It seems a long time ago since the cold dark days of February when Alastair found out he was going to be a Junior Guard at Linlithgow and Linlithgow Bridge Children’s Gala Day 2010. There was great excitement as he discovered that some of his school friends were going to be in the procession too.
March came along and with it the information evening for parents – and then followed the inevitable discussions of how we were going to decorate the garden! He had lots of ideas… miniature railways(!), planets and outer space(help!) and then, thanks to his topic at school – minibeasts (caterpillars, butterflies, worms, bees, spiders, centipedes, ladybirds…). He wanted lots of them in the garden! So we had the discussion about what we’d need to do to attract minibeasts to our garden and we decided that growing our own fruit and veg would not just be good for us, but good for them too. So his theme of “Growing his own fruit and veg to help our planet” was born. 
Thanks to a seed sharing initiative with Nanna and some very kind donations of seedlings from neighbours, we set up a special ‘nursery’ in our conservatory where we managed to protect our little plants from the worst of the cold weather through April and May and they started to thrive. Our Runner Beans grew taller before our eyes, our tomato plants started to grow flowers and we all got busy with the watering can.
Meanwhile, Daddy was out in the garage creating Scott the Scarecrow and Mummy was busy with Gran and Aunty Claire sewing stripes on bees and spots on ladybirds to make our minibeast bunting (from left over bits of material).
We then decided to borrow Nanna’s giant blue exercise ball and transform it into a globe using old green carrier bags! Alastair was busy colouring in signs to tell everyone what the fruit and vegetables growing in his garden were.
Marches Day arrived and we planted out a wheelbarrow with 
fruit and veg plants – courgette, dwarf beans, chard and strawberries, decorated with a windmill (renewable energy) and a miniature scarecrow. It survived its trip down the High Street and on Friday night it finally took its place in Alastair’s Gala Day Garden alongside pots of tomatoes, cucumber, climbing beans, runner beans, lettuce, spinach, strawberries, herbs, peas and potatoes, to name just a few!
With the addition of ‘Little Weed’ from our next door neighbours and some fabulous pots of homegrown cut flowers from No.7, the garden looked resplendent.
Well, that’s it all over now. We thought Scott the Scarecrow might be being dismantled by now, but have decided that he’s doing a very effective job in the back garden keeping the pigeons away from our broccoli! We had great fun putting together our Gala Day Garden – but the best thing is we’ll be eating the produce from it for months to come!
