More locally-grown goodness

This year has been a bumper year for apples and pears apparently. Ijust made this tart with pears picked from a neighbour’s garden last weekend. Amazing what you can grow in n4…

…supper

Ottolenghi tomato galette (home-grown tomatoes and chilli) and green salad (with office-grown green beans).

Harvest…

I grew these!

Something good is happening (slowly): my 10:10 story so far

I wrote this post when on holiday a couple of weeks ago. Am just getting round to posting it thanks to the fantastic innovation of my new flexi-time half-day which I am dedicating to time-banking and Transition stuff. Best decision I’ve made in ages.

Nearly eight months ago Oliver and I travelled by train from London to Copenhagen. On the return journey, inspired by the conversations we had had and the people we had met, I made ten pledges for 10:10 which I posted on this blog. Since the spring I have been very quiet on this site. There are two main reasons for this. One is that I increasingly find that away from my job I derive more and more pleasure from activities that do not tie me to screen: working outside, making and repairing things, cycling, meeting and talking to people. The second is that when I am at my computer I tend to have a long list of other tasks to do, many arising from the pledges, and the blog rarely receives my attention.

But now I am on another train, this time cutting right across the south of France, and with five hours to kill and no access to Internet this seems like a good time to take stock.

Urban container gardening

I repotted the this houseplant in some of our compost. There seems to be a pumpkin making a bid for freedom!

Getting set for spring: preparing to plant

This month’s 10:10 theme is all about planting. We’ve been joining in by fixing up the balcony for spring. We’ve massively increased the growing space this year by adding the trellis and shelves on the south wall to raise the troughs into the sunlight. So hopefully we’ll have a bigger harvest than last year.

All of the stuff we used on our balcony was either recovered from the street or recycled from previous projects in the flat (replacing the boiler for example). So the total cost was about £20 for some brackets and other such bits and pieces (screws, hinges etc.). More pictures in the photostream in the sidebar.

Meanwhile the big question is what to plant. Fortunately eatseasonably has some handy tips.  I’m not convinced they’re that easy – I’ve almost killed last year’s mint I think from over-watering. But I’ll update regularly with our progress.

Our little attempts pale into insignificance next to this fabulous project in a social housing block in Paddington.  There are now 46 adults and 16 young people growing food in raised beds on a plot previously experiencing problems with anti-social behaviour and crime. Apparently the founder Mike Wohl started out with only two tomatoes. So who knows how quickly our ambitions will grow….

Me emptying the wormery

Ushering in the new (and blocking out draughts)

10/01/10 or 01/10/10 for our North American friends: an auspicious day for a first slightly belated 2010 10:10 post.

One reason why I’ve been a bit quiet is that over the Christmas break I was enjoying spending some time away from a computer screen getting on and doing things. Like repainting our hallway with half a tub of paint recovered from the street a few months ago and waiting to be put to good use (very satisfying). And in keeping with this year’s low carbon fun-for-free ethos spending plenty of time outside, despite the snow and ice (cycling to work has I  confess fared less well over the last few days…).

This is rubbish. Food for thought.