5th May (written by Issy)

Dave has asked me to write this week's blog, and I wanted to use the opportunity to introduce a couple of sidelines that we have been working on. I thought it would be interesting to update occasionally to show the progress of these, but firstly, a bit of background.....

A couple of weeks ago I went back to Norway to see my parents, and the rest of the family. It was so nice to see them and I miss them so much being so far away. I have also missed skiing as being Norwegian, it is in my blood.

I was fortunate to get the opportunity to go skiing whilst I was there with my brother and his wife. Nothing too risky, just some gentle cross country skiing. Unfortunately I had a bit of an accident, and ended up on my bottom with a solid thump. The result was a badly bruised coccyx.

The reason that I am sharing this information is because it means that I am unable to be of much help on the field at the moment (at what is probably the busiest time of the year)

What I can do however is water (which has been needed), and if I'm standing upright, I can also do some planting. Which brings me at last, to the point of the sidelines that I have been working on

Firstly organic strawberries. Not a vegetable, but then strictly speaking nor is a tomato, and they are likely to be very popular

Dave's original plan for the change of lifestyle involved hanging baskets, and at one point he had bought a job lot of black plastic baskets. Not the nicest in my opinion, but easy to plant and who cares what they look like as long as the strawberries grow well. The thought is that being off the ground, they will not take space on the field, and the fruit will be away from anything that wants to take a nibble!

The other sideline is bedding plants in pots and baskets. There was a picture in a previous blog on 7th April of a basket that had just been planted

This is how they are looking now, probably about a month before they are ready

Not the same basket as the first one has geraniums in the middle, and the second has petunias, but it gives an idea of how quickly they are growing

What I've been working on this week is planting in pots. We have grown most of the plants from seed, with the exception of the calibrachoa and begonia which we get in as plug plants. We have tried to grow these from seed in the past and the results were dismal!!

Below is a selection of pots that have just been planted up, and we will share progress over the next few weeks

Back to Dave and the vegetables next week...