Here we all are, sittin' in a rainbow...

Yesterday was perhaps the First Day of Spring.  I think it's my favourite day of the year, because it means that winter, with its miserable cold, rainy, long days is on the way out.  I like snowy winter days, yes, but I love seeing the daffodils and spring flowers starting to grow and make the green grass that little bit more colourful.  To be fair to the British weather, I am pretty sure we've had a few nice days recently but yesterday gets the title because it was actually a Lazy Sunday, the nicest day of the week and best day to enjoy spring.

And we totally enjoyed it.

The morning cranked into gear with a little dog walk alongside the riverside walk, past the old Jarrold Printing Press and Cow Tower. I was having fun playing with my camera and taking photos of the new buildings and old city wall while Gav made Pepper a little crazy and sent her off running amongst all the flowers.  I really love blue-sky-days and think that they make wherever you are just a little bit better than normal.  I especially love walking along where we are - we're lucky that we've got the Cathedral on our doorstep and lots of really quite beautiful buildings nearby that make the daily walk a little bit more interesting.  Norwich is my adopted home town and it keeps on providing me with new little gems that I didn't know existed before - I'd been living here eight years before I really discovered the riverside walk.  While it's no mammoth trek through fields it's a nice wander with ducks, swans and a little bit of history (not to mention a few memorable pubs, but this was a morning walk we took so the only hairs of the dog we encountered were Pepper's own) along the way.  

With all this blue sky, the allotment was calling.  Well, it called Gav at least.  He headed off after brunch, dressed to dig.  Pepper and I moseyed on up an hour or so later, having spent a little time making sure our hair was pretty and looking at the photos we'd taken.  She's such a poser, honestly.  Any day now she's going to get all Mariah Carey on me and start telling me which side is her best, but for now she's happy to work for tidbits and affection.  

We found Gav hard at work and busy creating his own little store of dirt.  The grand plan is to clear out our allotment and remove all the carpets that had been left by the previous tenants.  Once we've done this then we'll rotovate (that's the royal 'we' and mostly means 'Gav'll play with a big petrol powered toy and dig up lots of dirt') before we start the fun stuff and start growing all our food and really living the good life.  I didn't want to get too involved in this dirty work so set myself the task of cutting up some bramble bushes that were threatening to take over our carpeted allotment.  We have some nice 'before' and 'after' pictures, to show you the fruits of our labours:

The pile Gav started with... I think he was digging for treasure.

Gav's dirt store.  This will be emptied to fill in the  pond and then filled with some smelly muck that'll give us the best tomatoes you've ever had.

Bramble-tastic

The sun came out to celebrate my clearing.  It was impressive, I tell you!

A strawberry shaped bird feeder found on our digs.  Our allotment will be sponsored by Kath Kidson.

Of course, no allotmenteering is complete without a visit from the BEAMs. Our little helpers came and encouraged some worms to live in our allotment by mushing up the mud just outside.  I'm pretty sure that one day soon I'll get those little wellies marching up and down to aerate the soil and get all sorts of creepies and crawlies to come and help our garden grow.  As long as I provide their mum with some extra washing powder, no doubt!!!

Sadly all lazy Sundays must come to an end.  Ours ended with a nice little wander with Pepper dog on Mousehold.  Have I mentioned how awesome Norwich is?  There's a giant heath waiting for dogs to explore and kids to race dirt bikes on.  We set our little four legged friend free to run in the forest and chase squirrels and look for frogs before we headed home to rest and be happy.  

Flirting with February

It'd appear that we're already in mid February - goodness me how did that happen!! There's always such emphasis on January starting and resolutions forming, I think February gets a little bit forgotten about. It is such a short month, after all...but still quite important.

After two years of waiting, we finally got our allotment at the end of last year. Last weekend, Gav donned his heavy gloves, grabbed an axe and disappeared into the heath. To tackle the brambles from our neighbouring allotment, and trim some dead wood from the little apple tree that I will spend my summer relaxing in the shade of while reading a nice book, of course!!

This is all what makes February exciting, the preparations for summer are starting all over. Every day as I leave work recently someone has said "it's nearly 5 o'clock...and still nearly light out!" until yesterday we could triumphantly claim 5 o'clock had indeed passed but we were enjoying daylight (albeit sunsetting) hours. When we're out walking Pepper (nope, not bored of that chore yet) you can see the snowdrops and other bulbs making their presence felt and it feels like the daffodils are just around the corner. I found myself in a garden centre pondering exactly what we should grow - I feel some onions, potatoes and beetroot are likely candidates, alongside my obligatory field of tomato plants. I am sure that we will get totally over excited and then learn the hard way about what actually works on our little patch of ground but I am looking forward to working with the seasons again and getting into a natural rhythm of digging, planting, tending and eventually harvesting the results of all our hard work. After several years of working hard, especially through the summers, when Gav would temporarily relocate to living in a truck on the road, I am very excited about spending the summer together and hopefully encouraging our healthy active lifestyle that we know we really want. We're also very pleased to have seen another little dog running about on the allotment so our newest family member will be able to enjoy our patch too; I'm hoping that she'll be a great scarecrow in the crucial seed-planting stage.

Talking of Pepper, she's doing great. Pepper has settled nicely into our home and perhaps a little too nicely into our sofa. She's going to be a lot of fun this summer and plenty of excuse for us to go out and play on the beach or the Broads in coming months. If anyone knows how to make a dog chase things though, we'd appreciate any tips you have...