Simply..a good day's gardening....

17/5/2017

I worked hard in the garden today.

I used an old plan - to concentrate on 3 tasks. An ongoing job, a start and finish job, and something I want to do.

The ongoing job was dealing with the grass - scarifying and edge cutting mainly. There is quite a lot of grass.

The start and finish job was planting out a wigwam of sweet peas. I always sow Shirley poppies in the centre of the wigwam. The canes could have done with repainting but I don't have time this year - I am going for that useful shabby-chic look.

The thing I really want to get right this year is to get this clipped lonicera into a perfect ball! Still a bit bulging and saggy on the right..

The other clipped shrub is box and I try to cut it in an oval to contrast. The azalea lutea scents the whole garden on a sunny warm day like today.

Every year I mean to divide and spread this lovely (though short flowering) hardy geranium. If I catch it right after flowering finishes I might get it done. I had it with white tulip Purissima once - very lovely.

I am so happy to see that the three precious cornus controversa variegata which were munched by the deer are recovering. Tiny new shoots are appearing. It's risky designing a garden around the form of one thing - in this case the horizontal form. (See photos here.) I once designed a whole garden around a well shaped broom which promptly died! I should have remembered they are short lived shrubs.

The brown patch in the grass is the mini meadow which should have been cut in late summer last year, but I ran out of energy and it wasn't cut till spring, but it will recover soon I think.

I forgot the advice I always gave others - to finish when you still have the energy to clear up. I did have 10 lovely minutes in the hammock and am heading for an early hot bath now...

Here are two products I love to use. Alfresco insect repellent is all natural, smells gorgeous and works for me. And for gardener's hands is La Maison de Senteurs Olive Oil hand cream. I'm not selling them I just thought I'd make them look pretty for fun :-)

The forecast is sunshine for a few more days...

Have you been gardening?

15 Comments

rusty duck link

17/5/2017 02:35:09 pm

It's been pouring down here the last couple of days but we do now appear to be going into a dry spell. Just as well. The slugs have been having a field day and there was a deer in the garden for much of the afternoon. It takes determination this gardening lark doesn't it??

Freda

18/5/2017 01:37:09 am

Oh it does! Hope you get a few good days - or a whole summer of good days - wouldn't that be nice?

Sheena

17/5/2017 11:50:45 pm

I have been gardening as if it is going out of fashion and am now in love with my garden again which is lovely. You are not alone in planting plans going awry, Freda, as I decided Clematis Margaret Hunt would be the perfect compliment to my big, old Rosa glauca and it was for the one year before the rose took the huff and died. Back to the drawing board.

Freda

18/5/2017 01:38:52 am

I am so encouraged to hear that it is possible to fall in love with your garden again....Will you try again with the lovely Rosa glauca?

Sheena

18/5/2017 11:38:05 pm

I will try again with Rosa glauca as the foliage is such a beautiful colour but, of course, I can't plant it in the same place as the old one. Then I would have to move the clematis! I think that will stay a dream combination only in my head.
It is difficult not to love the garden in May but a lot of my new enthusiasm comes from simply spending a lot of time outside. Maybe it is because we have had a spell of such good weather. Enjoy your garden, Freda, it looks lovely.

Lucille link

18/5/2017 12:47:35 am

I'm attempting the same with a lonicera. Yours is much more symmetrical than mine and as it sits against a clipped box I'm wondering if one neat and one shaggy might be the way forward.

Freda

18/5/2017 01:39:34 am

The contrast might be just the thing...

Lotta link

18/5/2017 04:57:19 am

I can empathise with the lonicera - I feel a bit like that too after winter - slightly bulging and saggy!
Planting out sweet peas and mowing are all I've managed so far in mine. The garden could do with some serious attention though - after a couple of days of rain everything has suddenly doubled in size!

Freda

18/5/2017 01:24:10 pm

It is one of my favourite times in the garden, but hard to keep up!

cath

18/5/2017 08:28:27 am

I am already looking forward to seeing the sweet peas...
No garden work here so far. Awaiting the arrival of the wooden tiles for our balcony floor. They arrived this afternoon. When they are in place first thing to go out are three (still) small acers (red, green, and a mixed green/white variety) that have been living in our living room for a couple of weeks already.

Freda

18/5/2017 01:25:22 pm

They will be glad of the sunlight and fresh air. Sounds lovely.

Viv link

18/5/2017 02:20:29 pm

I have been sitting at work but longing to be in my garden - either one! Still it has been raining most of the week. Everything growing well here in Yorkshire - sadly I won't see our Scottish garden for another week but it is always a pleasant surprise when we do. Your garden looking lovely - I like the oval clipped bush - they are not easy to do are they! Are you doing the open garden / studio again this year?

Freda

19/5/2017 11:43:03 am

I hope you get into your gardens soon and that you get the good weather we have been having. I'm not doing open gardens or studio this year but who knows, maybe next year...

Julia

19/5/2017 04:26:05 am

We've been talking, as we do every year, about how to create a small garden space here in our boreal forest, on granite, in eastern ontario. Pine trees too tall and precious as friends, to cut down for sun, who also make the soil too acid. We've lost a very large fir tree on the shoreline, so may be able to put pots down there for some seedlings....we are forest-dwellers in summer now, but do miss our gardening days. We'll live vicariously through you all.

Freda

19/5/2017 11:46:39 am

Forest floor flowers tend to be before the leaves come out, but few grow in coniferous woods. Maybe a few wild ones will appear where the tree has come down? We always not how thick the bluebells are when a tree comes down and the light gets in. Enjoy your forest summer Julia.

Simply..a good day's gardening....

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