Category:

Simply..influences....

22/5/2019

I once visited the village of Naerum, a short train journey from Copenhagen to see the allotment gardens designed by C Th Sorensen. The way the oval shapes sat in the undulating site was delightful and I am waiting until my patch has been cleared and graded (it will slope towards the corner where the shed is) before I decide whether to make the meadow circular or oval. I know I'll know when I see it!

I am going to plant 150 or so wild dafodills (narcissus pseudonarcissus) and will collect seed from local wildflowers to grow in plugs and plant into the grass - first will be pignut (conopodium majus) which is looking pretty right now in the mini meadow in the front garden and buttercups from the road verges.

I am looking for low maintenance but I still want the wow factor....

I'm enjoying browsing these books by Christopher Lloyd and Pam Lewis though I am mindful that they both gardened in the south of England.

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Simoly..simplifying....

21/5/2019

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A circular meadow with a path to the red gate mown through it....

Angus and his digger are booked for late August so there is still time to ponder.

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Simply..another use....

19/5/2019

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We also used the back garden as a drying greeen...

We planted a few birch trees. They were meant to be the white-barked 'Jaquemontii' but turned out to be the faster growing and taller native birch - however this did mean that they soon became strong enough to support what turned out to be my favourite thing in the garden - the hammock!

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Simply..a cutting patch....

18/5/2019

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Above all I wanted a cutting patch. I was totally seduced by Sarah Raven's lovely book.

We removed the conifers which blocked the view, the slabs, a wreck of a shed and other junk, planted hedge to fill the large gaps and give us privacy from the houses on either side, mowed the rough grass, put up a shed and woodstore and a 6X8 greenhouse and started a cutting patch growing everything from seed...

Have you ever started a garden from scratch?

Can I ask if anyone has found the layout of the blog page changed and the size of the font reduced? Oddly it appears misaligned on my laptop but not on my tablet or phone, or when I am in 'edit' on the laptop. Weird, and annoying!

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Simply..a redesign....

17/5/2019

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..of the back garden.

I'm thrilled that this photograph of the garden won photographer Andrea Jones 2nd place in the Garden Views section of the International Garden Photographer of the Year Award and appeared in this gorgeous book

The view was always fabulous but the garden when we bought the house did not inspire
...

I thought I would consider how it evolved as I start to redesign it...

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Simply..all about the garden....

15/5/2019

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I love doing something different each year with the large black pots.

This year it is going to be palest pastels, pretty and frothy... petunias, violas, nicotiana for some hieght, trailing lobelia and bacopa andpale sweet peas on canes painted white.

In this prolonged spell of lovely weather gardening has been such a pleasure. A few more days of it are forecast.

I hope it's nice where you are.

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Simply..a dish of water....

13/5/2019

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I watched a robin take a long bath in this shallow dish of water this morning. As well as bathing in it, birds drink from it, the swallows need it to make mud for their nests, it brings the sky down into the garden and reflects things in it. You can also tell at a glance if it's raining. It's an important addition to any garden however small. (I am scarifying the grass - it always looks worse before it looks better!)

When I am trying to make a decision I still find What would be simplest? my favourite helpful question but here is a good one from Gretchen Rubin -

What is the value of what I'm going to get if I...........?

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Simply..gardening....

12/5/2019

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After yesterday's chocolate fun I worked off some calories today as conditions were perfect for gardening and there is a lot to be done here.

I sowed, pricked out, transplanted, weeded, tied in, edged, mulched, watered, pruned, deadheaded and planned some big changes and between times I sat on the porch in the beautiful sunshine and listened to Private Passions.

By the time I had dinner, also on the porch, the light had changed, slanting across the garden catching the about-to-flower cornus.

I hope you had a sunny Sunday

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Simply..a gardening day....

2/5/2019

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The swallows have arrived!

Sunny and dry for the first grass cut of the year - front, back and the path to the shore, deciding which bits to let grow into mini-meadows (you can change the shape a little each year which I like to do), edging and general tidying, getting tid of some rubbish, some minor repairs - a very satisfying gardening day.

Tonight a heavy shower to refresh it all.

You can see the trees which screen my view of the felling in the forest, and clematis Freda is doing it's decorative thing around the study window...

I hope you've had a satisfying day, whatever you have been doing.

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Simply..the confetti effect....

30/4/2019

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At Benmore Botanic Gatdens today there was almost as much blossom on the ground as on the plants. Wonderfully pretty.

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Simply..growing my own....

26/4/2019

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..flowers for cutting is one of my greatest pleasures. Having a garden just big enough to be able to pick from it without leaving a great gap is a joy. Currently I have daffodil Thalia, tulip Purissima, forget me nots and blue camassias and I've had several small arrangements without spoiling the effect in the garden.

I happened to move a small lamp and find the way it lights the flowers is quite dramatic...

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Simply..from the garden....

25/4/2019

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Simply..sunny....

28/3/2019

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..in the greenhouse.

The New Zealand seeds are an orange cosmos.

When as often happens, I have so many things to do I don't know where to start I sometimes list them all and do just 10 minutes on each. This was my list for today in the garden.

transplant forget me nots
plant out foxgloves
set up the propagator
sow seeds of ox eye daisies
sow cosmos
clean up greenhouse

That took an hour by which time I felt I'd made a surprising amount of progress on all fronts and knew what I wanted to concentrate on most. It was really springlike and a chaffinch sang his little heart out all the time I was working.

I'm looking forward to the gardening season again.

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Simply..growing....

20/3/2019

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.. flowers for cutting..

Even tiny pickings are lovely. I had to creep into corners to find these little gems.

The dainty blossom from prunus 'Kojo-no-mai 'doesn't provide much for picking but if the weather is poor and I feel I am not seeing much of it's short lived blossoms I sometimes pick a tiny bit to put in a jar on the bedside table.

The bold and handsome foliage of viburnum 'Davidii' is uselful all year - the pink buds are followed by white flowers then blue berries and a spray looks very fine in a jar on its own.

I have daffodils for quite a long time. Topolino and Tete A Tete, then February Gold, then Jenny, then Thalia (still to come) with some others I don't know the names of which were here when I came.

A simple pleasure.

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Simply..going backwards....

8/3/2019

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Gales and rain and snow on the tops, but also the first little pickings from the garden...

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Simply..stunning....

15/9/2018

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I thought you might like to see the stunning garden Jennie created for a wedding on the first of September. These two photographs were taken in July and she managed to keep them looking this good for a further six weeks.

These were for either side of the entrance to the garden.

There were several troughs like this one.

The double border consisted of agapanthus, hakonechloa, white cosmos, and white and lime green nicotiana (very scented in the evening when there were also lots of fairy lights).

There were hay bales with rugs, and a marquee this side of the arch, and the weather on the day though not sunny was dry and warm.

My photos don't really do it justice!

A close up of the pretty mix (matching the bridesmaids' dresses). Smallish petunias, lobelia, helichrysum and the confetti-like euphorbia which although tricky and slow to start is still looking effective in my own garden..

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I simply..love them all....

11/9/2018

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From extravagant jug-fulls to tiny blossomes under the lamp, I love flowers in the house.

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Simply..in the garden today....

5/8/2018

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(and back in the studio tomorrow!)

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Simply..the green green grass of home....

21/7/2018

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I am amazed at how green the grass has stayed in the heatwave.

I watered it every few days when the weather first turned hot (before Open Days) but not since. I can only suppose that all the early season lawn care - scarifying, feeding and weeding - got it into really good condition and that has seen it through, and in the last couple of weeks we have had the odd rainy day. Just enough to keep it fresh.

Short blog break coming up (to keep me fresh too).

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Simply..waiting....

18/7/2018

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..till the time is right.
The flowers on papaver ruprifragum are over by mid-day and the buds fpr tomorrow hang their heads until the next morning. Dozens of flowers, day after day for the whole season.

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Simply..high summer....

14/7/2018

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Simply..too hot to blog!

7/7/2018

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Black petunia and euphorbia Silver Mist

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Simply..the longest day....

21/6/2018

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The morning of the longest day finds me on my hands and knees in the back garden sniffing the exquisite scent of a newly discovered orchid!

I'm pretty certain it is platanthera bifolia or the lesser butterfly orchid. Who knows how long it has been there waiting for it's chance to flower? I leave different patches of grass to grow each year just to see what comes up.

Everyone loves the mini-meadow in the front garden and a lot of visitors say they will try leaving a patch of lawn to grow in their own garden - even a metre square as an experiment might be fun to do.

If your soil is rich you may just get the coarser grasses but if you rake off the cuttings thoroughly each year you will gradually reduce the fertility and then are more likely to get the kind of flowery meadow we all dream of!

Little midsummer posy for the breakfast table

We're having a family party on Sunday.

Do you celebrate midsummer where you are?

My most memorable midsummer was in Sweden where they really know how to celebrate it!

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Simply..FAQ's....

20/6/2018

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How come your hostas are not eaten by slugs?

I do use pellets, sparingly, from when the first snouts show till the shoots are about 4 inches high and especially in wet weather.

What is the name of the one with the dark purple flower?

The hosta is Devon Green (lovely glossy leaves) but the flower is an orchid -dactyllorhiza elata - which seeded itself from another pot!

What is the name of this plant?

It is euphorbia 'Silver Mist'. Quite tender and it's leaves droop when it gets too cold or wet - it looked better during the hot spell recently. Very dainty.

What's in the bag?

Perfumed soap. The deer rubbed some of the lovely white bark from this betula 'Jaquemontii'. The smell deters them (and I painted over the damaged part with Dulux Brilliant White emulsion!)

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