The last two months have flown by! But there is certainly a lot still to be done. Also, it is National Allotment week. So, Happy National Allotment week! What have you been doing on your plot this week?
Our plot of tomatoes had become unruly, it has been quite windy in England over the last week so we have had to take some extra precautions. Our plants have become quite heavy with side shoots poking out here, there and everywhere. We tied up the heaviest parts and then tied the supporting sticks to one another for extra support.
I cut off the smaller side shoots and planted them to see how well they would take. They all rooted, so I moved the shoots into another plot. More tomato plants for no extra cost! I doubt these will get to the same size as the other plot of tomatoes, but they have already started to produce fruits.
The bean archway also managed to survive the winds of this past week. Thomas tied up each side so that it wouldn’t flap around in the wind. It worked a treat, but the archway has started to sag because the beans are becoming too heavy for the poles we used. A rookie mistake we have learnt from.
It was tied up to a box of rocks and the shed 
The beans will be ready to pick in a few weeks
We have four cucumbers that are almost ready to pick! They’ve done so well, I wish we had another plant. The cucumber, along with the tomato plants were given to us when we first got the allotment.
I’ve sorted the plethora of seeds we were given into order of month to plant. I now know what we do and do not have,so it made it much easier when I was buying seeds earlier this week. I went to a garden centre on Monday and they had a massive half price sale on all of their seeds! They actually ended up working out at about 75% off instead of 50%, which is a bargain. I may have to purchase a few more. I tried to pick unusual varieties of vegetables we wanted to grow next year. There were some seeds that I couldn’t find there, such as; lemon cucumber, purple carrots, red brussel sprouts and purple broccoli. I think I will probably have to buy most heirloom seeds from specialists online.
New additions
I also found a few other plants in the sale to fill up our bee friendly border. I picked up two large purple salvias and some pansies. Most of the pansies ended up in a hanging basket as I thought they were better suited there, they also add a nice pop of colour against the purple shed.
The white campanula finally opened 
Unfortunately, most of our leafy greens have failed. The only thing that did well was the lettuce. The kale, broccoli and cabbages have all failed. I think they may have gone into root shock. These were also kindly given to us when we first got the allotment, but they have barely grown since we planted them. We have been prepared for some plants to fail, but it is still sad that they didn’t survive. These will be ripped up and more lettuce will be planted.
Here’s to the next month on our allotment!