First cut.

The lawns have had their first (& early) cut of the year. I did them just before the heavens opened. At least we aren't under inches of snow as part of the UK is.

It's a white out.

How amazing it is to know there is a drastic change in the weather forecast but to still not believe your eyes on awakening to it?
I called Luke this morning to see the beautiful scene from one of our bedroom windows. It was a like a Christmas card (especially as our neighbours across the road, in their chocolate box house, have decided to leave their blinking Christmas decorations up all year! I'm guessing they find it too much of a hassle to unhook them from the front of their house each January but it will look out of place if and when we experience a heatwave (see, hope springs eternal!).



The sky was a very pale rose-white, the trees - a row of skeletons dusted with icing sugar and the roads, well the roads were a skating rink that only the bravest four wheel drives were attempting to drive along.
And how slowly those fat flakes of swirling snow fell. It was almost as if they were enjoying their slow descent from the clouds and wanted to elongate it by taking a longer circular route. Silently it fell and surprised all of us by blanketing the ground with a carpet of white.
All four bird feeders were put into action and food hidden under the steamer chair for the ground feeders to peck at.
The first to visit were five blackbirds, their silhouettes standing out in contrast to the virgin snow. They've made a crinkly edge to the fence where they landed in the snow and knocked it off.
Next to come was a fat thrush and a robin, quickly followed by the finches - gold, green and crested along with the chaffinches.
We also had the first visit from a single wagtail, twitching in the snow and looking like an Everton mint. At one point we had twelve finches fighting for a place on the sunflower feeder and then the Jay, a flash of cerulean blue and beige, glided through the sky.
We took lots of photographs as the morning light brightened the day and the rosy hue disappeared, leaving only a mass of white everywhere.
Finally, two collar doves gracefully and softly beat their gentle wings across the garden sky and a large wood pigeon landed on the hammock and then plodded into the snow, looking for food.
I sat indoors with a breakfast of pain au raison and hot chocolate and enjoyed the show.

The white stuff

Oh how ridiculous it must appear to people in Alaska when good old Blighty is forecast a few inches of snow.
I went to the supermarket at lunchtime and as I was at the bakery counter I heard one sales girl say to another, *We're out of fresh bread already today*. So much for the 'Keep calm and carry on' slogan that is appearing on everything from tea towels to mugs. Nope, everyone and his dog seems to be buying up bread and milk and stocking up with bottled water. We're only forecast two days of snow!
Luke can't wait for the little hens to be out in the snow, Ive cleared away the ice sheets from the bird baths (although I expect it will be frozen again by the morning) and we'll ensure that the chickens have access to the dry ground in the greenhouse and plenty of high fat food to keep them warm.
Fortunately we can just enjoy the snow here tomorrow as it's my day off but on Saturday I need to venture into the city centre for an event I am hosting. Let's hope the trains are running.
I'm hoping we wake up to a frosting of snow but I'm guessing it's going to be more than that. Check out my 2010 Christmas photos for he last big freeze we had. Luke and I trudged over snow bound fields to buy a turkey for Christmas as our road was cut off and after that the visitors who were meant to be staying couldn't get out of their own drive in Cornwall.

We shall have snow.

Very glad am I that the fork and I got acquainted yesterday as at least the raspberry patch is turned over. I started in the quagmire under the tree that has been compacted by six pairs of chicken's feet as well as those from the wood pigeons and robins that eat the spilled seed from the feeders hanging from the branches. When I turned the soil there it came up in great clumps, and there was a multitude of worms wriggling their heads or tails (who knows which end is which when they are so tiny?) in the newly exposed daylight. When I did my annual trick of unearthing several spring bulbs I decided to leave it all alone and just tidy away the deadheaded detritus. Even just an hour in the garden produced an entire binful of garden waste and made the garden look much tidier.
Not before time too as only a few hours later the snow fell, slowly and silently against the inky blackness of the winter sky. It hasn't settled overnight but we are expecting a few frosty starts this week. Nature will break up the soil with her frosts and the bulbs will start pushing their shoots up. Not long till the first snowdrops appear, I hope.

Number two

So last year wasn't the wettest since records began. It was the second wettest! It's a Slalem slope out tot he back of the garden, slipping and sliding away on the wet mud and all too close to the greenhouse glass to make it fun.
This morning I decided to let the babies have a proper long session with the garden and greenhouse all to themselves before the 'ladies' were let loose. As you know, chickens do have a very regimented pecking order and the babies, seeing as they came along last, are at the bottom of it. Shame really as it's not a level playing field but then life isn't fair anyway, is it?
The only way to ensure they could have a lazy dust bath and the choicest sunflower pieces was to keep the others locked in their run.
Every so often I would check out of the window and see two little monochrome feathery heads peeking up from their bath of contentment int he greenhouse dust. It's the only way they can have a proper clean up as there is no dry ground anywhere else in the garden.
By 12.30 I had decided that it was time to let the others loose but only because they had alerted me to the graceful and speedy sparrowhawk that was perched on the fence and flew off rapidly when it saw me. The chickens in the run were squawking in it's presence whilst the two little ones were too busy originally to notice it and only popped their heads up to see what all the fuss was. Talk about rubber necks!
Well, now they are all out I can trust them to have a fine old time of it all before putting themselves to bed by four when it starts getting dark. Which gives me more time for DIY, thank you very much (I don't think).

Night and day.

Depending on whether it is night or day, the narrow border at the front of the house takes on a different look. The white flowers will glow in the dark and the pink and purple will shine in the light.

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Still some colour in the garden. A rose, violas, cyclamen and heathers.

Don't trust me.

I hadn't realised until today that I cannot be trusted. What did I say to you a few weeks ago? "That's it, I'm done with gardening, I'm fed up of paying out for plants only to watch them drown and peter out". Then last Sunday Luke reminded me that the Patens Blue Salvias that he had to lovingly tended from seed were ready to be planted up in the garden. So, to heck with the black and white border I decided. I will plant those eight Salvias - bright blue - in the part of that border that was sadly lacking any life form....., or so I thought. After another three days of torrential rain followed by a brief spell of sun Luke checked the Salvias and found them gone! No, they hadn't been dug up and removed, nor pecked to bits by inquisitive beaks. They had just disappeared! On further inspection Luke found two bedraggled millimetre high stalks, completely depleted of any leaves and with a tell tale slime on them. Those ruddy slugs!
As he told me about all his hard work and patience being noshed overnight by those slimy critters I repeated my new mantra, "That's it, I'm done with gardening."
I wasn't done with D.I.Y. though and my friend offered to lend me her pressure washer to clean the grimy decking. At least I thought I could improve the look of the outdoors in some way that didn't include plants. So after collecting the pressure washer I started to drive back and thought what a lovely (rare) day it was turning out to be. Should I visit the garden centre, shouldn't I visit the garden centre? You must remember that I have been addicted to gardening for over fifteen years and it's a hard habit to break. As I drove home I had this inner dialogue going on, "Should I go to the garden centre in case they have some bargains?" followed by, "I have no money and there is no point going". For five miles I had this conversation with myself until it came to crunch time at a T-junction. Left for home; right for the garden centre. Shamefaced that I am you know which way I turned! I'm so predictable. Sigh!

Well, anyway- it's a fair cop. I did go to the garden centre but to assuage my guilt I went straight to the bargain section because right now I have no money to spare (My poor Mum is feeling guilty for having the audacity to have a birthday in the same month that we have had a £1000 worth of bills on top of the usual ones). But here's the rub.., they had BARGAINS galore. Pots and pots of plants for £1 or £2 per pot. I'd wanted to put a swathe of colour in the front garden at the top of the rockery. The original rockery looks great in the Spring but not so good now and it's been such a depressing year with nothing much prospering so I just wanted something that moved int the breeze, was blue in colour and cheap enough to buy enough to make it look impressive. Ahhhh, just what I was looking for - Isotoma, a compact bushy plant bearing masses of starry flowers. There must have been seventy plants there, all just one pound a pot. I bought nine without hesitation (they were 75% off original price after all) and after hermmming and humming I put back the three Salvias that I had picked up too.
Once I'd paid for my impulse buys I drove back home, unpacked the car and had a cup of tea before starting my day's work.

Because I wanted to pressure wash both the front and back decks I thought it best to mow both lawns first and once the chickens were free to roam I got the mower out and soon had a large mound of grass clippings for my efforts. Next up was the front deck with the jet washer making quick work of it. I had to clip back the leggy honeysuckle and clematis to get to the ballustrade. Then it was onto the front steps and then back out to clean the conservatory roof, the back decking, the dividing wall between us and our neighbours and then the slab of concrete that fronts up the shed. I don't know how I managed it but I ended up drenched so I had to change out of my scruffy clothes and put on something dry. The friend who had loaned me her pressure washer was calling over for a coffee but it gave me just enough time to nip back to the garden centre and buy a few more bargains. No fool like an old fool, huh? Just as I got back tot he bargain section my mobile rang and it was my friend asking where I was. "Where am I?!" I smiled to the garden centre assistant who had just commented that I had spent a good deal of time there that day. She blurted out, "She's at the garden centre," loud enough to give the game away. So much for sisterhood! Anyway, I rushed back in time for us to sit out on the front deck with a cup of coffee and a chat. After she'd gone home I planted up the front with the Isotomas (nineteen in total), two Scabiosa 'Butterfly Blue' and two 'Pink Mist' then three Veronica 'Red Fox' at the top of the bank for a little colour. (There will be photos to follow).
So much for giving up gardening!

And look at the gift from Mother Nature.

Last year we had a solitary poppy appear in our old tin bath (well, not OUR old tin bath but someone else's old bath that I have used as a planter). This year we have been bestowed another gift - a mass of the same poppy, festooned along the inhospitable, and frankly dour, steps to our front door. How they has found any goodness in the tarmac is beyond me but they are stuck firm and will give is a warm welcome every time we arrive home.

Here is the first poppy to flower; their tissue paper fine petals will be gone in a day or two but there is another head ready to bloom. Life finds a way in even the most unexpected places and feels like a little pay back for all the terrible weather we have had thus far this summer. I'm grateful for any small mercies, specially ones as unexpected as this.

The garden fights back

I know this could be an opportunity to plant up all the things that love wet conditions but I don't want to tempt fate by succumbing to this idea. I want to think that later this year or most definitely next year we will have sunshine and dry conditions. Plus who has the money to chop and change according to the weather? So, like almost all gardeners in Britain this year, I will grin and bear it although sadly not really with good grace. As the barista in the coffee shop said, "We are all just hanging on to our sanity but another day of this weather and the British public will all turn into serial killers! I must start buying my coffee from a different place!

Anyway, we can escape indoors and bemoan our fate but the plants have to battle on. Here are the flowers in the garden, some caught on a rare sunny day this July.

 Aconitum and a rose.

 Only one of the three plants I bought last year have come up but this gives lovely long lasting Autumn colour.

 Bear's Breeches and the aconitum with a Hibiscus

 One of my favourite, longed for plants. I bought this two years ago only for it not to flower last year and this year, when it did flower the rain has knocked it to the ground. Angel's Fishing Rod is it's common name but whilst it is wet enough to keep fish alive I've sadly seen no angels using them!

 This is part of the friendship corner, looking rather bedraggled after the downpour today.

 The hydrangea is changing from blue to pink. All dependent on the type of soil it is planting in.

 A close up of the hydrangea.

 The Eryngium (sea holly) has done well but it's used to harsh conditions. The Echinops (globe thistle) isn't doing quite so well.

 The star of the show, a huge Agapanthus blowing it's many little trumpets whilst the Gypsophilia fills the space in the background.

The white clematis has done well, head in the sun, feet in the shade.

 The spotted foxglove is a personal favourite of mine.....,

 and the bee too, can you see it up the tubular flower? If you click and enlarge the photo you can see the fine hairs on the inside of the flower that brush against the  bee as it climbs in and out.

In the wild area this plant is doing it's job - attracting insects.

 Detail of the Giant Scabiosa head. A great mass of this bendy stemmed plants at the back of a border really do create a lot of movement and long term interest. I love this skinny chap.

A victim of the weather; this lupin was overcome with greenfly, another infestation has stripped my blue lupin within a day. You snooze, you lose, as they say and I caught both of them too late. What a shame.

 My very favourite, Crown Princess Margarita rose. She always gives a good show. The blue in the background is a clematis.

 Evan with the rain, my roses have done their best and as soon as the sun dries them out a little, up they come.

 My second favourite rose, Munstead Wood. This photo doesn't truly reflect the richness of this glorious rose. I moved it earlier in the season so it could climb against the shed and it's doing very well. Such a reliable rose.

Here, the water damage is quite apparent. I pulled gently on the head of this sodden rose and the entire petal structure came away in one piece. Yet the bud by the side has had the benefit of a good dry day as it unfurls so if the rain stays away it will not suffer the same fate. As I type away the rain is back for the fourth time today, heavy as always, and my hopes for the roses fades somewhat.

This bush has one head with waterlogged petals too but still makes a good show. C'mon, Blighty. Show that weather who is the boss (yes, we all know. The weather wins every time)

 My new purchases for this year; I have five or six of these beautiful Verbascums, this one has a sprinkling of rain drops on it's petals.

 So, the Salvia Patens Blue have been planted - in the monochrome border! Well, something is better than nothing and if these handsome chaps flower they will be a delight to view from the house.

 Remember the bargain annual plants we bought when we met up with Luke's dad a month or two back? For five pounds I filled this large blue pot with fuchsias and upright and trailing lobelia. At least these gives us some interest and can be moved around to fill a boring spot in the garden - if only they weren't so heavy to shift!

The half barrel (still smelling slightly of beer!) sits out by the front steps and has spilled over the edges to soften them up. This barrel was filled by Jack next doors' 8 year old grandson and me a few months ago and is a very cheap and cheerful welcome to the house.

 What a graceful arch to the yellow flower stem of the humble tomato. It will be such a shame after Luke's tender cultivation of these plants if they do succumb to blight. It's a miracle though if they don't - conditions (wet and warm) are ideal for it. He's going to get some resistance spray and fingers will be firmly crossed.

Here is a lovely tiny tomato with beautiful curlicue bits adorning it's 'head'.

A room with a view. From our loft you get a slightly better idea of the shape of the garden. With fruit bushes along the left, the vegetable patch behind the white bed and the chicken run and wild garden behind that we move over to the shed and the greenhouse, fronted by the herb garden and then down past the hammock to the clashing corner, the long border, the tree with the bird feeders that our chickens make a run for every time we let them out of their run and down to the friendship border which is obscured by the conservatory roof. Further on down is the monochrome corner, the deck and the wood store. Our compost bin and water butt reside in between the shed ad greenhouse and our bits and pieces, including logs to be cut, hide behind the shed.

If you think I have exaggerated about the rain we have endured this 'summer' just look what has happened to these keys in five days! I tied these to string and hung them over the peas to act as a pigeon scarer (well, really just because I wanted to hang these old curiosities up actually and I needed an excuse) and already they are rusty. Happy days!

Plenty of front.

Here's the latest photos of the front garden, still a lot to be desired but the rockery is looking more established and the riot of colout around the weeping pear makes for a bright view.

The tree in the back garden also has some interest. Whilst it's not leafed up yet it seems to have grown a cat! Here she is trying to blend in for when the birds arrive. She eventually gave up!

I've now added some photos to my 'wild about gardens' post & my little inspiration post.

Putting on a front.

 The little wheelbarrow has a change of colour, from last year's orange to this year's pink.

Primroses and pansies after their shower.

Rosy days.

I wasn't working today and now the bank holiday is over the sun has come out. Unbelievable.

We've also been promised highs of 24 degrees centigrade by the weekend. So, three days of downpours and the promise of a good few days of warmth means it's a great time to get on with moving the roses. I'll soon find out how many roots have escaped through the drainage holes of it's pot to put proper roots down. Basically, I bought the roses last year as I couldn’t choose between the ones I loved so I bought one of each. However I had them in a holding bed until I knew where I wanted to plant them without realising that the onset of new neighbours would mean I'd have to rush and wouldn't have the luxury of planning where to put them. So instead of planting them out in the front garden as originally planned because it needs levelling and stripping of it's turf before conditioning I have kept them in the back garden.

I have used the beautiful, pale, creamy apricot rose, Claire Austin, in the pastel friendship border. Spirit of Freedom, (which was already planted up in it's right place), Munstead Rose, Geoff Hamilton and Winchester Cathedral have been dotted along the long border with the white Winchester Cathedral rose in the clashing corner to tone it down somewhat. I've added some sand, some compost, a good slug of water and made sure each hole is very well dug over so the roots do not have to fight to get through clay soil. I've also teased our the roots to ensure they grow down and out rather than becoming root bound. As always, once planted I gave it a good soak to establish itself.

When planting these roses in the border I had to take into account that not only will they hopefully grow but that the plants around them, out at similar and different times of the year also need to have enough space. So I've cut away some of the lawn to allow enough room for everything. I know I've said before that I favour the jumbled way of planting; cramming lots of things in so you see very little earth and everything has to fight for space but I do believe in giving them a few years to get their strength up before the jostling begins.

I also moved a few plants to accommodate the new additions and also I moved the two huge Allium, Mount Everest from where the raspberries will need to be moved to over to the conservatory view in the pastel border. Jumbled in with the two purple Alliums and tall foxgloves makes it look more lush and less sparse. I need to plant plenty more for a show of lolly pops in the spring and will do that in the late Autumn ready for next year.

The peas had new string wound around the bamboo supports so they can climb up them easily and I added extra kitchen waste to the compost bin. I could spend another four days in the garden before I'd be where I want to be with it but sadly work calls for the next three days and I've got three late nights in a row. Ah well, there was just enough time to swing in my hammock whilst reading my book in the late afternoon sun.

I'll add some photos soon but I have just added some photos to the last few posts - the rain drenched plants and the space where the conifers were are now uploaded on earlier posts.Check out Hens v delphiniums, Two down one to go and the Rain post.

Putting my back into it.

Well, have I paid for lugging those great rocks around yesterday?! Although I had long hot bath and slept on the waterbed last night I still feel like I've got a washboard attached to my back today.

Right now it's raining (squally showers that seemed to come from nowhere) so I don't have to make excuses why I am not gardening. Instead I'll tell you what my day consisted of yesterday, if you'll allow.

First of all, about 10.15am, I had a cup of tea and five minutes of cogitation – or more likely procrastination before I set to work with a spade, a ladies' gardening fork which is smaller than the usual one. It makes it easier to manage as I'm not turning over huge amounts of soil so it's less arduous on the back. There are tools nowadays that somehow turn themselves so you don't have to put your back into it but thankfully I'm not at that stage yet. I also took a large box for the stones and the garden tidy for weeds. Along with these I took the extension cable and a radio. I was ready for the hard work ahead of me. The weather was mild and before long I had shrugged off my fleece and was down to a pair of trousers and a vest top.

So, first to go were the slate chippings. I tossed them under the hedge in case I need to use them at a later date. This will suppress the weeds and the hedge is established enough that it won't make any difference to that. First visit of the day from the neighbour who likes to chat.

The next job was to remove one of the mahonias which proved more difficult than I first imagined because it was buried very deeply. The roots hadn't been teased out when it was first planted though so once I had dug deeply enough it came up easily as the roots were still curled in a tight ball. 

Now it was onto removing the bamboo after I'd warmed up but before I was tired out because I knew what a tussle it was be to remove it. I've mentioned this quite a bit in the last couple of posts so should give bamboo a fair press and have taken this from 'potandgrass' website (which is not a hashish site despite the name).

“In cultivation, care needs to be taken of their potential for invasive behaviour. They spread mainly through their roots and/or rhizomes, which can spread widely underground and send up new culms to break through the surface. There are two patterns for the growth of bamboo, "clumping" (sympodial) and "running" (monopodial). Clumping bamboo species tend to spread slowly as the growth pattern of the rhizomes is to simply expand the root mass gradually; they do not send out runners. Running bamboo species are highly variable in their tendency to spread; this is related to both the species and the soil and climate conditions. Some can send out runners several meters a year, while others can stay in the same general area for long periods. If neglected, they can be invasive over time and can cause problems by moving into adjacent areas. The reputation of bamboo as being highly invasive is often exaggerated, and situations where it has taken over large areas is often the result of years of untended or neglected plantings.”

Well, there we are, neglected planting was the reason mine was so difficult remove. It took over an hour of struggle to get the entire thing out and mine wasn't even that large. I'd taken a big clump out last week and passed it onto Jenny, my friend but this piece was buried right up against the wall which meant I had to insert the blade of the spade between it and the wall and then try to prise it away. You can't just pull it up so in the end as I've already mentioned in an earlier post, I had to dig right down to get underneath it. It wasn't easy to get to it because I was standing on the road at the bottom of the slope and the clump I was trying to extract was three feet above me. Anyway, even though several times I wanted to give up on it, I did get the entire thing out. It looks very puny for the amount of sweat I poured over it quite literally. At this point the neighbour was back with a cup of tea. Very timely.

Once that task was over I cut back the straggly thorny branches that draped down and threatened to lash out if I got in the way of them. Out came the other mahonia which I immediately planted alongside the one I had earlier removed. I'll have to see if they survive. One has already been offered to my Mum who lost hers due to the winter temperatures. We are about three degrees colder than just a mile away and as such lost a standard bay, our lovely olive that was a present only last summer, my tree fern and four cordylines along with euphorbias and other plants.

The neighbours were having a delivery and continually blocked the road which meant I had an audience of bored car drivers and their passengers. Occasionally the lorry would move after being beeped at by frustrated drivers who couldn't back up and use a different route and even more occasionally I got a wolf whistle or beep. I put this down to my Charlie Dimmock look. If you don't know Charlie she was the gardener who wore skimpy tops and no bra and got plenty of press coverage for being rather butch yet still feminine due to her obvious assets.

I think people were so bored just sitting and waiting for the lorry to move that they couldn't help but watch this messy, middle aged, sweaty woman in a vest scrabbling up and down the bank. hauling huge rocks around and bending over to scrape back the earth that had fallen onto the road. It was definitely the fact that I was lugging big rocks that appealed to them whilst almost exposing my own 'rocks', I'm sure. 

How embarrassing.

Eventually the police turned up (not to charge me with indecent exposure I'm relieved to report) but to tell the lorry he'd have to move. Without an audience to make me self conscious I could crack on.

I pulled out a wheelbarrow load of stones, took out the sickly hebe, repositioned the last row of rocks, planted up one plant I'd taken out, a bunch of narcissi, a much reduced in price because it's almost over it's flowering muscari blue spike (grape hyacinth), two saxifrage aizoon minors, two unidentified blue flowered plants, a campanula, three primula denticulata (drumstick primulas), saxifrage white pixie, jasione leavis blue light and phlox cushion blue. A great list of names but it looks very sparse right now. The last thing to do once I didn't need it to pull myself up the bank on was to saw off the  I'd like to add a few evergreens to give it interest in winter. Hopefully it will be carpeted in the plants in a year or two.sapling that was jutting out the ground at an awkward angle halfway up the slope and then rake the whole area to make it look more level.

I am mad at myself for not doing a proper preparation job before I planted the plants but having had two more visits from the neighbour one side and one nice chat with Jack from the other side it was way past four pm which is when I had hoped to have finished up.

I ended up by cleaning the driveway with a brush and a hosepipe, watered everything well (never overlook this bit, it's the best way to get your plants to settle in) and cleaned up the rocks with water and a hand brush. Then I planted the few plants at the base of the deck and tidied away the tools I had used. By this time I was basically dead on my feet so it was all an uphill struggle. I wound up the hose, put the stones into the bin, photographed the bamboo and the finished bank, put the weeds in the garden waste bin , put the chickens back in their run,  checked the time (6.40pm), flopped on the sofa, started typing a post, gave up, had a bath and went to bed. Luke came home at 7.00pm with curries for us both and I came down to add some photos to my post. Then it was bed and ablissful sleep. The trouble was I dreamt about a plant show! Arghhh.

April's fool.

I've done it. My arms ache, my back is complaining, my legs are wobbly (what's new?) and I am utterly spent BUT I've done what I set out to do. I'm a real believer in doing what I say I will and, much later than I had anticipated I had finished the last of the planting and came straight to the laptop because quite frankly, if I don't tell you about it straight away I think I may be fast asleep....., nope, I'm going to fall asleep.

Here are a few photos to tell the story for me.Give it three months and it will look more natural. I hope.

(Above and below: Before I started the work)

 Halfway through the work, the slate has been removed by hand, the ground dug over and two mahonias removed (and planted in the back garden.

Rockery stones moved and replaced before the plants are added and everything is given a good watering.