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We've spent our Sunday afternoon digging. Spring is a long time away, but in the hopes of being prepared we are getting the garden beds ready.

There were little hands and little helpers, all of which needed essential marshmallow and fizzy juice type fuels to keep going*. You can see the cast aside spade in the background.

The beds were in a sorry state. When we built them, I was concerned about stale water sitting in the base, so the beds were lined with newspaper . I thought I was being incredibly sustainable and respectful of the soil as a living organism. I forgot to consider that plants grow both up and down. The surrounding trees discovered the cornucopia we had built for them, sending up masses of roots, and stripping the soil. Three years later, after wrestling with root bound beds, our afternoon was spent digging out a bed, laying down some weed mat and then filling it up again.

Our compost heap has been decimated and carefully layered into the refilled bed. Next on the list is to gather together some luscious organic sheep cr*p and dags to give the soil a bit of a help along. At the rate of one bed a weekend, we might just get there in time for September planting.

*I was having doubts about sharing our adventures as it's not a typically wholesome adventure and probably wouldn't get into the pages of a high class parenting magazine anytime soon. Little E even ran off with the camera in order to capture the wonder of her purple and pink toes nails. I might be tempted to say that we drank home made lemonade and ate oatmeal cookies, but I finished the lemonade myself the night before and prefer my oatmeal served as porridge.

It's funny that I should be second guessing the sharing of our adventures on the basis that they are not fashionably eco enough. Yes, I paint my daughter's toes (fantastic sugar free coaxing) yes, we drink fizzy on special occasions and yes, the kids had a great time, outside in the ever so brief winter sun. All round it was a great time and quite honestly, next sunny weekend, we'll be lining up to do it again.