Gotta hurry up!

I have been looking at my old blog posts from this period last year and realise that at the same period I had done a hell of a lot! Much more than this year! And yet curiously enough the garden seems tidier. Maybe this is because of the very harsh winter we have had which killed off so much "dead wood", leaving the allotment quite desolate. Anyway I welcome it because it means that the weeds have not had time to take a hold, I will have a little more time to get the first planting in then concentrate on the tidying and preparation of the rest.
Yesterday I went down. Firstly the visit was dampened by the sobering news that one of the neighbours had passed away. One of the "old boys", his mates will be saddened to see someone else gardening his plot later in the spring.
Despite this, I did some work, a bit of pruning and tidying, more manure spreading (it's a long process!) and my masterpiece, I finally got around to building the elusive coldframe! Just a few tiles and an old showerscreen but it looks sturdy enough! I am so proud of it, and plan to keep surrounding it with covered pots etc to grow more things outside, as I feel the seedlings do better that way, they are hardy and vigorous. I am just hopeless at hardening off when I grow inside so best just to do most outdoors, except the real tenders of course. I will use it to seed brassicas, lettuce, beetroot (I will try two methods this year, in place and via seedlings as I am always disappointed with my crop), sweetcorn, herbs, flowers, maybe even spring onion.