Compost

The plan was to build John a Man Cave shed at the bottom of the garden, and that he would put his lathe and big drill and everything in there and potter. And, perhaps, get a bit of peace and quiet. We had costed up the shed and thought about all the important stuff, like a Thinking Armchair.
Then, in May, when it looked like he might only have a few days to live, we made the decision, more on his side than mine, that this was the end of his working time, and he was, whatever else happened, retired for good

And he came home. Now, part of the plan was to move the compost bins further up the garden, putting them behind the two arches that split off the vegetable garden, and making new bins from nice pallet wood. One was part-made. I finished it, and looked at it in it's new place, and put it firmly back at the bottom of the garden where the old one had been.

And there it has stayed
.
And, until yesterday, it leaned nicely to the left, which was annoying, and not up to John's fairly rigorous standards for woodwork (I did make the sides myself, but he had cut and painted all the wood)
So, I've been shifting and sifting - see the new veg bed above. The compost is lovely, apart from the huge amount of twigs...
You can't get the staff these days (I paid someone to shift the right bin to the left last year. This year, no such available staff)
You cannot beat home-made compost for growing good crops, and mine has every scrap of kitchen waste, grass cutting, and tops of nettles (no roots!), soft weeds, all manner of stuff.. I found a rat skull in the bottom of the new bin...
When we came here the garden suffered badly from having had the topsoil disturbed and the clay subsoil exposed. After two years, no more digging (I use a fork only, and do not walk on the beds)

By last night, the new bin was empty enough to tip the whole thing over, roll it onto it's head, and let it dry out a bit

This morning, in a fit of enthusiasm, I levelled the ground (and dug out 4 more barrowloads of good compost), laid four leftover pavers into the base, applied the spirit level, and tamped down (by jumping up and down), then rolled the bin back into place... Look! No lean!

Now I just have to shift all the Stuff from right to left again, and the Stuff at the bottom of the right-hand bin may be usable almost at once. The secret to all of this system of compostery is patience. Shift only once a year, fill the right bin, empty the left...
I hope John is / would be approving, apart from the little voice I could hear going "Don't lift the stones" at the back of my head.  Didn't lift, rolled...

I hope you are proud of me, my lovely man. I am trying to keep standards high.