Giving Gardening a Go

My poor mum's garden has been suffering from neglect this year. Every time we have planned to go out and do some work in it the weather has had other ideas. This week though the weather gods were shining on us. It has been lovely and so we got to work. Or rather, I got to work and mum gave out her orders (I am a newbie gardener, orders were needed).

I wish I had taken some before photo's of the garden as it would really show the difference. I tidied up quite a bit. Especially the Horstas (which I hate). They needed quite a bit of tidying and as soon as I did that the green shoots were shining through. There was also a fern which badly needed cut back. I'm not convinced anything will grow from it but mum has faith. That and she knows better.

We were also able to get some planting done. First of all I picked up this plant for my mum. I know she likes her shrubs and I quite liked the colour of the leaves. It's an Acer which is known as the Japanese Maple. Mum liked it too. So much so she pointed out one she already had - oops. To be fair the one in the garden had only just begun to bud so a newbie like me would never recognise it for what it was.

This one is a Fuchsia plant. Another one that I know my mum loves. She has had these both as indoor and outdoor plants over the years. They are quite pretty when the bloom.

Mum planted these ones. These are her tomato seeds. My sister got her this wee set of pots for her Mother's day one year and she has used it for her tomato plants ever since. They will go indoors until the start to sprout and then they will go outdoors. We actually have a pot in the garden already for them.

That was enough for one day and the garden looked pretty good once we were finished.

Today I went out plant shopping again and picked up some pink geraniums. My mum had asked to get them for her and they were planted in the wheel barrow. The black bin bag underneath helps contain the soil. There are holes in it so that the water can still drain and it doesn't pool in the soil.

I also picked up some marigolds as I remember my mum had them last year and I am sure that she mentioned to get some at some point. These went into the chest that was initially filled with chocolate many moons ago. I am sure I wrote about it in a post about her upcycling this a while ago. I am having trouble finding that first post. I can only find this one from last year although I know I took photo's from the previous year.

There were nine marigolds in the tray and the chest only held 6 so we put the remaining three in this cute little wooden planter.

As you can see I got a wee bit of sun. I have colour in my cheeks that's not been the result of make up. So here are a few things I learned over the last couple of days.

1. The most disgusting looking beasties will get into plant pots no matter how high up they are and I will squeal like a little girl.

2. Walking past slugs is not the same as having to deal with them in the garden and again I will run away squealing.

3. Don't through out your broken plates or plant post. Break them up and put pieces at the bottom of your planters as this will help with drainage.

4. You should really go out earlier than this to do your tidying. Don't leave it like we did, although we didn't have much choice.

5. Don't give up on a new plant. It may come round and flower the following year.

There will be some more things to do next week, weather permitting. Before that I will post some photo's of the plants flowering just now.