Requiem for an allotment

Just when you thought that the news couldn't get any more grim, what with the horror of Brexit and Trump updates being farted out into the ecosystem on a daily basis, here I am to throw another chainsaw of misery into the spokes. We've given up our allotment.

Yeah, I know. Big stuff. Take a breath, sit down, do whatever you need to. Stabilise yo self. Alright? Good.

The thing is, despite my previous assertion that having a new baby and keeping an allotment shouldn't have to be mutually exclusive enterprises, this has not, for us at least, proven to be the case. It turns out that having been at work all day I didn't really want to go and do the weeding in preference to taking part in Zosia's bedtime routine. It also turned out that when the weekends came by I was far more interested in going on a trip out, or to see friends with Kasia and Zosia than I was in sowing green manure. As you can see from the pic above, by September things were starting to look pretty shabby, and we just didn't have the time nor the inclination to do anything much about it.

But while this little patch of Benwell Allotments is now dead to us, it very much lives on as we were able to pass it on to a couple who live locally and who have kids who seemed keen when I showed them round. On both the occasions we've taken over allotments there was a vast amount of work to do just to get things up and running, as each plot had been neglected for years. It was nice to be able to hand this one over with it needing nothing more than a good weeding in order to get started, and with some harvestable crops still in the ground.

We'll defo be looking to get back into the allotment game in the future, maybe when Zosia is old enough to take an interest and perhaps even help a bit. In the meantime, we've said that we'll concentrate on keeping our garden at home in tip-top shape next year. Maybe I'll grow some veg in the borders or in containers, or put in a raised bed.

Anything that happens in that department will be chronicled here, as will the odd restaurant review.

The very last time I ever went up to the allotment to tidy up a bit for its new custodians I noticed that the Victoria Plum tree we've been growing for years, first at our old plot at Nunsmoor, and then here after digging it up and replanting, finally produced some edible fruit. Only a handful mind, but after waiting for five years you take what you're given. I tried one on the way back down to the house. It was deliciously bittersweet, which seemed appropriate in the circumstances.