Blog – Page 23 – Small Plot, Big Ideas

Time for an update but there’s no good news…

As it turns out there is no such thing as a smooth house move. This is not entirely unexpected news based on my previous experience of house moves and the general anecdotal evidence. However the really disappointing aspect for our particular situation is that everything had gone smoothly up to this point and over 2 months had passed.

It now seems that, although we have done everything asked of us, the mortgage company do not really want to lend us the money. There is still an outside chance that they will come back with a revised decision in the next day or two but if I’m honest I don’t hold out much hope for that!

The sequence for our mortgage application went something like this:

Existing customer porting existing mortgage deal – not a problem
Mortgage affordability – not a problem
Loan to value – not a problem (less than 50% being borrowed)
Full structural survey of the property – not a problem
Mortgage deal offered – No

I wish I could sum up what the problem is with our application but even though I’ve asked a number of times there is never a clear definitive answer. There is some mention of the fact that there are 2 title deeds that make up the whole property and also mention of the agricultural land but according to our solicitor neither of these points should be enough to refuse a mortgage deal.

Unfortunately we had a similar response from our initial enquiries with another high street lender so it sounds like most “ordinary” lenders don’t want to be bothered with any mortgage deals that involve anything out of the ordinary.

The upshot is that in these difficult financial times meeting the lender’s stated criteria for affordability and risk is just not enough to get a mortgage offer.

So we keep our fingers crossed that Plan B (a mortgage consultant) can find us someone who will offer us a mortgage so we can save the deal. In the meantime, we continue to wait in a kind of “no mans land” where there seems little point doing anything major to our current garden and veg beds – it’s hard to generate any enthusiasm at the moment even for the small jobs!

I’ll just keep reminding myself that the glass is half full and there are plenty of other people worse off than us!

A grand day out!

A couple of weeks ago I spotted on the North Pennines AONB Twitter account (@NorthPennAONB ) that there was a Walling Taster Day on Sat 13 April. It seemed like a good idea for a day out and an interesting change from the usual routine so I booked up a couple of places.

Life is a journey

The journey over was fascinating as (I think) we crossed from Tynedale to Weardale then to Teesdale which was the final destination. I’m not completely sure though as we did end up on a slightly unplanned route.

Going over the tops between each valley quite clearly illustrated the differences between the higher ground which still had some relatively large snow banks left by the ploughs and the greener, almost spring-like valleys.

Walling for dummies

The whole event was very well organised and was run by Peter, a reassuringly competent and knowledgable instructor who really knew his stuff. The fact that there was a small group of only 6 people meant that everyone was able to get some one to one guidance from time to time.

It was quite daunting at the start when we took down the section of wall we would be working on but once that part was done it was much easier to understand the principles behind the construction of these walls.

I won’t go into all the details about wall constructions and the terminology for each part, if you’re interested they are running more walling taster days. I would definitely recommend them to anyone with a slight interest in them and certainly if, as we will shortly, you own some walls that may need repairs from time to time.

We feel confident enough after that one day to think about mending a few small broken sections of our own, at least if that falls down we can just have another go!

By lunchtime the first half of the wall was in place and looking good to out untrained eyes at least. This picture doesn’t really do it justice though due to the angle when taking the photo. It looks quite a short section of wall here but when measured the section we actually worked on was around 4 metres long!

I wasn’t sure that we would finish by the stated time of 4pm, especially when a small extra section fell down of its own accord not long after we had started. Luckily no more collapsed and we were able to safely build up the wall to fit in very nicely with each side of the gap we made.

I’m sure that a skilled Waller would probably have had a fit when they saw our results but to me at least it looked convincing enough. It was clear of the trampled ground which section we had worked on but when I looked up and down the rest of the wall it seemed to fit in beautifully, in fact some sections were much worse than our amateurish attempt.

Knowledge is good

A most enjoyable day out and although I wouldn’t want to try to build whole wall from nothing, I definitely I came away with more knowledge than when I started. I’m looking forward to my next attempt at some walling

For anyone who may be interested, here is a link to the next Walling Taster Day being run by the North Pennines AONB

A chitting dilemma

I’ve seen on various blogs that other people have started to plant out their seed potatoes. As a result I knew it wouldn’t be long before I would be able do the same for my first batch.

They are looking fairly impressive to my untrained eye and, even allowing for the fact that my small veg garden being roughly at a latitude of 55° North, the weather is getting noticeably warmer lately.

One advantage of living close to sea level is the difference in temperature with higher inland areas. This is more noticeable to me of late as we expect to move to a new property in the near future which is 1000 feet up in the North Pennines!

There is another, slightly larger batch of seed potatoes which have made almost no sign of progress. Presumably this is because the first batch were brought into the (centrally heated) house where the others were left on the (unheated) garage window sill.

My dilemma though is whether I can hold off on planting all of the seed potatoes until we move to the new property. Alternatively perhaps I should plant the more advanced ones to save any risk of losing them or damage to the shoots.

This decision complicated partly because I’m always too eager to get things planted but also because we really need to “clear the decks” in preparation for the move so this first batch might well be safer in the ground anyway!

I suspect that the first batch will have to get planted this weekend so that I can get a small amount of planting gratification. Hopefully the second batch will eventually come to life over the next 4-5 weeks so that I can take them with us when we move and plant them as the first job at our new place.

Thoughts of a first time writer

Home Farmer - May 2013 — Home Farmer – May 2013

It may not seem like much to some people but my first ever published article appeared in the May 2013 edition of Home Farmer magazine. It was a fairly low-key start but still something that I’m irrationally proud of and if I can come up with some more ideas there maybe there will be more to follow!

Having read through the published article, I am coming to terms with the many improvements I think I could have made. I’m sure that this is quite common though and I plan to use this as motivation if / when I write anything else in the future.

It is definitely better to spend a little more time writing it in the first place and not agonising over what might have been done differently after publication!

The single best tip for beginners like me seems to be “write about what you know” and that’s why my article was about the decisions and dilemmas of downsizing and buying a smallholding. The whole subject is still very fresh in my mind and we have learned so much just getting to this stage.

It is all too easy to believe that you have nothing to contribute or that everyone else knows more than you. After spending the last couple of years hunting for a property with land to buy I still can’t claim to be a complete property expert but I feel that I have something to say which may help other in the same predicament as me.

Time has moved on since I wrote that article though and we expect to complete our move to a property with lots of land in the next 5-6 weeks. As a result I think my next article might be on topics like “coping with panic attacks” or “natural remedies for insomniacs”.

If anyone has any tips along these lines I would be most grateful…

There’s more than veg in the garden…

Sometimes I need reminding that there is more to the garden than just the productive (i.e. edible) parts that take up most of my time. It is good to remember that there are many other signs of life now that spring is approaching and I think it is important (to me particularly) to acknowledge this sometimes…

Hellebores

I am particularly proud of that the hellebores have done so well in recent years. I’d like to take all the credit but I suspect that would be a little greedy even if I was the one who originally planted them some years ago.

Since that time I have occasionally remembered to mulch them and even sometimes trimmed off the older, dying leaves or weeded around them. However my guess is that my limited contribution is only a small part of their success.

Flowering Currant (?)

We have a few of these in one flower bed and I have spent the last 15 years calling them “Flowering Currants” because I thought they looked like that and never had any berries… until last year that is! Most unexpected but not the first time I have been wrong about a plant and probably not the last!

Mahonia

Apart from the occasional prune and a bit of weeding this has been left to itself over the years. It seems to prefer that kind of treatment because it has gone from strength to strength and I’m even tempted to take some cuttings so I can have some in the garden at the new house…

Winter Flowering Jasmine

One of the few plants I have added to the garden that I can remember the latin name – Jasminum Nudiflorum – so even though it hasn’t done spectacularly, I am still happy to see the bright yellow flowers each January / February.

And finally…

I think this is some variety of primula perhaps but I’m not always good at remembering the easy names. We must have moved this from another part of the garden into this spare chimney pot but I can’t remember where it was before. Perhaps we actually bought a few of these at a garden centre some time ago and the rest have died (or been pecked by the chickens)?

It has been surprisingly productive though and is still trying to put out flowers despite the cold spell and the apparent damage to some of the older leaves.

Early signs are encouraging

The rhubarb crowns that I planted in pots earlier are beginning to show signs of life although the fact that I originally planted one on its side probably didn’t help.

My excuse is that it wasn’t easy to figure out which way was “up” when I received the crowns through the post.

Luckily I had my doubts within a few days of the originally planting them and it was a quick thing to fix with hopefully no adverse effects on the growth and future cropping!

Although i planted both varieties in matching pots with the same compost, it’s the Stockbridge Arrow variety which is looking the best. Perhaps this is the result of using bubble wrap over that pot instead of the horticultural fleece which covered the pot with the Champagne variety?

Champagne rhubarb is not so promising (…yet)

These pictures really highlight the difference and if I wasn’t such an optimist I might have had thoughts of giving up on the Champagne variety.

However it’s still very early days and I’ve never grown rhubarb before so it makes more sense to keep an eye on it and let nature do what it does best.

They can be easily transported with us when we move house and I have no other use for those pots at the moment!

The cheap lettuce seeds I bought in the sales that were planted only last week are already showing promise which encouraged me to plant some more vegetable seeds this weekend. This even included some beetroot and peas in the garden veg beds which had been covered for a few weeks in preparation.

The cloches went straight back on again afterwards as well because the weather is unlikely to be in my favour just yet! I’m also choosing to ignore the fact that with any luck our house move will take place before these reach a suitable point for harvesting – the new owners can treat them as a house-warming present though.

I hope I don’t regret that in the future when I have too many plants and nowhere to put them. I can always give them away I suppose so watch this space in the coming weeks as there maybe a vegetable plant give away!

Just a few seeds planted

It was going to be a matter of principle for me this year to follow the general advice and wait patiently for the right time to start planting. I have read so many articles and books emphasising that it is better to wait one more week than to plant too early because it won’t affect the results too badly and planting too soon can be a big mistake.

At first this wasn’t too hard to do especially when we had a couple of spells with a few days of snow and some very low temperatures overnight. More recently it has been getting harder especially as I’m very aware that March is rapidly approaching – I happily choose to ignore the fact that I live in the North East, UK where spring comes a little later than most!

I had been doing so well but I eventually gave in to the temptation and opened some seed packets yesterday which I had bought over the last few weeks. We have had a few consecutive days of relatively good weather (for the time of year) plus I had prepared some seed trays which have been “warming up” in the house for the last few weeks.

This was only a very small sowing just to ease me in so only 1 tray has been used and no more than 10 of anything was planted. This first batch includes:

Onions from seed as I’ve only grown them from sets before
Beetroot because I’ve never tried growing that before
Squash because I’ve never tried it before (and I bought the seeds in a sale!)
Lettuce just because the seeds were cheap and I didn’t want to risk any other seeds yet

There’s not much to show for the effort yet of course but I’ve included a picture anyway and I feel more like spring is on the way at last.. (just until we get the Easter snow of course!)

A promising start to 2013

We are 2 months into 2013 and looking back now I can see that although things have progressed, there is still some way to go. My efforts are focused on avoiding potential mishaps or delays but I’m told that this is a form of negative thinking – Personally I’d rather be prepared if possible.

Now that we have our buyers in place, the paperwork in motion and mortgage dealt with we have been able to assess the chain of purchasers. This is pleasantly short with only three property sales involved and first time buyers at one end and our sellers moving into rented accommodation. There is always a faint worry about the chain collapsing somewhere else but the fact that there are so few links should help.

It felt a little odd to have a second viewing after our offer had already been accepted but luckily there was nothing of any great importance to put us off – not even the weather could dampen the enthusiasm for the future.

I have so far beaten my usual impatience and managed to hold off sowing any seeds but I think this week will see some seeds going into trays/pots indoors. For some reason I feel the need to get things moving especially if it encourages the arrival of spring but I know that anything planted out before moving house will be left for the new owners.

This year sees some new vegetables that I’ve not tried before so I’m keen to learn what will happen and at least I can take that knowledge with me even if the plants are left behind! I think a few beetroot and carrot will be the first phase but I’ll wait until this weekend before planting out the peas just to be certain the current cold spell is over. I’ll also be sure to keep some seed back for later so I can also try them when we get to the new place.

The 3 chickens are still laying intermittently with just an occasional “jelly” egg (perhaps once a week) which I think must be an egg with little or no shell on it. They are all in good health and are enjoying trashing the far corner of our garden now that some new fencing is in place to keep them there! I had expected a more noticeable slow down in egg production or even some days with none at all but so far we always get a couple – except when egg collecting duties are handled by an over enthusiastic 6-year-old.

Living up to the name

Today is exactly 1 year to the day since my first blog post and at that time the overall idea for Small Plot Big Ideas was still coming together in my head. A big idea or grand scheme is all very well but you need to start somewhere and all I had was a suburban garden, a small plot, so I made the best of what I had at the time. Looking back now I don’t think I really knew where the whole concept would lead but I always felt that I would know when I was making progress and that nothing was impossible (although some ideas have proved completely impractical!).

The internet is awash with excellent blogs from people with more growing experience and writing talent than me but I still felt like I had something to contribute. Besides a secondary purpose for my blog was always to act as a diary so I can look back on the highs and lows through the seasons. With my non-existent writing experience being roughly on a par with my limited vegetable growing it seemed an obvious solution to learn about both things as I go along.

There has been a great deal of progress over the last year with the focus on vegetable growing plus the introduction of the chickens. However I’m still very aware that we have barely scratched the surface in the world of smallholding and the knowledge we lack outweighs the knowledge we have gained so far.

Although the garden produce was always the main interest, I should confess that the blog might not have lasted so long if it wasn’t for WordPress. The beauty of blogging software like WordPress for me is that I can indulge my technical side with add ons (plug-ins) and themes for customisation if I want to but it’s always optional. As a system it separates the content from the presentation so I can change the look and feel without the need to wade knee deep in computer code or rewriting past scribblings.

So the big news on the first anniversary is that we have accepted an offer on our Small Plot and (fingers crossed) will be moving to our Big Idea in a couple of months. More by luck than judgement, it turns out that everything is still on course and recent events are roughly following the general theory – particularly the “big ideas” bit as we hope to take on 15 acres!

Exciting times lie ahead I’m sure even though the potential timing for the move will probably mean leaving some of this years vegetables in the garden at the old house (where pots can’t be used). That is a relatively small price to pay in my opinion and an unexpected bonus for the new owners when they move in!

Watch this space…

I’m not impatient, I’m following the instructions!

It does seem a little early in the year but my excuse is that I’m just following the instructions that were included with the box I had delivered from Marshalls Seeds. It is a little annoying that after you complete your order online they will not send anything until the time is right but I can see some sense in this and it certainly stops me getting ahead of myself!

In fact I could develop a liking for this annual delivery event and I can imagine that over time it will become yet one more sign at the start of each year that Spring must be heading our way.

Chitting tray — Chitting potatoes using every available space

This year’s box contained some seed potatoes – Swift – and the included instructions for these were very specific that these should be opened and set out for chitting as soon as possible after arrival.

Apparently the seed potato crop suffered badly with last year’s wet weather and I get the impression that they are worried about rot. Who am I to argue with the specialists and they provide cardboard trays for free so I might as well get it done.

I’m sure that I ordered the same sized small bag of seed potatoes as last year but I definitely got more in the bag this time around – perhaps that is an indication of the smaller size available this year? It remains to be seen whether the smaller sizes this year will be slower to get started or will produce a reduced yield.

Also included in this order was my selection of seeds to try out this year. When ordering these I tried to find interesting varieties that wouldn’t take too long to reach maturity so that even if we manage to sell the house and move, we might stand a chance of eating something that we harvest from the garden!

There is nothing more on order now so unfortunately, apart from getting in some seed compost, the garden shopping is done for the moment. I just need some warmer weather and longer days so I can get started!