Golden purslane wins the super speedy seed award – it was up the next day. I also have swedes (about 30 by the looks of the tray) and chicory and marketmore cucumbers. I’ll have a happy hour of fiddling about with seedlings tonight – they are so wispy I’ll need my sweetcorn fork to get them out without causing carnage…

The Barbie bed has been filled, manured, and planted with sweetcorn, garlic, beans and beetroot. In today’s cold they all look quite depressed to be there, but the balcony looks a lot less crowded! I’ve staked my balcony garlic, which had decided to lie down, though it’s nowhere near ready.

The boards for the next bed have been thoroughly greenified ready for putting in place when this week’s woodchip delivery happens.

I ditched a couple of chard triffids to make way for the rest of my beetroot, only to find an ENORMOUS red ant nest where the triffids were – cue Red Ant Dance and colourful language. I also stuck some leftover Duke of York spuds in a pot with lots of manure and hopeful thoughts. (please, please, no blight this year!) The final addition this week is my doyenne du comice twig, which is now in a bigger pot and might give me fruit in about 4 years… Next time I’ll fork out for an older tree I think. I have very little patience…My quince doesn’t seem to have set fruit this year – mebbe at 2 years it’s too young? *heads off to check on the internet*

PS I had my first strawberry today – delicious!