Sweet peas with dill.
Sweet peas with ammi majus.
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We are having a spell of wonderful weather, which the Mother of Pearl poppies and I are loving. I hope you are too. I am taking a bit of a blog break while I try and establish a work routine in the studio. It's a long time since I worked full-time! If you are one of the millions who have been working all through the pandemic, keeping the world functioning I want to take this chance to say a huge thank you. THANK YOU SO MUCH.      I grow several kinds and love them all. These are Mother of Pearl, subtle colours and delicate veining..    I love the way the meadows change each year. (They are just areas where I stopped mowing.) Cat's ear, hypochaeris radicata, is dominant this year. The flowers don't open until about 8 o'clock but then the garden is ablaze with their brilliant yellow. More orchids are still appearing, and I have put in wild cornflowers which I grew in plugs So vibrant beside the yellow!.
 Makes me smile every day.   I love he brilliant leaves of the golden hop, humulus lupus aureus against the black walls of the house. It grows quickly to about 10 feet or more every year, and tries to get into the house! You cut it to the ground at the end of summer and the bines are useful for making wreaths. I also grow it on a wigwam of blue painted canes, where this year it has been joined by clematis 'Dark Eyes'. (£1 from the supermarket.)    I sowed this pretty annual in pots but they got straggly and leggy as I didn't pot them on or pinch them out at the right time. However they are flowering profusely n spite of my neglect and I was puszzling how to support them when I remembered some white painted twigs from Christmas. Just tje thing. These are Schizanthus x wisetonensis Dr Badger's Mix from Chiltern Seeds.     I love the unusual colouring of this viola..and the excitement of a trip to a garden centre!   A garden is a lot of hard work, as many of you will know. But so worth it...     I just need a floaty dress instead of the torn at the knee gardening trousers (not a fashion statement!) and the old tee shirt. I am sure I once owned a floaty dress or two... I wonder what happened to them? poetry, as the mini-meadow begins to flower. One wild orchid so far.. 
 As the hardier seedlings gradually go out into the garden, I am beginning to thnk about prettying it up for summer. I like to use earthenware pots as much as possible. I love the proportions of the 'long toms' in the second photograph. I bought them in the supermarket, and the fuchsias I am growing in them. I am missing visiting garden centres but Morrison's have served me very well! I had lunch in there today with a glass of wine and a coffee. Nice.  Thalia
Brilliant sunshine all day, but freezing and with a strong wind carrying the odd flake of snow.
For almost two weeks I have had what I thought was a bad cold, with headaches, and I was wondering why it was lasting so long. Two nights ago it occured to me that I had jugs of daffodils in every room in the house and that perhaps..... I used to suffer from hay fever but it had faded over the last few years to almost nothing at all. I removed all the daffodils to the studio and! the headaches have gone and I have stopped sneezing! I think I will just have to enjoy them in the garden. They are wonderful this year.  Thank you all for the interesting comments on yesterday's post. It's good to share with, as Gwendoline put it 'sympathetic travellers' and it's fascinating to hear from different parts of the world. Transitioning to a more nornal existence will be different for each of us, but our feelings about it may be very similar. Today there is frost on the grass but full sun is forecast for the whole day and I will be out in the garden. There is still a lot of work to be done and I am clearing and mulching around each clump of flowers as they appear, so it's primulas, pulmonarias and daffodil Thalia today and I'll be having my meals outside. Wishing you all a happy Easter weekend.
Daffodil February Gold doesn't flower in February here, but waits till spring arrives. I love it's reflexed petals and I love having enough to pick for the house. My plan to garden every day of March worked really well until the last couple of days, when it has been so cold and wet that I retreated to te greenhouse, but the forecast is better for later in the week and I reckon I will have averaged the one hour a dy goal that I set myself. April will be even better! The shed is being repaired and I will get the power hose onto the paths and steps... I like when we change the clocks here in uk. It was still light at eight o'clock tonight. ..if you will, a tiny blue tit hanging on, upside down and by one leg to the last flower at the tip of this branch. I saw a photograph of just that on an RSPB site and wanted to use the photograph on the blog, but could not find it again. It seemed to represent how some of us are feeling, and it made ne smile. If the blue tit can do it, so can I!  ..is what gets me out of bed in the morning. Almost the first thing I do is take a look to see what has germinated overnight,  These llittle specks will grow into four feet tall foxgloves, white with spotted dark wine coloured markings. Dozens of them. Isn't it amazing? Of course they may not turn out to be white ( I collected the seed from one which appeared in the garden last year), and they won't flower until 2022, and I will need a lot of space to grow them on, but that's all part of the excitement.... What gets you up in the morning?  It is so encouraging to look back at photos from last year and know that the garden will look like this again!     Six new packets of seed and space to fill! Sweet peas on the canes, and I'm thinking poppies and gypsophila. A tray of ammi majus have just germinated. I want an ultra pretty, frothy effect and will try a different combination in each quadrant....More delight.
Sitting in the sun with a very early breakfast today I heard a woodpecker in the forest, saw the first butterfly and watched in amazement as a red squirrel pottered around the table, oblivious of my presence.  I may not have friends at my table (yet) but I did have sunshine for half an hour this morning, and flowers.  And more to come - white campion,wild cornflower, ammi majus, dill, gypsophila Covent Garden and dahlia Bishop's Children. It's all about the garden now.... I like that all these plants need my tender loving care..  Fresh snow on the hills this morning, but I still gardened - though only for half an hour. The snowdrops have been brilliant this year. Bigger than usual and long lasting. I will divide my smallish clumps soon. |
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July 2021
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