Here are my tomato babies. I’ve used some recycled materials; plastic milk bottles cut into strips make great plant labels as you can see in the photo. I’ve also used some cardboard drinks holder trays that I was given from someone who had collected them from all the coffees they had bought. When I first saw them I wasn’t sure how useful they’d be, but they are a perfect size to hold these plant pots, and with a bit of foil across the base, the water won’t escape out of the bottom.

I’ve got four different varieties on the go: green zebra, derby stripe, golden queen and a yellow plum variety. I’ve chosen varieties with low acidity levels and therefore the fruit will be sweeter and easier on digestion. I particularly love the green zebra tomato which has unusual green and yellow striped skin when ripe and has a beautiful sweet flavour.

All yellow tomato varieties have low acid content and are nutritionally different to red tomatoes in that they have lots of niacin (vitamin B3) and folate (vitamin B9, when added to food it’s called folic acid). Although yellow tomatoes have less vitamin C and lycopene (antioxidant reported to be beneficial in warding off heart disease and cancer) than red tomatoes.

During this growing season I am making a determined effort to get organised. Every other gardening year my methods of labelling plants and planning sowing and planting times have been haphazard to say the least but this year I’ve got three different gardens to think about; my own allotment, a community allotment and a school garden project and if I don’t get organised then a) there could be some very disappointed school children and b) my head might explode.

So I was very happy to see an idea for a seed organiser: http://www.mytinyplot.co.uk/planning/getting-organised/

I’ve copied the idea and made a seed box using an old shoe box and some thick card to make the monthly dividers. Behold the box of organisation:

I’ve now made a seed box for each of the gardens I look after so I can see what seeds need sowing each month. If the seeds can be sown during a number of months, I put them in the earliest month they can be sown and then I can move them along to the next month if they don’t get sown.

Genius. Well it’s a start anyway.