The potatoes are here.

Enjay, you must start growing them at once. They are very easy, very satisfactory to contemplate in all stages of development, and very, very delicious. Chitting is, as you imply, just a matter of encouraging them to do what they do naturally. You set them out in a cool, well-lit, frost-free position and let them sprout. That gives them a bit of a head start. They are tough little tubers, but the foliage is susceptible to frost, so they can’t go in the ground too early.

Are you in Britain? If so, I highly recommend Alan Romans as a supplier. He doesn’t publish a paper catalogue – you have to go on-line. I used to order from Thompson and Morgan, but one year recently, after I had, as usual, spent happy hours during the winter reading and re-reading their interesting list and finally narrowing things down to my four choices – they sent me two substitutes. It spoiled all the fun.

I would also recommend growing Pink Fir Apple, a salad potato so beloved of trendy veggies that I long avoided it. I grew some last year, and am converted. Prolific, delicious. It’s sort of a funny shape which is presumably why you don’t get it in shops. (It's on the far right in the picture above.) A warm potato salad with Pink Fir Apples and a couple of fistfuls of sorrel and some butter is a dish fit to set on the table next to the nectar and ambrosia. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s recipe. The heat of the just-cooked potatoes wilts the sorrel.

Tamar, thanks for the tip about growing potatoes on the surface. I’ll read up on the possibilities when were are in Strathardle and I am reunited with my gardening books. I think it can be done under black polythene, as well. Digging isn’t the problem – that can be done a forkful at a time, as required for lunch, and grandchildren enjoy helping. It’s like digging for treasure. The difficulty, strength-wise, will be getting them in, in that delicious but narrow window of opportunity in April and early May when everything has to be done at once.

For the moment, I proceed like the Little Engine That Could. I have set the potatoes to chit. When we are next in Strathardle (from tomorrow) I will prune the autumn-fruiting raspberries I put in last year. Pruning consists of cutting them down to the ground, because they fruit on the current year’s growth. I can do that. I want to start digging holes for the courgettes – dig a hole, half-fill with compost or manure, fill it up, mark with a stick. I’ll need eight such sites in all, and hope to establish maybe three this week. Chose a place for the Mara des bois strawberries I have ordered, and weed and fork it over. All that should be possible.

And, oh yes,

...knitting.

I speed onwards with the Princess with winged sandals on my feet. I’ve reached row 22 of the 11th centre repeat. My mistake, I think, was to stop, last time, just after that pesky initial motif, with the thought of making it easy for myself to resume. On the contrary, I just felt mired down in endless easy knitting. Whereas now that I’ve toiled through the motif again, easy is delightful and speed is enjoyed. I should pass row 23 today which is, in a sense, half-way through the 46-row repeat. “In a sense”, because another 23 stitches will be added in the second half.

Jean, thank you for the memories of your mother-in-law’s contract knitting (and all best wishes for your move). There is simply no way that hand-knitting can produce a living wage, or even very much by way of pin money. The knitters I often wonder about these days are the ones who knit for designers.