Springtime ~ in which flowers emerge

Hello Friends!

I love Spring! There's just so much to love as the Earth awakens from it's long, slow regeneration over the cold, dark Winter months; the light returns bringing a few precious minutes more with each new day; leaves and flowers sprout, grow and flourish; and we look forward to warmer days ahead that put an end to the cabin fever days of Winter. If we are lucky, we get a taste of Summer days ahead, which is especially good over Easter when almost everyone has time off work.

Here's what's happening in my cottage garden as the weeks of the year turn slowly into late Spring.

I haven't decorated my front porch for a number of years. Alzheimer's is a strange disease, and while Mum ordinarily loved to see what I had made, as her illness progressed the disturbance to her environment caused by the simplest of things would bring on a change in temperament.  So, it was best not to decorate and disturb the familiar surroundings.  This year, it took everything I had to do anything at all, but I know she would love it, and hope she was smiling as she looked down upon my Easter buntings.

I've pottered about with some pots, and underplanted the slate trough with violas. I am slowly doing away with pots, everything will eventually find a new home in the evolving borders, but you would not think so to see the patio this year!

I love my white Pasque flower. It came into it's own, full of pure white blooms just in time for Easter.

It's now in that stage where the earliest of the blooms are turning brown and the temptation is to dead head and tidy it up, but I know that if I do I won't see the reason I grow this lovely plant, and that is to see, and photograph, the simply fabulous seed heads which provide a great point of interest for many weeks to come.

One of the things you will notice about me as I putter around the borders is that I am not fast, oh, no, I am a slow gardener for I like to give the awakening wildlife a chance to wake from their lazy, sunny afternoon dozing amongst the weeds, giving them an opportunity to escape to another spot, but not before I have snapped them!  Here is a beautiful Angle Shades moth.

Not moving in haste also gives me time to find mosses, worts, and lichens that scatter in the soil or on plant pots.  I think this is a liverwort but it looks more like something from outer space!

Last Summer, my village hosted a charity fundraising open gardens weekend. It was a relaxing two days, popping into every open garden for a peek, a chat, and often a cup of tea and some cake. A few gardeners had potted up small cuttings to sell to generate more money for the cause. I bought this, a Libertina, and completely forgot all about it until I found the pot yesterday afternoon. It's a striking plant, I love the bright, vertical stripes of colour, and I think my camera and I will have a lot of fun with this one as the Summer progresses!

Finally, for today, the Aquilegia have started to open, and I am pleased with this photo I took of the earliest bloom to break bud, looking forward to many more in the coming weeks!

Thank you for stopping by today ~~~
Until next time ~~~
Deborah

Short and Sweet

Hello Friends!

First, a heartfelt, country welcome to all my new followers.  You've found your way here by different hosts {Google, Networked Blogs, etc} and no one has told me you are here, but I've noticed my numbers have gone up! So happy you have joined my little page and I hope you enjoy your visits and thank you for following me.

Well, it has happened again. I've pulled my back. Let's not dwell on this, or how it happened {reaching for my pot of face cream this morning} but suffice to say my mood is low as, once more, it happens at the worst possible time for the garden. The lawn needs its regular mow tomorrow, there are berries ripe and ready to pick, and pots that still need watering despite the gentle summer rain today. So thankful for the rain, because, at least it puts a natural, not medical, halt to the gardening; however, there is tomorrow and the next day, and so on, when I will be sitting or hobbling and becoming very frustrated.  At least there is still Wimbledon for a few more days!  It's getting really exciting now, and I am riveted to it.

This does raise a big issue, though, as the increasing number of occurrences of my back going at the most inopportune times {but then again, is there ever a good time for back pain?} is making me seriously readdress what I'm doing, and going to do with my garden. Without dwelling on it, I also have arthritis in my spine, so feel I can never get ahead these days, and the weeds are seriously no longer a joking matter. I am rethinking deeply now, and researching a lot on line; I have to accept that I may have to get someone in to help me make the garden lower maintenance all round, at least to help me with the heavier work of digging, moving soil and big rocks.

With our changing weather patterns, I have spent about five years looking at what is doing well in the garden and what is not. Some plants thrive, others wither and disappear.  Some are nothing more than slug fodder!  Ah! Slugs! The bane of every gardener, I'm sure of it.

I am in the middle of measuring up the various plots. My Berry Patch turns out to be 36 foot long by 10 1/2 foot wide plus two odd shaped triangular bits on the end which I did not include. My former vegetable plot, soon to be a herb and tea garden, measures 17 foot by 23 foot not including a funky shaped bit on the end! I have not yet measured the lawn and borders, those are for another day, but my drive measures 65 yards long!  That needs constant weeding both sides and down the middle.  It is a lot of work for me, with all my other responsibilities too.

I have started making plans for all of these areas, and have bought myself a lovely Strathmore spiral bound art journal with 190 gsm paper to record my intentions and progress. There is lots of room to expand as I stick in seed packets and photos, as well as being a deliciously large A4 portrait format! Did I mention I bought two of them!

So, dear friends, this is my plight again, but in the meantime, and on a more cheerful note, here are some photos of what is flowering in the garden this week ~~~

Mothering Sunday gift, this will be nurtured and used in a border later on

Glam Rock hydrangea

Beautiful, prolific, frothy, acid yellow, and useful Alchemilla Mollis

miscellany of bits and pieces and my garden corgi "Igraine"

Fragrant red dianthus, quaking grass, Alchemilla Mollis

Monkshood {Aconite} 

Crocosmia "Lucifer"

Glam Rock hydrangea with the long, whippy stems of Verbena Bonariensis

Wild Field Poppies in my 'wilderness' bit

So, dear friends, I sit in miserable pain, but it gives me time to reflect on what is happening in the garden and what needs to be done to move forward.

Until next time ~~~
~~~Deborah xoxo

Silken Threads and Crystals

Gentle Reader~~~as the true start of Summer approaches, the days are noticeably warmer and gentle breezes blow, with short, sharp and unexpected showers of thundery rain~~each morning the garden greets me in a glistening garment of silken threads sprinkled with sparkling crystals.  Sometime during the night, spiders spun their magic weaving across the bushes and trees and finest strands of silk float out across the garden.  The dew, like fairies tears, glistens and glimmers~~but wait a while and all disappears as the rising sun warms the grateful earth and all is as if they were never there, now trapped in the memory of my mind, like a ghost of a whisper at dawn~~~

I have only one allium left in the garden now, so it stands, a solitary sentinel of the ranks that once looked so proud and upright amidst the frothy acid green Alchemilla Mollis.  I do so like to photograph it in macro, filling the frame with it's spiky silvery~purpleness as each new day brings more of it's crown of stars to fulfilment.  I just love the green and purple combination~~~

The courgettes {zucchini} are growing from strength to strength each day now and there are ten small plants today ~~~

 

Golden rosebuds burst open, gently kissed by the morning dew ~~~

 

And strange creatures invade the garden too!  This is a Hummingbird Hawk moth Caterpillar ~~~ a scary looking creature and quite the ugly bug, but weirdly beautiful in it's uniqueness too, helping warn off hungry birds ready for a juicy snack ~~~

 

A warty toad ~~~ but I am worried that I haven't seen that many in the garden at all this year ~~~

 

The current bane of my gardening life!  The beautiful, yet so destructive, Mullein Moth Caterpillar~~~such pretty markings, but will demolish my Verbascum {Mullein} overnight!  They are voracious giants too, reaching about four inches long with appetites to match ~~~

 

Oedemera nobilis, also known as the False Oil Beetle, Thick-Legged Flower Beetle on a wild white Morning Glory~~~

 

A well camouflaged moth hides on the stone wall of the cottage~~hoping to remain unseen~~~

 

 

While a big Great Tit watches, waiting to swoop for a feed!

Here are some small and very pretty flowers.  I must find out what they are, for they are very sweet and delicate.  The seed freely in amongst the stones and borders in yellow, pale and deep blue, with miniature sword~like leaves~~~

 

This is quaking grass~~~a prolific self~sower that is now everywhere in my garden!  The original was given to me by my Aunty Non who passed away a few years ago~~~but her gardening legacy grows on in the gardens of many across the village and The Shire~~~

 

Finally, a well earned reward~~~some lovely chocolates, handmade in Wales by Sarah Bunton chocolates ~~~ I especially like the Green Tea in the dainty chocolate teacup!  How novel is that?

On that delicious morsel, I shall leave you for tonight, safe in the knowledge that ~~~ 

~~~A Gardener's Work Is Never Done~~~

The Weather is Changeable

Gentle Reader ~~~ the weather is very changeable.  Another year brings the same question: "What has happened to Spring?" for here we are in early June and yesterday I kept the heating on for most of the day!

~~~They say it is the wettest Spring on record {with more rain to follow} but we haven't had that much rain here, or so it seems. 
~~~They say it is the third warmest Spring since records began {I love that "since records began" ~~~ I often wonder when did 'records begin' ~~~ it makes me smile} but where?  Certainly not here, for I am still wearing winter layers and the heating is on every evening. 

Well, there isn't much we can do about it, but it gives us something to talk about ~~~ as if we need encouraging?

Last night, a band of thunderstorms swept up from the south across most of Britain.  We were in the earlier barrage, so by morning the worst of it was gone and I awoke to sparkling clean windows ~~~ one more job off the list then ~~~ for nature sometimes has a way of helping with the housework.  The day was grey, then it brightened up a tad, greyed over again and played with us, teasing us with sunshine from time to time, but now the sun is definitely here to play.  The garden is glorious, freshly washed from the rain, all bright and beautiful in the brilliant sunshine, dancing gaily in the slightly too stiff a breeze which is cooling things down maybe a little too much for such bright sunshine.  Long sleeves still needed, too cold for shorts.  Not that I wear shorts, but if I did it would not be warm enough today.

I never fail to be amazed at how quickly weed seeds grow, certainly the appear to sprout out of nowhere overnight into nearly full grown plants, and so much more quickly than things I want to be growing ~~ like my vegetables!  Why, it is less than two weeks since I cleared a patch for my courgettes {when they are ready for transplanting} and about the same time I sowed my courgette seeds, on May 26th.  So, here is the patch {which I covered with a scrap of netting to stop cats scratching around in it} and look how green it is already ~~~

These are the Franchi Seeds of Italy courgette/zucchini 'Romanesco' that I particularly like for their deeply ridged skins and buttery yellow flesh that, to me, is quite superior in taste ~~~

Courgette seeds have a pointy end and a rounded end, they say to sow with the pointy end up and the rounded end down for better germination, so this is how I sowed two seeds to each pot {later, the weaker of the two will be pricked out} hoping for 6 plants in all ~~~

As many of you know by now, I love to recycle, re~purpose, and re~use and this is re~purposing of those horrible filmy bags used in so many supermarkets these days, tied on tightly to make a free propagation unit, with a ready meal plastic tray as a saucer ~~~

 Then, today ~~~ Yay! the first tiny seed has pushed through the soil into the world! 

On now to some pretties for you to feast your eyes upon ~~~

I love my Verbascum, also called Mullein, and this is my dwarf verbascum that comes back every year.  I hope one day to be able to divide it, for it is a favourite of mine ~~~

A pink osteospermum with yellow and teal coloured centre ~~~

A gorgeous, tight rosebud ~~~

that opened into this beauty ~~~

The Oriental lilies are slowly opening to reveal their bright orange vibrancy ~~~

Oh, and one of my favourites, the rambler Frances E Lester, starting to open ~~~ I gave it a very hard pruning earlier and thought there would not be many blooms, but, oh! my! there are hundreds of clusters this year, I cannot count them, and there are thousands upon thousands of blooms like this to open!  I wait, with eager anticipation to see them later in the Summer ~~~

Rosa Rugosa, another fragrant favourite ~~~

 Laburnum, golden and dancing, overhangs from a neighbour's garden, I get the benefit for free! ~~~

and finally, a real hairy beast!  Would you just look at this poppy bud? ~~~

 So, Gentle Reader, my words are done, my images today are shared ~~~ more will follow soon, for remember that ~~~

~~~A Gardener's Work Is Never Done~~~