Saturday

Good morning, everyone.  It's too early to tell but BBC weather tells me that today will be nice and sunny although not necessarily all that warm.   OK by me!

Yesterday was a day of two halves.
In the morning the lovely Sharon arrived, mask on, to sort out my and Beth's hair.  Oh, it was lovely!  Because it had grown longer than I'm used to, I was able to slightly change the style and I'm very, very happy with it.  We're back to six weekly appointments now, assuming all remains well.
Poor Sharon has been working her socks off and she said it's lovely to keep being greeted with delighted faces and welcoming words.  She's everyone's favourite person right now and I can understand why.

As Beth left afterwards, in came my students.  It was another assessment session, this week focusing on verbal reasoning and writing and now I know exactly what we need to start on.  They've very useful, these assessments.

It was a dear friend's birthday today.  Because she is shielding (and will be doing so for the foreseeable future, for health reasons), I wasn't able to see her, but I dropped a clean, wiped-over-with-anti-bac-stuff gift and card from me and Beth before stopping off at the allotment nearby to check it and pick some broad beans.

All's well there.  The yellow courgettes aren't big enough to cut yet but give them four or five days and some warmth and they will be.  Cheesy courgette fritters - mmmmmmm.  The beetroots are coming on, the corn isn't quite as high as an elephant's eye but it's doing its best to get there and there are flowers on the runners. 
We're leaving the rhubarb now.
As for the apples and pears - wow!

It's all going well at home too.
I've cleared the strawberries now, apart from the ones I bought this spring, and will get new plants come the autumn.  The ones I put in the pot are doing extra well - they are long fruiting and also trailers, which I didn't realise when I got them.  There's definitely some fruit still to come here - even the runners are flowering!

In the meanwhile, I finally got round to planting the chilli plants out a short time ago (way too late but better than not at all, I guess), inspired by a rather lanky and feeble looking one that Dad's gardener, Colin, left in his greenhouse.  If it comes to nothing, no problem, but I think a bit of TLC will work wonders and there are three others, much smaller but looking healthy and starting to flower. 

The runners are starting to flower and as for the mini cucumber, I cut one and the next day there's another to take its place.  The skin can be quite tough but the actual insides are lovely, fresh and crisp.

I think I need to give everything a liquid feed today.  They can't run on empty, after all.

First thing, though, I'm off to Sainsburys because earlier in the week my jeans nearly fell down so I need to see if the next size down is a possibility and I like the jeans Sainsbury's sells.  A few other items may jump in the trolley as well, you never know!

I might stop off at B&Q and see if it's not too crowded.  One row of allotment potatoes has now been dug up and I was wondering if there's any available 'bedding' veg that could go in there.  There's room for a couple of rows of something.  It's worth a look, anyway, don't you think?

This afternoon, I need to tackle the front strip as it is very weedy again.

So it looks as if today will be very pleasant and, hopefully, I will sleep a bit better tonight.  Fingers crossed.

Be safe and stay well, everyone.  xx