Anyway, Squiffany had her dancing class this afternoon, so Pugsley came to visit, then we all went to bounce on my bed, then I went through in time to watch In The Night Garden, which is a great treat for me, before I left Ro and Grandpa reading bedtime stories. “Ro” confided Squiffany to me “is my favourite boy.”

And the real news of the day, which I am now allowed to mention, is that our daughter El and son-in-law Phil are expecting their first baby in August. They emailed us the scan today – it made us go all peculiar, in an exceptionally happy way.

15 comments on “Growing

  1. Kitchen Witch

    Congratulations. šŸ™‚

    And the gardening thing sounds very interesting – if only one had that much time available for it, I would love to be completely self-sufficient. As it stands, eggs and veg will have to do. There are only so many onions one can grow!

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  2. Z

    You mean no one guessed a puppy?

    KW, Al said that the way they do it is the only way it would work – any less ground or hard graft and they wouln’t grow enough for their needs and any more and it would have to be done in a more commercialised way as it would be beyond them. As it is, they do have volunteers come and work, in return for their board, to learn all about it. I know I couldn’t keep it going, although I admire them for what they do.

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