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I'm sorry for the lack of posts, sometimes life gets in the way!!
Here is a quick fly by on whats blooming.

dicentra : bleeding heart




I am in love with the camassia!!



wisteria



thalia daffs



spuds went in Easter
cara and desiree

best buds

Euphorbia.

Well I'm still pottering even if the weather people don't always get it right. Last week I noticed green leaves on the wisteria, time to prune. This isn't the best time to prune a wisteria as the flower buds have already formed on last years growth. So I was careful not to cut too many budding stems off. Believe me it may look harmless now, you wait until summer and you will see how rampant it becomes.

Still plenty of buds though!

Seems like most of the garden is in bud too. Blossom already forming on the apple tree.

First ever flower buds on the climbing hydrangea.

The exquisite fragrant of the osmanthus feels the air right where I've been weeding. Its quite a heady perfume a bit like ylang ylang.

I've been weeding a virgin bit of soil for me, as I had to dig up a huge lavender which had seen better days, it was a beautiful specimen, but now I have a new bit of garden to plant! Joy!

However the surrounding ground is really awful heavy clay and full of weeds and grass so i think I've made a whole bunch of work for myself!

Lastly some thrifty spending. I'm not supposed to be spending money at the moment so its nice to be able to spend a few pounds on something that I know that is value for money. This is stachys byzantina.
How cool is this canister of string? Its a blatant copy of worcester ware, but for 1.99 inc string, I couldn't pass it up!!

surprise finds

This little beauty is a cowslip I think and has been totally overlooked by me. It was growing amongst shrubs so I was totally blinkered to its charm.



It was only when I moved it to its new home I realised how stunning it was, especially at this time of year when it can be a bit drab.


Its new home being my new bit of garden, which has swiftly been filled with plants gathered from around the garden. Its an odd aspect, part shade/part sun so I will have to see how they fair.
There are purple aquilegias for spring, orange helenium for late summer and a hydrangea which has yet to flower for me. Also a white dicentra/bleeding heart which I have recently bought, don't tell the husband!


The best thing in the garden at the moment is the perfume wafting around from this heather.
Who knew heather smelt so sweet? Its a cross between parma violets and bubblegum!

Lemon balm tea: anti viral and clears the mind!



Looks like I needn't have worried about the peat free compost as everything has grown.
Including some white echinacea and white lupin seeds that I bought online from some chaps garden. This is a money spinner I could cash in on maybe?

busy busy busy

Pulmonaria a shade lover.

Time is flying by so fast this year,
fortunately with this drop of good weather I'm on top of most of my plans!!

I'm not sure how?

Well its done. The new bit by the patio with help from the old man.
And yes I have managed to nearly fill that space with plants already.


There is an agapanthus in the shubbery if you look closer.
Now that the shrubs have grown its just crowded out.
So I have dug it up and squeezed it into an old bucket I picked up at a local house clearance.

Not before I got the old man again to drill some holes for drainage.


I have also been lifting and dividing for the first time this year.
However my way is lift and splice with a spade, none of your two fork jobby,
anyway I dont have two forks!
Today I have sown outside peas, mangetout, spring onions, radish, pakchoi, parsnips, carrots and leeks!!!

A beautiful hellebore.

the time is now

Ive been meaning to sow seeds for some time now, and today at last the weather was pretty nice. No biting winds or miserable drizzle.

This year I've planted the sweet pea seeds in toilet roll tubes. Sweet peas have a long root so the tubes are ideal as well as being 'green', as they will be planted straight out, tubes and all.

In my heated propagator I have sown meconopsis (blue poppy type flower), nicotiana lime, phlox purple stripe, moluccella strange green thing! And these curly seeds calendula orange.

Sorry botanical names are boring and hard to remember!

Ive used organic peat free compost, which says its ok for seeds but I wasn't impressed, its more like a mulch. We shall see if these seeds don't germinate I'll try something else. I have a ton more to sow but its too early for some and too cold for others that will go directly in the soil. However I have sprinkled some poppy and nigella seeds already in the border.

The above is obviously my compost bin, which I find a pain, and didn't turn out at all last year!

Naughty me. I realise that for such a big garden this is a tiny composter. I did have a nice big open one like you see on gardeners world, then the rodents moved in! We put a wire mesh under the bin so they couldn't burrow, so now I use it for kitchen waste like veg/fruit peelings, teabags, egg shell and newspaper (shredded bills too). I dug a wedge out today and spread it on the veg patch.

I am toying with the idea of removing more grass, which means more plants!! No actually I have enough to fill this space already. I've been generally pottering around all areas of the garden, doing a bit of weeding and a bit of pruning, and thinking how do I cope with it all!

spring has sprung

Although its not quite as sunny as the weekend, I feel spring is definitely upon us.

When I walk round the garden (which is becoming a daily ritual) I'm beginning to notice changes from day to day, whether it be fresh shoots pushing through or the increasing birdsong. The garden is in limbo, waiting to burst into life. Which is why I am happy that I have had a bit of a head start this year with the warmer weather. It would be nice to have a finished garden one day, but what would I do with myself!!

I'm getting the urge to sow some seeds which is always a good sign!

Eye spy....?

the big dig!

My third day in the garden proved quite productive so instead of the usual bewilderment of where to start I feel on top of things! This will be my fourth year in this garden so I'm beginning to feel like its mine.


My first job was to make a path down the side of the veg patch, it used to be a grass edge but I hated how untidy it was getting. As per usual I bodged it a bit, but I'm just a girl so its not bad.
I recycled more of the old fence wood, I do wonder if anyone watches me trifling with the dangerous weapons ie' a saw'. I do still have all my fingers!


I made the path out of bark chippings on top of weed suppressing material. Lets see how long it lasts. So I've dug most of the veg patch over, probably the first of many. Its good to get turning the earth as it encourages the birds to eat up the pests (as if they need encouragement!)




Don't you love fresh new shoots. The top pic is the new leaves of aquilegia 'Nora Barlow' which I grew from seed last spring, hopefully there will be flowers this spring. The one above is a tip of a camassia which I planted in the Autumn.

These curious pink things are the beginnings of rhubarb.

I definitely feel I've been to the green gym this week!
But how blissful to be back in the garden!