And relax, it's over. It's nearly over. Winter, the imprisonment for all gardeners. We just look at the window at a load of brown stuff that looks dead and like it will never spring back to life. 

But no, there are signs of spring everywhere, as I tell our daughters, and I've always told our daughters on, you know, those walks that you take your kids on and you think is going to be really good fun. But no one really enjoys themself. Everyone can't wait to get back home.

But on a kind of February, early March walk, I would, of course, begin spotting everything with slight, slight bud attached to it, or a slight sprouting of something fresh and green coming through and call it signs of spring. 

Look, girls signs of spring. Now when you 6 or 8 that's quite exciting because you've been told in the tone of voice to be excited, haven't you? Oh, look, signs of spring. 

Oh yeah, Mum, look, Mummy, look. It's a sign of spring!

No darling that's a crisp packet, but never mind.  

But now they're older and so wise at the age of 15 and 13 there, so clever and smart. They don't need that. But it is payback because they will never, ever escape signs of spring. And in fact, one of our girls came home from bike ride the other day with the mate. And she couldn't help herself. 

I said, hey, look, signs of spring. And then I realised I sounded like a real idiot, just like you mum. 

Then I think she pulled the v-sign behind my back, but I can't actually provide any evidence for that. 

So, hey, signs of spring in the garden after a considerably long period of time indoors. In fact, it's considered a long period of time in the UK not really doing anything at all. So it is a delight to get a change of scene, frankly and yes, the temperature is cold and it's chilly if you if you're not moving. But there's no wind. It's a blue sky. It's sunshine, sunshine, sunshine.

So I'm getting the gardening. I'm getting the muscles built up again, trying not to overdo it. But I am a bit excited. 

I have in my hand a Stanley knife. Let's just go in the greenhouse first and get a tool before I show you what I'm gonna do.

So this is the first year of the greenhouse stardate 1st March 2021 greenhouse year one. Come on, then we go. 

Oh! Oh, my God. If I break a pane of glass I'm actually gonna get divorced from my husband on pane of death. Get it? 

You may remember from such times as season one of My Garden Podcast, I brought in things like my delphiniums, Canas. Hoster's brought those in to protect them over the winter. Now, I've never done that. I've just always left stuff out, a bit haphazard, but now I'm professionalising with a small greenhouse. 

So they'll be ready to go outside. But we had a frost last night and I dare say we'll continue to have frosts until the end of March. So I'm going to hedge my bets. I find this quite difficult because I haven't actually spoken into a microphone on the podcast for a little while. 

So what are you doing this summer? Hey, what are you doing this spring? What are you doing with your garden? What am I doing with my garden? 

I don't know is the answer, but I feel rather under pressure. Handsome husband has ordered loads of seeds. We've got cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, coriander. Brussels sprouts at the other end of the spectrum. Rocket, leek cabbage, chilli peppers. Loads of things. 

And now I feel quite under pressure to deal with them in some sort of organised fashion. But I can't be bothered. 

So what I've done instead is taken the potatoes that he ordered me the seed potatoes and read about them got a bit excited. 

I've got the instructions here. 

What I'm currently doing in this box is chitting them. I said chitting, don't be rude! That means getting some sprouts off them before you put them in the dark soil. 

You've got to get them sprouting to give them a head start. 

Now, these are Casablanca early's, which means they will provide us with salad potatoes, new potatoes. June, July time. 

Joey leave it!

Anyway, so where was I? Potatoes. What I'm worried about is goofing it like I did last year, which was to sew a whole packet of something because I thought that's what you did. I just didn't even think about it. So I'm worried that if I put all of the potatoes in the ground, we're gonna have a glut of potatoes which we won't know what to do with and we'll be eating potato salad all summer.

So I wanna stagger my journey into potato growth.

So, I'm some doing a bit of chitting with half of them. The other half are in this nice box, keeping dry. We'll just see. 

I don't know how many potatoes I'll get off each seed potato. 

I don't really know how to plant them. It's all that have-a-go gardener stuff, right? 

What's this, Stanley knife or let's go and have a look. 

So stepping out, stepping away from the greenhouse. Mister husband is like a feeder but for gardeners. 

He's bought me seed potatoes and has also bought me 10 bags of muck, which is a combination of manure and compost for the new veg boxes.

We're gonna be putting all those seeds in eventually. So they're only half full of some old compost and what I'm going to do, it's split some of these bags off, Mr Muck compost. Filthy. Doesn't it sound like a nightclub in SoHo in the seventies? 

We're gonna put Mr Muck in and just get the soil really good. 

How to Chit Potatoes - Guardian Gardening