Well finally the weather has cleared. It hasn't rained for a few days and the sun has even come out for the last 2-3 days. Just as well, as I was getting itchy feet to get started on preparations for the next growing season.
Yesterday and today I finally got around to building that cold frame from the old shower doors I found last week on a rubbish tip. Shame I can't show you a photo as I'm still camera-less. I'm rather proud of it! I'm not the greatest DIY man. You see when I was a lad my Dad fixed everything. He is very good with his hands. Anything he takes apart he puts back together. Believe me, he can take a nuclear power station apart and back together again! However, like many working people with little education, he is also not a good communicator. Whenever I asked him to show me how to fix my bike he'd very quickly loose patience and do it himself.
I have got better over the years, but results of any project I start a rather unpredictable. The coldframe project did come off satisfactorily though. Made entirely of recycled material: 4 old shower doors, some old wooden doors and other miscellaneous bits of discarded furniture and numerous old wooden poles previously used to support vines.
The whole thing is about 10 feet long, 3 feet wide and 2-3 feet deep (sloping) and seems to be holding together. I'm looking forward to filling it with compost and sowing my tomatoes, peppers, aubergines and all in there.
The land itself has benefitted from all that rain. The first lot of broad beans is flowering and getting over the damage inflicted by the winds. We're starting to pick Tuscan black cabbage and broccoli and everything is looking in good order. Roll on spring!
8 comments:
There's something really satisfying about making things out of old bits and pieces. Our doghouse (part of the old house in the garden) was built out of odds and ends, old bits of wood, corrugated iron, hardboard, etc. It even has an old discarded bamboo blind, found under some rubble, cleaned up and cut to size.
I can't wait for Mr A to get back and clear the garden so we can start to think about vegetables this year.
Well done on the recycling!
Excellent Heiko!
It will be nice for you to have something for your starts. I'm glad to hear that your rainy weather has let up but it really wasn't necessary to send it our way. It has been raining pretty good here and with the ground still frozen we have all sorts of puddles and creeks.
Wish I could see your cold frame but I have a pretty good image of it in my mind and it looks fantastic...good job man.
That sounds like a really good cold frame. I'm envious, as mine is only about two feet square... a shortage of old window frames!
Lots of respect for everything! I hope to have something of a garden one day and grow things to eat. At the moment, I have a garden of about one square meter, but the thyme plant in it is doing fine.
The story about your handy dad was very good and recognizable. Maybe most dads are that way, of taking the things you try to build out of your hands to finish them themselves. Or maybe just yours and mine.
One day as a child I was building a wooden airplane and had sanded down the propeller. Then my dad wanted to blow away the sawdust. But that ended up right into my eye! I was half blind for a week. But do you think he learned something from this? Oh no! He's still the same. Last Saturday I was cooking onion soup for him, and still he has to circle round the stove, 'to help'. And in the end, somehow, it's always him finishing the things.
Keep Green! Greetings,
Martijn
Hi Heiko,
I have to say that I am getting ready for a meeting and had no time to even look at your blog...yet...but I came over to tell you how loudly you made me laugh with your comment on Mr. H's blog (about the possible implications of so much raw food). It had been a crazy hectic morning and your comment made me forget about it. So THANK YOU!
Ah yes, handy dads are good, but handy dads who can teach and then back off -- well, they're rare.
Good luck with the cold frame. We're still too wet to do much.
Your cold frame sounds perfect... good luck with your sowings.
ohh wish u had a camera, would love to see your project! i just garnered some windows via Freecycle... and was told there were more... a greenhouse will be my eventual plan!
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