catherine November 5th, 2009
Finally things are cracking along. Grateful thanks are due to Bridget, Catherine, Jackie, Laura, Monica, Pat, Philippa, and Ros, who all helped to put in place the new raised beds, fill them, and excavate the rubble in the second border filling the hole with soil. Together we shifted 11 builder’s bulk bags of soil and compost and about 8 cubic metres of rubble. Four more raised beds will now be ordered, so that each year group can have its own. There was a problem with the original potential supplier of the beds, so we had a rethink and ordered ones from Forth Resource Management which are made from pressure treated new railway sleepers. They look really brilliant and sturdy, and are ready for planting in the spring.
Thanks also to Xanthe Bird who helped me put roofing felt on the shed while we balanced on two tables, breaking all health, safety and insurance requirements…. All it needs now are replacement windows to make it secure.
Our mushroom seats and carved animals, chosen by last year’s P1 have come and look great. They will need to be concreted in, so that they don’t get stolen or heaved over the wall. And our B&Q donation of tools and garden materials has also arrived.
Photos to follow asap
catherine September 26th, 2009
Things are moving ahead very slowly in the garden, but they are moving ahead!
- Our grant from the G&H Roberts Community Trust, has enabled us to buy some quality topsoil for our raised vegetable beds. Nine builders bags full have arrived, and we are just waiting the arrival of some of the raised beds which are expected shortly.
- Our grant of £350, from Edinburgh Rotary Club is going towards mushroom seats for the garden. These were chosen by Mrs Macmanus’s P1 class last year and they are now on order; they include five mushroom seats of varying sizes, and as a bonus, a wooden owl, and a wooden hedgehog, all to go in wildlife border.
Please see the St Mary’s Thanks… page for details of the ways in which many people have been very generous with donations of their time, funds and materials.
What next? Well, our wheelbarrow was stolen during the holidays, and we just await the arrival of a new one so we can barrow the topsoil into the new raised beds. Soon a skip will arrive and the next job is to clear the rubble from the second area.
catherine August 27th, 2009
Back to a new term! In the holidays we were lucky to receive two more awards. We received £250 from the G&H Roberts Community Trust, and so we now have all the funds we need to install raised beds for growing veg. We have also been awarded a B&Q One Planet grant of £213 worth of materials from the store in Easter Road - this includes some masonry paint and woodstain for the shed, some guttering so that we can run water from the shed roof into the water butt and some tools and other gardening equipment. [photo of these to follow when collected]
Unfortunately, vandals broke all the shed windows during the holiday….c’est la vie.
The pumpkin plant sowed by Mrs Williams’s primary 1 class last year is rampaging out of its pot and is covered with flowers, so fingers crossed for some actual pumpkins!
catherine July 7th, 2009
Just heard that the school will receive another grant from a trust towards the purchase of topsoil. The cheque is being sent to the school. Details to be confirmed.
catherine June 26th, 2009
The holidays are nearly here! Our raised beds still haven’t arrived, and we are awaiting the results of a grant application which might enable us to buy compost and topsoil to put in them. The mushroom seats which we will be able to buy with the Rotary Club grant will go at the end of the wildlife border so this will stay as it is until these arrive as they will probably have to be concreted in - we can then plant things round them and get this end of the border looking really great. If we are successful with other grant applications we have made, we will be able to buy some ferns and other plants.
Although it sometimes doesn’t seem as if there’s been much progress as we wait for funds and materials, things are moving slowly on. Two Catherines dug out the old pond liner as it had been filled with rubble and pretty much collapsed. It was a very smelly job…. Now a new liner can go in, and then perhaps we will have frogs again. The pumpkin plants that Mrs William’s class grew are doing well, despite the best efforts of a fox to dig one of them up last night! The broken window on the greenhouse has been fixed with the help of a donation of perspex from freecycle, and the felt is going on shortly.
catherine June 20th, 2009
Although the school garden is quite small it is full of wildlife. We have visiting urban foxes at night who can sometimes also be seen in the neighbouring allotments, plenty of birds, and the wildlife border is crawling with bugs and beetles. At the moment it is especially full of seven-spotted ladybirds. These are the most common ladybird in Europe, and as well as being beautiful they are a really useful insect if you are growing vegetables because they eat aphids which are a garden pest.
catherine June 19th, 2009
The brilliant greenhouse is very nearly finished, (pic to be uploaded) but Mrs Buist needs more bottles for the roof. Please don’t forget to bring in your 2l bottles and help finish it off.
John Renwick Roofing have generously donated the roofing felt for the shed, so it shouldn’t be long before we can put all our Morrison’s voucher tools safely away.
The bark path is gradually creeping towards the end of the wildlife border. We will be able to spend the money we have received from Edinburgh Rotary Club on some lovely mushroom seats and as this money is going to stretch further than first anticipated Mrs MacManus’s P1 class have chosen a couple of other little surprises, to be revealed later in the summer…
catherine June 10th, 2009
 Tiny pumpkin plant - will it be ready for Halloween?! |
The pumpkin seeds that Mrs Williams’s class planted have sprouted and were big enough to plant, so one of them is now gracing one of the whisky barrels. |
catherine June 2nd, 2009
Today the shed went up. We have some tools which we got with Morrisons vouchers and from freecycle and now we have somewhere to put them! We just need some roofing felt…
There was more backbreaking work involved later on when Fiona Fitzgerald borrowed a post office van and came up to Hermitage of Braid with her colleague Brian Anderson to collect some more logs for edging the path. Jess the cat was hiding in the back, and frankly not much use.
 Fiona and Brian |
 Lots of logs |
