This week we had a very special surprise for the children – a new grown up! Now that we had taken out all the old vegetable beds, it was time to put in some new ones but we needed someone who could teach us about the tools and techniques that would be needed. Tara’s dad, Ronnie came to help and brought with him some tools which we had not used before. We got busy immediately by carrying the long planks of wood down the path and lying them down ready. Ronnie showed us how to cut smaller pieces of wood to make anchors for our new beds. He then showed the children how we make holes in the wood with a battery-operated drill before showing us a strange tool which we did not recognise. It was a hand drill! Ronnie demonstrated how to use the hand drill and then each child took turns to drill a hole into the wood. We were then shown how to mark wood so we could attach the anchors into the correct place before hammering them together. Hammering was hard work but everyone worked together to ensure all the nails were secured into position. It was then time to drop the wood into place to create our first vegetable bed.

Aubrey was amazed by the hand drill and asked Ronnie to make a hole in the conker she had collected. Ronnie held the conker in position and another child skilfully placed the hole into the conker. Aubrey decided she would like to make a conker necklace and began emptying her pockets. Out came one conker, then two, then three and before we knew it there was a mound of conkers on the floor ready for holes. Once complete, Aubrey was thrilled with her conker necklace. As our vegetable bed began to take shape, some children helped to clear our pumpkin patch whilst others helped to clear out the old rhubarb, even creating rhubarb leaf hats as they did so!