The list gets longer

Friday

With all this wet then frosty weather it was good to get out in the garden today, even if it was only to fill the bird feeders and check the greenhouse. On my way round I noticed that lots of Hellebore are flowering, some for the first time. I have an area behind a gate which is quite shady and moist, it contains some nondescript hellebore that have over the years seeded profusely. These I have moved around the garden in the hope that one day I might find something worth shouting about. Also I have bought in a couple of doubles so the overall effect is now beginning to show a tiny bit of a promise.

A yellow double bought some while ago bulking up nicely. The clay pot has nothing to do with this, it’s containing a vigorous hardy ginger, must cover the pot.

The leaves on this hellebore are what made me buy it. I have a feeling this is ‘Winter Moonbeam’

These are some of my seedlings and even the backs of the flowers are lovely.

H’ Sternii, grown from a seed. Several plants now grow around the garden.

A beautiful double bought a while back, this is also making a large clump.

A seedling that I am pleased with, a nice clear yellow and good strong leaves. Hopefully more plants will be opening their tight buds in the next few days and weeks.

Sunday

Do you have a ‘To do list’ ? I do and it seems to get longer by the day. The trouble with me is I get side tracked when ever I start something. Take this morning as an example, I was just going to tidy the front garden as the men from the council came to trim the trees on our road and left a mountain of debris in all of the shrubs. This turned into pruning shrubs by epic proportions, I may regret this later ! Something else on my list is to make more ‘stuff’ for the open days. So these last few weeks I have made tote bags, some note books and larger books with pencils.

The books with pencils are made by making a ‘loose’ cover for a bought note book. I have hand blocked a piece of white heavy cotton fabric with a stylized flower. The small books are hand made using an old poster for the covers. The bags are made  using all donated fabric, most of which has been over printed to make each one unique. All the proceeds from all of these items and my plant sale this year will go to the East Midlands Air Ambulance. I just hope that in the months to come the garden fills out and performs well for me.

Is your garden coming back to life yet ?………

 

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Garden Open

It’s been ages since I posted anything. It’s been all systems go here for the past month or so. Mr Malc has been repairing fence post and trellis, getting the grass to look presentable and we have pulled so much spanish bluebell foliage up I don’t want to see anymore.

Even the greenhouse has had a makeover. Looking through the back windows you can see large clay pots looking like they are on a slippery slope. Well that has all changed, the shelving that was in the greenhouse has now gone behind it and a new staging rescued from the allotment now sits along the back of the greenhouse, this will accommodate all of the Auricula from the ladders during the summer. Note the wheelbarrow full of gravel, we had to empty the other staging before we could move it. We don’t do things by halves….

The greenhouse nearly finished.

All up and running much more usable space. Excuse the wooden window in the back….Talking of which I may even clean the windows…

Taking time out from all this work, around the garden, summer is proving bountiful already.

The Hay Basket is filling nicely with petunias and bijou sweetpeas and to follow, trailing begonia. The Birdcage is looking pretty with pink petunia and purple verbena.

I was a 60s teenager and the colours we wore then have in some way shaped the colours of my garden. I love putting orange with pink and purple, somehow it always looks right.

Pink peony and orange wallflower

Orange poppies and a purple iris

Orange wallflower with purple alliums and red salvia.

Also this year I have a good crop of apricots, keeping my fingers crossed, I don’t lose any. In the past 4 years since I have had this I have only had 4 apricots off, but this year I’ve counted 20+. Planted on a south facing fence and grown as an espalier with two tiers.

And to finish…..Last year my sister in law gave me a seedling of meconopsis baileyi…and look what I found this week. A perfect end to a busy week.

And for all my followers who are local here is the poster for the trail….hope to see you ….

Top of the Ladder

It’s been a brilliant year for the Auricula. Out of approx 150 plants, not all different , I think 80% have flowered.

Top of the ladder.

Auricula Joanne

Lord Saye en Sele

Arundle Stripe

One of three Auricula ladders. The fun starts when I replace all of these with Pelargonium for the summer.

Then And Now

This week we will have been in this house 37 years. When we bought it we left a 6 year old modern house and came to a 50 + year old tired house needing lots of TLC, but on viewing the house I not only saw potential in the interior but the garden was enormous. Now I say enormous but it wasn’t really, it was compared to the modern garden we had just left and the fact that both of us had been born and raised in old terraced houses in quite poor areas with no gardens just yards and outside privies.

So the joy of having space for small children to run, kick a ball and for Mr Malc to grow some veg was amazing. Over the years we have had pet rabbits in a run, climbing frames, cricket pitches, parties galore and a very special wedding.

Looking back at pictures now it seems unbelievable that I thought this space was ever so big.

This picture and the next one were taken probably a year after we moved in. Thoughts on the garden were the last thing on my mind then. See the shadow on the right, well that is a leylandi hedge running the length of the garden. We had no idea what we had taken on. They were our trees and we couldn’t wait to get rid, but it did take a few years to do so.

The back of the house, now this has a conservatory running the whole width of the back. This is our second one, as the first smaller wooden one started to rot so we replaced it with my beautiful plant room.

This is the footings for my greenhouse. You can also see the rabbit run and Mr Malc’s veg patch. All this disappeared when I got the gardening bug in the mid 80s. The area where the rabbit run was is now my tiny white garden. The veg patch is where the g/daughters play house was.

This picture and the next are about the early 90s. Just look at either side of the circle you can just make out the tiny box plants, well these are now more than a metre tall tree tier box balls. The leylandi are still here in this shot.

Still with leylandi, and looking towards the hedge from what is now my summer house and before the rill was put in to join the two ponds.

The view now from our bedroom window clearly showing the rill.

Views from around the garden, including the three tier box balls, the now crumbling fence which replaced the leylandi hedge, think the ivy is holding it up…. Now I’ve got a several of trays of plants to go in before we open…..mmmm can anyone see any space….?

Saving the best till last

I know we have all been putting hellebore on our posts for a few weeks now and we are getting a bit hellebore bored but, I do have something to share. Many years ago, could be around 30 years ago, an elderly lady gave me a hellebore plant that always grew variegated leaves, in those days I was a novice gardener and didn’t know a hellebore from my elbow. Well for all these years this plant has given me a few straggly variegated leaves and no flowers, that is until this year. Finally I have flowers that to me look quite stripey and the leaves at the back of the flowers are definitely variegated. Now is this a new type of hellebore or are you going to tell me that you have one too. I would love to know…..