From pallets to plates…

Bonne soirée cupcakes!
Well I started this blog straight after posting the last one (a couple of weeks ago) but then I got distracted… Hobbes wanted to go out, I got hungry, thought of a song and well, life ran away with me!

As I said in my previous blog, we were excited to make a big raised bed for our new edible garden (that I have been planning to start this year) and after scouring google, pinterest and blogs we decided we could make them for FREE! Well I say free- you need to buy the stuff to fill the bed with, paint to protect it etc but the actual bed we made for £0.00!!

 

I would like to point out before we start that Stephen was the genius behind this project, that why all the pictures are of him- I did a lot of holding, moving, sanding down and reassuring! I also painted it by myself but yeah, this is really Stephen’s baby, I’m just documenting it!

First thing you’re going to need is a lot of pallets- we picked up these from a warehouse round the corner!

Also I got this circular saw on ebay for £8 and luckily the owner only lived 5mins away as ebay can mean a big drive across London!

We started by taking apart the pallets (excuse my pesky finger getting in the way of that shot!)

This took a big hammer

Took out all the nails with hammers, pliers and sheer determination!

So we were left with two halves of a long pallet and lots of free wood

This is where I started sanding

Soon this…

Was this! (By adding 2 more strips to fill in the structure)

Like this…

And then another piece on the top to fill the gap and make a nice detail!

Then saw to make sure they are all the same size and flush

2 sides done!

For the ends we used the thicker pieces and measured them all to be same size

And attached them together with metal plates

Then connected them to the sides (PS – for these fittings drill the holes first, we tried without and it did not work!!

Do this on both sides

We ran out of plates, do you like our makeshift one?! (broken off an ikea bracket!)

Carefully place together your frame and screw in place, marking as you go!

 Now, annoyingly my phone ran out of battery at this point and it started raining so we put the parasol up and continued under cover!

To make the base:
Using the thicker bits of pallet we measured them all the same length to fit along inside the frame and placed 4 of them spaced apart so the long strips could be attached to them. Like below…

Then I painted it…

Days later we stapled landscape fabric to the inside to cover all gaps etc. This was £5 to 2 big rolls at poundstretcher – bargain!

Time to make it slug proof! This was £4 on amazon!

We wrapped it around the bottom of each leg to stop the little blighters!

Then with a mixture of stones on the bottom, chicken manure pellets and compost…

We filled it up!

I started to place and plant out our new friends! (Yes, I cheated and bought plug plants but it’s seeds all the way for me now!)

DAY 1 of our vegetable garden!

Onions, Leeks and Beetroot on this side

Carrots, Mini Sweetcorn, Courgette and the rest… Potatoes!

Also over in the corner is Raspberry, Little Gem Lettuces, Cabbages, Cauliflower, lots of herbs and flowers

 So there you go from free wooden pallets to food for your plates… here’s where we are up to now in week 3 of our little veggie patch!

It’s all doing really well- look at the potatoes coming up nicely!

It’s so exciting seeing them develop day by day… I can not wait to be able to harvest them and cook home grown vegetables! We already had some of the lettuce with last night’s supper and it was delicious- you can’t beat fresh veg!

I’ll keep you posted!
Till then!
Love and lettuce from the garden
Xox Gabnosslugsallowed xoX