After the post on flood defences, we turn to the more positive topic of making compost. Three delivery containers make for a brilliant series of compost boxes. You will observe that the first is already filling up with garden refuse, rotting straw and raw vegetable matter from the kitchen.
We have had to buy compost for vegetable beds. It will not be many months before we shall have our own home-made material.
A favourite area at the nursery school is always the kitchen. It is understandably reassuring to children who are new to Mr Noah’s and especially to the youngest children. So at the weekend a new ‘room’ was created and equipped.
Also, it was apparent from a mere one week trampling of the reception area that bark would be more practical than the grass (becoming mud) surface.
It hardly seems possible that the long-awaited day is upon us. Everything is ready and some finishing touches have been applied on the eve of opening.
And it was right to suppose that there is a whole colony of fairies that have taken up residence.
Anticipating Monday when we open for our first session with children, final touches are being made. That does not mean that the nursery school site will be complete. There is a lot more work to be done over a period of time, but we must be ready for little people. It is like preparing the ground for sowing.
Here is some ‘no-dig’ ground preparation. First, the cardboard goes down to inhibit the growth of weeds. Then the multipurpose compost is heaped onto it and spread evenly. And we are ready!
Finishing touches are being applied. There are lots of little people’s gates and labels for the sake of literacy.
And look at the beautiful refurbished little benches.
After the months of work, a sit down and a little snooze seems like an attractive prospect, but there are children coming.
Today we were able to put our OFSTED registration certificate on the board. Having had the OFSTED site visit last Thursday, the necessary document arrived today. What a pleasure it was to pin it beside all the other documents!
The practical significance is that we will now be able to open to children, and the term will begin, albeit a month late.
The story began with poles. Then on top of them was constructed the framework for a roof. The bales just remind us that it is going to be a barn. The chickens were fascinated.
Then the roof was fixed, and the inside was filled.
Close scrutiny will reveal that the bales do not so much fill the barn as form walls. So you have to come and look inside.
It is a stage for a nativity play, a refuge from foul weather or a literacy corner. It can be anything you want it to be.
Teddy got there with his story books just in time for the visit of an OFSTED inspector.
The livestock have been on the site for months now. We hope the children will be present soon as well. But there are evidences of others too.
Who lives in these houses? Is a colony of fairies taking up residence?
Will the blue tits find the box that sits above the chickens?
And, almost completed, is this a place for a barn owl?
For the answer to the last question, just wait until you see the next post in this blog.
As we wait for the visit of an OFSTED inspector and being granted registration, attention is being paid to the garden.
There are planting beds for children to look after. Frames have been constructed from pallets, the base lined with card to deter weeds and then filled with compost.
A vegetable patch has been started with some radishes and lettuce. Wonderfully the seedlings were clearly visible within four days.
Then there is a handy rack for watering cans.
And speaking of watering, we persevere with what is supposed to be a quadrangle of grass. Water is being pumped up from the pond and sprinkled. Only very slowly grass is appearing.
So here is something else that is taking months.
Much has been going on over the weeks, but some projects take time before they are ready to be presented. An example is the paths that surround a square of green.
First, there was the path itself to be marked out and laid. Some suitably shallow steps lead up to the veranda.
Then came the materials for constructing fences.
Don’t miss the box plants that are going to grow into a hedge all around. (And the grass is beginning to take properly).
Now here is a section of the finished route around the plat.
At a university we would probably call it a quadrangle.
The making of a sandpit is a story in itself.
Digging a pit ought to have been easy, but it was not so. Sometimes the spade struck hard clay or stones, but what brought work to a standstill was a long piece of kerbstone, not horizontal but at an angle down into the soil. It was dug all around, but nothing seemed to shift it. Of course, eventually, it was removed, but it demanded some ingenuity.
Once obstacles had been excavated the hole was made square and a lining place in it.
Then it was just a matter of waiting for sand to be delivered. Those little plastic bags of play sand wouldn’t be anything like enough. When it came today, it was deposited like a giant sandcastle on the beach. (If only the children had been there!)
Some of it was removed to achieve the desired effect. The sand taken out amounted to a full sack. If four sacks were bought, how much sand is there now in the sandpit? See what maths opportunity has been missed by children not at nursery school today.
It will be like going to Camber Sands every day.