Sauce

Luke Skywalker is struggling to dig his allotment plot.
Obi Wan appears and tells him to "Use the forks, Luke! Use the forks!".

My kids obsession with Star Wars continues, so a run of silly made-up Star Wars jokes has been initiated, kicking off with:

Luke and Obi Wan are eating fish and chips.
Luke complains that his fish is dry.
Obi Wan says "Use the sauce, Luke! Use the sauce!".

Yesterday we managed to get up to the allotment as a family for a good hour or so. The sun made it a most pleasant experience. Our time was spent creating two raised beds for the kids: one 2' x 2' and the other 4' x 2'. Last year the kids missed having plots of their own, so these two little beds will become their focus for the growing seasons. The beds were populated with a couple of strawberry plants, some early sweetpeas, a rogue pea and a few lettuce plants. A sprinkling of a wide variety of quick-growing vegetables will soon follow over the coming weeks. Ever the optimist, my daughter expects to fit potatoes as well as *every* thing else in her 2' by 2'!

The harvest of the day was a bunch of daffodils.

Homegrown daffs - a mixed bunch

Busted

There's not been much allotment activity over the last couple of weeks due to a combination of bitterly cold winter and a Star Wars Jedi Academy birthday party for my now five year old son. Creating a life-sized Jabba the Hutt head and a Pin the Lightsaber on Yoda game took preference over digging and planting. So except for a tray of tomatoes, cucumbers and flat-leaf parsley being seeded & sprouting*, it's been very quiet.

I'd almost given up on the 5 pots of leek seeds that I'd planted on the 17th and 20th of February, but on Tuesday I came home to find a wealth of tiny seedlings pushing their weenie green heads through the compost. Nestled snugly in my four tier plastic greenhouse the little chaps looked in good health and I was felling warm, excited and quite pleased with myself in equal measures. The prospect of 3 or 4 rows of leeks would quicken the heart of any allotmenteer.

So coming home last night to find that a malicious supernatural wind had blown over my greenhouse** - not only crippling a tray of 5" tall sweetpeas, but decimating the whole collection of 60+ leek seedlings - was a cruel and heavy blow.

I tried in vain to save some - I have about 8 left in a pot and they look worse for wear.

So we start again from scratch... I've planted some more up in a few pots and now plan to plant some more in the coldframe up at the allotment in order to give them a headstart and attempt to play catch-up.


* My Hungerian Hotwax chilli peppers have so far failed to germinate :(
** Considering the greenhouse was weighed down at the bottom with some big heavy pots and a bag of compost I can only conclude it was a gust born of supernatural forces!

Q: What are long, green, scaly, have lots of teeth and used on stage by actors?

A: Propagators

The seeds we planted a fortnight ago - Witkiem Manita broad beans, Kelvedon Wonder peas, Percy Thrower and Spencer Special Mix sweetpeas, Little Gem, Saladin and Marvel of Four Season lettuces - have been doing great guns in our windowsill propagators. Photo of the peas and Little Gems shows the progress they've made.

Thing is, I don't really know what to do next and when. Is it safe for me to put some of these little chaps outside in my unheated mini greenhouse? Do I leave them in the propagator with or without the lid on? How big do the plants need to get before I get start transferring them elsewhere or putting them in the ground?

This is the problem with being a novice...