#21 - new raised bed

 From this …

To this …

I’ve planted up with Rummer Beans at the back, and Salad Onions in the front.

Then yesterday I found a little rusted bird ornament to sit on the top bar, and round balls for each upright.  I’d take a photo of them, but is is pouring and we have a thunder storm kicking off.  

The balls aren’t fitted yet, and I think they might get a coat of Valspar Blanc de Blances (as per the shed door). The bed itself is painted in Blue Stain and I am going to repaint in Ducksback Forest Green, and the uprights and top bar have been painted in Forest Green, so the Blanc balls will be a nice contrast.

I am super lucky that he Darling Husband  builds these beds for me, but he out did himself with the bean support on this one.  There are a whole stack of gravel boards waiting for him to build me more, and I have to say that I quite like these climbing supports, so he may well add them to the bed on the opposite side of the shed, I think that they were made out of shuttering boards from when the shed base went in.

I also found a lovely wind chime in Home Sense, which has a nice tinkle, but it’s painted black with a weird symbol on the sail.  It has been put on the black rose arch for the time being.  Probably it will get the same Valspar Blanc on both the “hat” and sail, and I’ll cut out a vinyl flower on the Cricut Machine.

Hugs

Kay xx

#20 - Deadnettle ... mundane name for a nice plant

 

I mentioned this plant in passing on yesterday's post.  This one is destined for the raised  bed near the new side gate.

It has such a mundane name, Deadnettle, but is in fact a sweet little filler plant in this garden.  I have several different ones, but this is a new addition Lamium Maculatum 'Cannon's Gold'.  I purchased it from one my favourite plant habit addiction centres, Thorpe Gardens at Horam.   I was about to tell you that they don't have a website, but do have a Facebook presence, but am delighted to say that they have now got one HERE.  I could not see any Lamium on their plant inventory, but they had a lote of them, and most of my other ones also came from there.

Thorpe's are always offer a friendly welcome, have a reasonable selection of plants and a wealth of knowledge.  I unfortunately can be found there a lot!

The leaves delicate and lime gold in colour, being edge in green.  Semi-evergreen in nature it will form a carpet with whorls of long-lasting magenta flowers in this case and will really light up the underneath of a shrub, or as I plan to use it around the base of a pot.  Height is around 6 inches or so, depending on which variety you go for.

It is easy to propagate, hence why just the one.  All I do is just hack off a bit and stuff it in a new location.  Just as long as it is well-watered for a while, it will be fine.

I also have a green and silver one near the arches through to the top bed, and a run of the mill one in the raised beds, so I think you will get a sense that I like them.  I believe that there is also a green/white variegated one skulking in the side garden the other side of the new gate, which has been there on and off since we moved in.

The only downside is that they have a slight, and only slight, not unpleasant, but weird smell if you brush against it.  It is smoky almost ... don't judge, but is a bit like sniffing a recycled black bin liner.  NOT that I do that on purpose.  Oh dear, that statement makes it seem that I have a problem with doing that, butI don't want you to suspect I might actually do that!  I need to stop it's just getting stranger.

Please do not be put off by that strange paragraph above, it is not a problem smell and definitely should not be considered a drawback to considering it.

Hugs

Kay xx

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#19 - Second shift today - hold on to your hats as it has turned into a long ramble ....

 I started work early this morning very early, 7.am early in fact to beat the heat, as it gets very warm on the top bed.

I started off by lifting up the board between the bark path and the boarder edge under the arches.  The pile of weeds was just one of many, and need to a bulk bag to go to the tip, as the usual Brown Bin collection is delayed due to a local authority strike - it's not going great for them at the moment.

Then moved on to weeding more of the bed ready to transplant about 12 or so Foxgloves from the raised beds that had self-seeded last year.

The next photos are just here for safekeeping, so please ignore it, or enjoy the half trimmed hedge, which is our rear boundary (not the boundary for the tenant at the rear to trim), which is what happened last week.  We had purposefully left it long whilst the hedging of Laurel and Viburnam Tinus grew up.  Of more importance,  its bird nesting season and so they had no business cutting it for that reason, let alone that it does not belong to their property.  I have been in contact with the local authority as it is a social housing tenant, and need to send them some photos, so in case I accidentally delete it from my device.

You can see the line where I stopped them, I have no idea what was going through their heads as they know full well that the boundary belongs to us. It is not that in the appropriate season I would necessarily have objected to a height prune, but would have liked the option to control what was taken off.  Obviously, there are no objections to them trimming the face of the hedge their side, but the height is definitely not in their gift with out prior agreement from us.  

As Bird Nesting is from March to end of August (better September) in the UK there would have been plenty of time to organise permission from us.  Actually, the contractor they used got a sharp talking to about being aware of Bird Nesting and boundary ownership before starting work.  Our son is a Fencing and Garden Maintenance Contractor, and I know that he always checks, and is right up there on bird nesting legislation.

There is no point in being low frequency and angry about it, as I am realistic enough to realise that the vegetation cannot be glued back on, but the Warden is go have a word with them about their behaviour and remind them of the correct procedure etc.

Anyway, on to nicer things.  Monday is Top Bed day and it is now looking a bit better, with first pass weeding of most of it, and second pass weeding of some of the area done at the weekend.  

The eagle-eyed of you will have spotted the wheelbarrow full of my efforts and the big pile next to it.  Lots of Buttercup, Dock Geum and the grass that shall not be named.

What a joy the emerging gloves provide, they always remind me of Beatrix Potter and Jemima Puddleduck illustrations from childhood..  The perfect and quintessential cottage garden.

Indeed, I  made such good progress that some Foxgloves were also moved from the raised beds, well before at 8.30 and I stopped for breakfast, and are now snuggled in with their new bedfellows. Who have lovely blooms just forming.  There is a Robinia and a Grevillea (I think it is called) that need to be moved out to new beds.  Iris plants that need to move in, along with about 12 Shasta Daisy plants I raised from seed last year, and some other large clump forming Daisy plants that came from Mother in Law's beautiful garden.  So the area will be quite full when it is finished.  At the moment it has just tipped over from an area of shame to on the verge of being really quite lovely.

After breakfast and a well-earned rest I sallied forth again, as I’m repairing the stone wall by the gate (to retain soil mostly), and I can then plant up with Lobelia. and golden Lamium.

 I also moved a bit more compost from the old bin site into its new location.  It is dirty work, but somebody has to do it, and somebody is me!

The Big Boy Hot Bin is still pending a move, but it is not a single-handed task.

The fence is looking good in the Cuprinol Ducksback in  Forest Green looks great on the fence.  We painted the other side yesterday, and that is also looking mighty fine. It's a bargain at the moment from Wickes at £8 per 5L pot.

Hugs Kay xx

#18 - One out of four and the big boy

 

Compost Bins that is.

Yesterday I managed to lift off the plastic compost bin, and re-locate it to the side of the willow, there are three more to also move, hopefully, before the weekend.  Then darling Husband can give me a hand to move the big boy Hot Bin over as well - that folks is going to be a task and a half, but I really don’t want this working area to be as discreet as possible.

I also made a start digging over the bed in front of the new fencing, but called a halt after scraping off some of the carefully back-filled Earth done by the eldest kid as the bottom panel, and more importantly the gravel board need to be painted.

If it stays dry this evening the darling one will paint it for me, if not that will be tomorrow’s job, as I still need to top off and backfill the wall with large stones so that I can start to plant up.

The Cotinus in the pot is auditioning, if it stays there it will probably go further back, but nevertheless it needs a home somewhere.  That is definitely the problem with being a plantaholic, a new home for something or other is always required.

Having ground to a halt here, I moved on to weeding the top bed, which has expanded massively, but was sadly neglected last year.  Plenty of the grass that shall not be named, Dandelion and Buttercup to pull.  It’s a behemoth of a task.

I know there should be no shame in the garden game, but it is not looking good, or at least, it’s looking better than it did.  A rock is marking the spot where a small water feature is going, and so I will have to work around that as a Buddleja has self-seeded at the back, and needs to come into the sun.  There are a couple other inappropriately placed shrubs to move.  I have enough Shasta Daisy plants to sink a small ship, which are desperate to go somewhere, so expect to see at least three there.

I need to watch my time outside today, as I managed around over 4 hours yesterday, and over did it a bit.  The problem is I forget the time.

Hugs

Kay xx

#17 - You could of heard me belting out a tune this morning

 CeCe Penistan would be livid too.  ‘Finally, uts happened to me, right in front of my eyes’ ...

It’s the small things that make me ridiculously happy, or in this case a large thing that has taken its blasted time to being nursed and tended from inauspicious beginnings.

Meet my one and only Aquilegia (currently), with the variety lost in time, that was rescued a few years ago from an overturned seed tray deep that had been blown over in a storm and the rest of its seedlings perished.  

It has been nurtured, and also nearly bitten the dust a few times, but despite all the odds is now this beautiful specimen, and looks like it will be cream or pale yellow.  I can’t wIt for it to fully bloom.

Judging by the slowness of my recently sown seedlings, Aquilegia might be slow growing, so you could end up for a two or three year break before there is this level of enthusiasm seeping through the screen, because when all8# said and done, it one of my favourite perennials, and a cottage garden staple.

Hugs

Kay xx

#16 - A good day of work

 … and the new gate and fencing at the side rear has been done ...

It’s a difficult area  to work with as the bank is a lot steeper than it looks and has a camber  A huge rambling rose had to be cut back hard to install the Reed fence panel, which left a gaping hole in the boundary fence and hedge too, so a short term solution is the Reed screen, by the time it’s worn out the Laurel will be much bigger.  It looks distressingly small in this picture, but is in fact larger than it appears. I am rubbish at photography!

We have been debating a triangular trellis atop the fence panel, doubt will no doubt kick the idea back and forth for some time until the right solution is found.  

There is still plenty of work to do, like painting it all, which begun this afternoon when there was not a cloud in the sky, but has been halted by patches of spitting rain. Isn’t it always the way?

An unknown animal has already damaged the corner of the Reed, and so we have had to come up with a solution to stop it from creating a bigger hole … honestly, it could have just gone around and behind the screening rather than create a somewhat cartoonish hole in it.  We clearly need to have a chat.

This morning a few plants hopped in the car from the Nursery at Horam, some for this area, vegetables for some of the raised beds and  a nice tray of container plants for outside the front door,  it more on that over the next few updates, one in particular is really exciting.

For the rest of the week it is more weeding elsewhere in the garden and ground preparation in this area before the planting  can begin.

Hugs

Kay

PS:  Supplier of fencing, posts and gate was Tate Fencing and installation was down by eldest kid and my darling Husband.  The kid despatched a good amount of old tree roots, and the most god awful grass in vast numbers that just spreads everywhere,  I am not going to dignify it with a botanical name, as it most definitely does not deserve one.