Thursday 29th July 10

A good day... spent from about 9am til lunchtime finalising some paperwork with Gill, and then I phoned in the information to the relevant authorities. This was a big relief.

During the afternoon I sorted out the front garden, tidying, chainsawing up some logs, splitting them. Tara popped in briefly to pick up some muesli base; we got 20kg from Suma last time and usually I only get 10, so I've spare, and when she asked last week about the next Suma order, I said we'd just had one, but her request of a bit of muesli base could be granted.

Once she had been and gone, I went down the garden to continue with the pond area, which I'm really enjoying doing. I put a load of ground elder roots in the centre of the newly vacated 'New Zealand bin' made of pallets raised up off the ground, with a load of vegetation and twigs under them (and some fruit and veg 'resources') and will put a load more on top... the roots will cook!

I came in at 6ish to have tea, a pile of pasta with the rems of tomato soup on, with home grown courgette and our first tomatoes too! Then it was off out to go to the St Nicks AGM.

This slowly got started, after a glass of elderflower wine and some cakes, with a presentation from Lizzie Freeman about Edible York. Lizzie explained how this group had formed following the York in Transition 'Food Open Space' meeting and a visit to the Incredible Edible Todmorden conference. She told us that this local group was part of a much wider move to grow food locally, including Grow Sheffield, Edible Middlesborough and Shoreditch Vacant Lots. We were told about the two current EY projects, Abundance and GardenAble.

For me, Edible York is a very exciting project... and I'm delighted to have donated 30 sacks of compost to the Paragon St raised beds. There are quite a few future sites, including perhaps a big area in the Museum Gardens and, if lucky, a raised bed near the Theatre Royal.

After a break, the AGM proper started. Gail chaired and after her intro, introduced Catherine from York Rotters, Jonathan the new Volunteer Co-ordinator, Rachel the Schools Education Co-ordinator, Tom who's in charge of the recycling collections, and finally Ivana the Centre Manager. There were presentations from all of these people. Ivana told us about the most recent award, given yesterday, the 'Green Pennant', which St Nicks has earned for it's high quality green space.

Then there were the simple elections of the Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary and Treasurer (Tina Funnell is the new Chair, the Treasurer post is now vacant.... anybody want to volunteer? If so, contact St Nicks!) and the Management Group were all voted in too. Several people were leaving their voluntary positions and got thanked.

I didn't hang around to chat once it had finished; I put a small donation in the perspex-fronted compost bin and cycled off towards the University, where a tree has been taken down and the logs left for people to pick them up. Goody!

Home after 10.30pm, and later, I lit the stove to get rid of some of the assorted paper and card etc, and to get some hot water for a late night wash up.