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Today we had a busy and productive day at the woods. Clasps were added to the kitchen cupboard and there was some cutting back of brambles on the footpath. Work was started on another planter as well as an outdoor picnic table. Kindling was sawn and split and one of the wooden chairs was fixed. It was another warm and sunny day with the bluebells and wood anemones still looking good.

This week we had a fabulous trip to Herstmonceux Science Centre. We walked through the woods to the science centre and took our packed lunch. We spent three hours exploring all the different exhibits; it was great fun and there was a lot to see and do. When we got back we did some gardening in Fruit Corner to prepare the beds for the seedlings we are growing in the poly tunnel. We even had to water Fruit Corner for the first time this year.

Today was a busy and productive day. We worked hard on lots of small jobs that is helping to tend and take care of the woods. An old door was smashed us and burnt, lots of the felled branches were chainsawed up into logs and all the logs were moved into the newly situated corrals. A mallet was completed, new support stakes replaced rotten ones for a brash wall and old pallet wood was de-nailed. After lunch we went for a walk to the pond and played Eye Spy - Helen won!

On Tuesday, we were treated to another warm and sunny day. We spent most of the day fixing things and moving the corrals of logs. They are being relocated to give us more space around the fire area. The bluebells are in their prime this week and we took the opportunity to sit amongst them and have a sit spot. They look and smell incredible at the moment. It was nice to go for a morning walk with Twig and lay on some of the fallen trees. One of the students has a birthday this

Today the temperature reached 20 degrees in the shade on our thermometer- the hottest day of the year so far! We made a start on weaving the willow sides of the Yoda hut, which felt very exciting. More moving and sorting of wood from the newly coppiced area took place, as well as three wooden mallet projects getting finished. The acorn chopping boards had more sanding and were oiled and the bench in the car park was also completed. Everyone is happy to have a seat in the shad

It was another beautiful sunny day and we really appreciated the warmth and dry ground again. We even had to water Fruit Corner! Some of us have been tidying and moving wood in the newly coppiced area and this has created such a sunny spot for new growth.So me of the wood was axed into smaller logs for firewood in the autumn. Acorn chopping boards were sanded and kindling was sawn and split. At lunch time we had a picnic lunch under the oak tree; it almost felt like summer,.

Happy Easter to all our students, staff and their parents and carers. We had a lovely day today and were delighted to celebrate Easter with a delicious chocolate Easter cake made by one of our student's mum, as well as cooking apples over the fire, rolled in cinnamon and sugar. In the morning we moved the brash from the recent tree felling to build up the screen for around the bath, made more kindling, worked on the bench for the car park, finished a mallet and took the dogs

On Tuesday we had a relaxed day which flowed well. Everyone was engaged with different activities and there was a gentle pace to the day. Some students fixed a couple of chairs that were damaged, a new shave horse was assembled, we had a nice walk with the dogs and climbed a tree. We made lots of kindling and sorted out the tool boxes.

We decided to spend time in the morning taking care of the woods. This involved clearing fallen wood, cutting down a fallen branch overhanging the foot path, raking and clearing the bark peelings and generally having a tidy up of our working space. It looked and felt good once we were done. Work continued on the bodger shelter, building a new shave horse and using the pole lathe to make a mallet. It was a very different temperature at Heartwood today from last week. In the af

This week we have been sowing radishes, beetroot and tomatoes to germinate in the poly tunnel, as well as planting out some spinach and rainbow chard seedlings donated by one of our staff. It feels exciting to get our hands back in the soil and we are looking forward to seeing things starting to grow again in Fruit Corner. Our main focus was to use some pallets to build an addition to one of our sheds. We managed to finish it and fill it with deconstructed pallet wood for fu

We have had another sunshine spring day and today were delighted to discover that the frogspawn we rescued has now hatched and the pond is full of tadpoles! We look forward to watching them develop. Work was started on a planter for one of our volunteers and a fixing job has been started on one of the poppets on the pole lathe. The new bench for the car park has had both support logs peeled and the ends burnt and the bench seat has been measured up. More trees were felled as

Spring has really started to happen at The Heartwood Project. We have been noticing lots of animal and bird prints in the soft mud these past few weeks and so felt inspired to put up an animal camera to see how many of them we can catch on film. Helen and some students sowed their first seeds of the season and these were runner beans and peas. We enjoyed getting our hands in the soil again. In the afternoon we went for a walk with Barley and Twig to the ancient chestnut trees

Today at Heartwood we welcomed a visitor who was having a taster session to see whether they would like to join us. It was such a lovely spring day and there was lots to see and try. We started to use the pole lathe to turn wood to make a door knob; it's very exciting to use something that has been made at Heartwood to create something else. More chestnut poles were peeled to use at the supports for a bench we started. Some large chestnut cores were also split. In the aftern

This week on our walk at Heartwood and were so surprised to discover that not only were the wood anemone beginning to bloom but we found that a few bluebells were starting to come out too. Now that is early for bluebells! There was a lot of sawing and splitting to make kindling, pallet breaking to deconstruct the pallet for wood working, fixing the pole lathe and also fixing a mallet.

Today was another glorious spring day and we noticed the white blossom on the Cherry Plum and Blackthorn trees, as well as all the catkins on the hazel. We were thrilled to discover two frogs that had moved into our new pond and took the opportunity to do the frogspawn rescue. This was important as the other pond area has already starting drying out, leaving the some of the frogspawn above the water level. We did more splitting of the chestnut cores, peeled a large chestnut p

We welcomed in Spring with the exciting discovery of the first frogspawn in our not pond pond. This is an old dugout area where it fills with water each winter but which gradually dries out. We will need to do a frogspawn rescue! It was a fabulous warm and sunny day. Some of us even got to wearing T-shirts while we worked! Thankfully, it's really helping the land to dry up. Much less mud. Whilst digging holes for the Bodger shed, we discovered some very interesting fungi whic

Such a beautiful and relaxed spring sunny day. We welcomed the warmth of the sunshine and were very busy with lots of different activities, these included mallet making, peeling the large posts for the new bodger shelter, burning the ends of the poles to preserve them longer from the soil, a second coat of oil went on the pole lathe and two more trees were felled. Brash was moved to the perimeter to create a brash boundary. Some of the large chestnut cores were split and new

We were thrilled to have a dry and almost sunny day on Tuesday. It was great to be able to spread out to work around the site, especially once we had emptied another trailer load of woodchip around the mostwet and muddy areas.   We started work on building a bodger shelter to house the new pole lathe. Two deep holes were dug, and the pole lathe had a first coat of oil. We used forks to create air holes and improve drainage in the clearing, as well as finished creating the wil

Today it was all about building the Yoda hut and having a go on the new pole lathe. Work began on attaching the long bending willow to the stakes and were then attached to each other to create half of the dome. It was great to give the pole lathe a try and we practised how to use the chisel and time using the pedal to turn the wood- not as easy as Mark makes it look! There was a lot of peeling to be done on 4 large chestnut poles for fencing and Twig was taught a new trick of

As it was Shrove Tuesday, we made and cooked pancakes over the fire. They were delicious and very much appreciated by us all. We especially appreciated the sunshine after so much rainfall recently and also the wood chip collected by Mark. It was a good team effort to dig and wheelbarrow the wood chip to our waterlogged fire site. Both made for a much drier underfoot experience! We discovered lots of animal and bird tracks in the soft mud and amongst them some good squirrel pr