WE'RE BACK!!!!!!!

Yes, it's the start of another brand new year and already the children have been in the garden!

We all started school on Wednesday where I spent the afternoon digging up potatoes and doing a lot of weeding.  Mr Maldonaldo came up with Class 7  to have a look at the new pond (see below) and have a good look around.  They even adopted a vegetable patch to care for over the year and the other classes are also signing up to "Adopt a Veg Patch".  It will make my job a lot easier and the children will get more garden time too.

The tomatoes are doing well, but remain stubbornly green.

Thursday saw me patiently sorting out seemingly hundreds of photos of our past year in the garden and arranging them in a display ready for the Cookridge Horticultural Show tomorrow (Saturday) and making signs.  That seem to take ages but it was worth the effort.

Today, I took 6 children up to the garden and asked them to create a vegetable box and a display of herbs for the Show.  They were like children in a sweetshop, not knowing where to go first - the pond, the tomatoes, everywhere!  They helped water the tomatoes, and then picked quite a few for the box.  Cobie and Shazanna filled a school tray with straw while the others arranged the tomatoes, potatoes and rhubarb in the middle.  We then suddenly realised that the vine in the polytunnel had grapes, so we plucked a few bunches and then headed to the blackberry bushes and picked blackberry, blue berries and blackcurrants. I was rather pleased with what we managed to muster considering our abysmal summer and our failure to really grow anything due to the rain and the various anthropods that consider our garden a rather desirable residence! Then for a decorative flourish, they decorated the edges with herbs. 

After they were happy with the Veg Box, they set about the herb display where they made posies of various herbs and arranged them in a small wicker basket, before heading into school and gave our creations an impromptu tour of the school including Mrs Bailey's office!  Then they made a couple of labels for the Veg Box and Herb Basket announcing themselves as the artists and which school they attended.

So now the veg box, herb display and photos are sitting on my kitchen counter awaiting delivery to the Church tonight (2pm at the Cookridge Methodist Church, Tinshill Road, Cookridge) and tomorrow I will go up and see if we've won anything.  Last year, we got 2nd for our Veg Box and a couple of the children won prizes for their handwriting, so fingers crossed. Watch this space on Tuesday when I'll have photos of the (award winning?) Veg Box and herb display.