Waiting for Wood

It’s a miserable day outside, not very motivational weather. I’m having problems with my motivation at the moment, I think it’s mostly to do with the fact that I’m a complete night owl and never go to bed ‘on time’. On time being a reasonable time that most others would go to bed. It really messes the start of my day up as I find it hard to drag myself out of bed and stay up.

So I’m changing my habits as of today. Think of it as a nod to the leap year, today being 29th of Feb and all. A chance to mark the day when I started working harder and getting some sort of consistency and routine in my life! Working from home is great, but you have to be about six million times more committed and self-discplined than normal in order to really make it work. I’ve been naughty and spend far too much time floating around daydreaming.

So this is how it goes – I get up, I stay up and I get my work done in the mornings. I eat a proper home-made lunch and then the rest of the day is mine for doing something fun but constructive. Goodness knows the Smallest Smallholding has been in a state of stasis for weeks now, completely and utterly down to me. I tried digging some more of the larger veg plot, but my back problems (thanks to falling halfway down the stairs and landing smack on my back) of late haven’t helped. So I have to do little and often, which can be a drag. Oh but listen to me! Moan moan moan! Come on woman! Sort it out!

So, the plan is that when I’m paid early next week, we’re going to take a trip to get some (FSA sourced) untreated wood and start constructing a proper container for our compost. It currently sits under the Dogwood, suffocating all the runners that have previously threatened to take over the whole of mid-Bedfordshire. But every the compost heap grows out of all control, so actually accessing the really nice compost is difficult. Plus it looks very unsightly, and although I understand so many things in the Smallest Smallholding have to be very functional, there’s nothing wrong with making them look pretty too (I’m a girl, give me a break). Another job is to finally but another border around the second veg plot that was dug out last year. I started my veg experiment with two tiny plots – and everything apart from my chantennay carrots (carrots are actually pretty hard to grow! Plus, I sowed them far too late) were a veritable success.

I’m also going to either buy the wood for my greenhouse staging or be a bit naughty and just buy it. I really really really want to get going with my seed sowing, everything is ready and waiting – compost, seed tray, loo rolls for sweet peas, potatoes chitting – so I just need somewhere to put it all. I haven’t even bought my flower seeds yet, although I’m going to try and beg, steal and borrow as many cuttings as I can, and use my own seed collections. Even just thinking about it gets my brain whirring and the seratonin pumping – my seashell cosmos that I grew from seed last year were a veritable success, and very popular with the bees well into November. I’m also going to brave the wind and dullness today and get some long-awaited shredding done. But first – as I promised myself, work first, play later!