Not fully in the shade but give it a couple of weeks and that will be it until the sun returns in March/April time. I tried just year to have over wintering onions but only about 50% was successful, possibly not liking the wet and cold for so long, so I decided that our garden is not a place for over wintering anything. The beds are still full but the various beans stopped producing anything worth while earlier on in the month and the tomato plants are quickly become tomato’less as we pick them as they start to ripen and we have now picked most of them. We have used up most of the carrots and the same with the beetroot. The butternut squash is taking over the garden but it got going quite late and so far there is just one small squash which might continue to grow and give us something.

During these last days of “summer” (it’s midway through September so we really are hanging on to hope that autumn and winter will not come, you never know) I decided to sand down the picnic table and recoat it with some furniture varnish stuff. The cheap belt sander I had packed up near the end and so had to finish off the sanding with a small “mouse” sander which took a lot longer to do than the belt sander but I got there in the end. I managed to get two coats on before rain, which is due to be with us for the rest of the week. When it next looks like good weather, I’ll give it a light sanding and do a final coat. In doing this I took most of the table apart and replaced the screws then putting it back together, tightening up any that I did not take out. It should be like a new table… for next year.