Mum's Garden - November

A surprise post and sadly only the one photo. On Saturday I paid a visit to my dad. I took him out for a coffee and I planned to do some work on the garden weather permitting. The last visit I pruned all the shrubs at the front but there was still a lot of dead plants and pruning to do. This time my dad wanted to help. I removed all the dead plants from the summer. I trimmed down a few more plants while my dad trimmed down the plants in the rock garden (thankfully he waited for my advice before starting this time so they may survive). I also trimmed down the small tree at the back.

While dad tidied I planted the spring bulbs as we went. I planted the tulips I saved from last year. I think this may be the last year we get anything from them. Might have to have a trip to Amsterdam just to replace them. I also planted some daffodils and lots of tulips. Lots of red flowers and some spring flowers for the bees. The only bulbs that weren't planted were crocuses but I plan to do that tomorrow. Spring next year should be more colourful than this year. I think my mum would be pleased.

Believe it or not there were still a couple of flowers in bloom. The roses each have a flower about to bloom. There was also a poppy and some kind of orange flower on display but I had to remove them to tidy the garden. Sadly, I wasn't able to take photo's. We didn't have time before the light began to fade and I think my dad just wanted it done. Will save it for next year.

Mum's Garden - July

Today I paid a visit home. I was picking up a few things and took the opportunity to take some photo's of the flowers. After planting them it feels a shame to have missed so much. For example, the hanging baskets have bloomed and are now starting to wilt. At least my dad has been enjoying it and has been sending the odd photo here and there. There are no shots of the whole garden. My dad has been working away and hasn't had time to cut the grass in a while. Looks like a wild garden (not quite that bad). These Dahlia's are looking good though and it looks as though there are some still to bloom. I planted three bulbs in total and they look good at the front of the house.

I also planted these at the front of the house but in a large pot. I can't for the life of me remember what they are called but they look like little cabbage roses which is why I picked them.

The Lillie's have been growing back each year and this year is no exception. I did plant pink ones at the front but they haven't made an appearance. Perhaps they will next year.

 These are black ball cornflowers. To be honest I'm not entirely sure I like them. At least not where I planted them. They are a little to dark next to the red acer.

The poppies are also out and I discovered where I actually planted them which was at the front and in the little wheel barrow. Sadly, they are loosing their blooms but I did happen to notice a few bees still enjoying them.

The white roses are also coming out. No sign of the yellow though.

The horstas are looking good too. This one is starting to shed already but the others are just starting to open their flowers.

These are Atirrhinum's. These were the little seedlings I had on the window ledge months ago. The Dahlia's which I also had on the window ledge are out too. Sadly the photo didn't turn out and I only noticed it when I get home. I'm afraid they will be gone by the time I get back to the house in a few weeks.

Despite the overgrown grass the garden is looking good. Just some weeding needing done and it won't be long until I start planning for next spring.

Mum's Garden - June 2016

Sorry for the silence the last few weeks. All those months of saying 'when I get my new flat' and now I am finally in there. I am pretty much settled. Just waiting on a carpet and a sofa for my living room to arrive and then I can truly get comfy. In the meantime I am kinda living out of my kitchen and bedroom. Both of which I love. I will do a post on that later (once the living room is sorted).

In the meantime you might have noticed that my red theme post appeared and has now disappeared. It posted before I was finished with it. This is why you should always hit save rather than schedule when you still have editing to do. I will post it later this week. Complete this time.

I may be on the other side of the city but I am still keeping an eye on my mum's garden. My dad has been sending photo's when plants have started flowering and he has been watering the garden during hot days. I was over yesterday to visit my dad and to have a look. I apologies for any weeds. My dad has let them go rampant for fear that they are flowers. I sorted that yesterday.

Believe it or not the first two photo's are of plants which are supposed to be poppies. The cover of the seed pack is an image of a field of red poppies. They don't look much like poppies to me. They are pretty though. I love the pinks and purples.  Fingers crossed the bees and butterflies like them too.

These little pink flowers from a bush near the back door are back on display again. I think they took longer to bloom this year. Although, maybe everything bloomed faster last year. I need to trim the grass around the plant or I would have zoomed out on that one. The bees always love this one.

The pink roses have started to bloom. Sadly I missed the prime of this one although my dad caught it as he sent a photo of it last week. There are more there about to come out and the roses at the front have a few buds too. I can't remember if the ones at the front are white or yellow so I look forward to finding out.

I have a pot at the back which I had been undecided for a long time as to what I was going to plant in it. In the end I decided to leave it for now and use it in the autumn. I haven't been watering it and it was full of what I thought was just weeds. I was then surprised when I saw this little flower which I remember planting for last summer. It's not in the best condition nor is it's neighbours but it was a nice surprise all the same.

PS Happy Father's day folks. That was the real reason for my visit yesterday. My dad got a coffee machine with capsules, sweets and a couple of bottles of nice red wine from both my sister and I. I'm also taking him out to dinner on Wednesday.

Mum's Garden May 2016

Sadly the tulips have been and gone. We had a week of sunshine where they really came out on display. Followed by a week of rain which has resulted in petals all over the garden. When I get the chance I will move the pot to the back of the garden and then save the bulbs as I did last year.

The solitary red tulip was actually the first to bloom and the last to go. I think this would have pleased my mum.

 The tulips aren't the only blooms which have been and gone. The magnolia has also sprayed it's petals all over the garden. It was lovely while it lasted and I am sure it will be back next year.

One plant I thought was a goner was the heather. Which would have been a shame as the bees love it. It was dry looking and if I pruned it I felt that it would have taken the whole plant away. Thankfully I left it alone and then a week or so ago I noticed that it was displaying some colour. The bees will get their favourite plant after all.

A plant that I did prune right down was this fern tree. It was just too large last year and it was blocking all of the sun. My dad commented that he thought I had killed it until I pointed out the little buds that were already starting to sprout. Just days later wee have this and it's looking better now that it isn't so overpowering.

I did get another surprise. This time in the rock garden. These little white flowers appeared next to the yellow. I didn't plant them and they weren't there last year. I think my mum must have planted it and it only came round this year.

We also have some purple flowers coming back. I love these little flowers even though I have no clue what they are. So there is colour slowly coming to the garden. Bulbs I planted are starting to grow and the hanging baskets are quickly coming to life too.

Mum's Garden April 2016

 Friday was Earth Day which seems apt as I have spent the entire week (just about) working on the garden. I've been off this week, my dad has been away and the sun has been shining. Perfect conditions to getting things organised. I have done a lot of planting and apart from a few seedlings that are still on the window ledge everything is pretty much out. All I need to do now is take care of it and watch everything grow.

I am still waiting for most of the plants to start blooming at the back and the front. The same is not true of the rock garden along the side of the house. Old favourites are starting to bloom again and have come up a lot thicker than last year. These little white flowers are among my favourite. They look so dainty and they always seem to come up well.

These yellow flowers have grown a lot thickeer. There were definitely more spaces between the flowers last year. As a result there is a firm block of yellow and it looks lovely. Glad I save these from my father who wanted to pull them up a few weeks ago thinking they were weeds. You would think he would have learned his lesson from when he did that to my mum when she first planted her rock garden.

I planted this last year. I thought it was a gonner as the edges are a litttle brown (I'll fix that next week). The little purple flowers have come back once more though and there are a lot more of them.

The little green rock plant I planted last month had also begun to bloom. I love the deep purple.

This one though Is my favourite. Although I planted it at the same time as the last one the flowers that were there at the time withered and then these blooms have grown back in. So long as I take care to remove the dead flowers each time it should continue to do that during the summer.

As I said I am still waaiting for many fo the plants to bloom. I think these tulips will open in the next week or so. Keeping in mind that I planted these only a few months ago. I looked at one of the neighbours tulips and they are still waiting to bloom too.

While sitting on the bench and having a coffee during the week I happened to turn and look at the plant post on a little set of shelves we have in the garden. I noticed at the back there was a little white pot and I recognised two little buds coming up from it. These are the trumpet lillies that my mum loved. I didn't think they would grow again and so put the pot away and forgot about it. I have since tidied up the pot and added a little more soil. By summer we should have those large beautiful blooms again. I actually bought some more of these bulbs and planted some in the front garden so we should have more of them.

 The Magnolia Tree has also begun flowering again. A little late this year as this was also fully bloomed this time last year. As long as it still does sit I'm not complaining. There was a time when my mum thought this little tree was on its last legs.

There are a few spaces in the garden this year. I got rid of a rather large fern shrub last year. I was planning on getting another Hosta as it was one of my mum's favourites. There are already three of them though and when I saw these rose bushes I couldn't resist. We have a pink one where the shrun should be, a yellow on to the front where we planted sunflowers last year and a white one in a large plant pot. My mum always loved roses. Sadly no red roses but when she had roses in the garden they were usually pink. 

So fingers crossed that next months post will show a garden filled with colour. All this gardening has been giving my wrist and hand a break. The good news is I have been knitting again. Providing I exercise my hand I'm managing the knitting quite well and for longer periods of time. I think it will be a while yet before I can go back to the crochet though.

Mum's Garden March 2016

I have decided that each month I am going to bore you with images from my mum's garden. I'm getting excited over the fact that things that I have planted are now growing and so I want to share. I have a feeling that even when I move I will be over regularly to try to maintain it. The crocuses I can't take any credit for my mum must have planted these although I don't remember them being in bloom last year. These purple ones and the snowdrop were hidden under a shrub. I just missed an image of a large bee in the centre of the flower to the right. Obviously, it heard me coming.

This solitary white crocus was next to the fence amid a host of purple. I think it stands out all the more because of it. I think during the autumn I will have to plant more bulbs for next year.7

Do you remember my mum's tulips last year? My mum bought the bulbs in Amsterdam and the blooms were beautiful. With some advice I tried to rescue the bulbs to use again so that they would bloom this year. I didn't plant them and I thought for sure they would need binning. When I went into the shed to get out the tools I looked and saw that the bulbs were starting to sprout. I popped some of them into a pot with some fresh soil to see what would happen.

They started to grow! It doesn't seem like a lot in this image but this was taken a couple of weeks ago. The leaves are much more prominent now and taller. I hope they flower as well as they did last year. It will be interesting to see. I can't wait for colour to return to mum's garden again.

These were bulbs that I planted last year. I have no idea what they are. I just remember that they didn't grow. Well, they are growing now and I look froward to seeing what they become.

I also planted some seeds to grow on the window ledge before they are ready for outdoors. The petunia's weren't one of them. It's still too early for them, next month I think. I planted the two beneath which are Atirrhinum's and Dahlia's. Dahlia's will attract the bees.

Which is good since they are the ones which have started to sprout. No sign of the other pots sprouting but there is still time.

I bought and planted some other bulbs. I planted Lily's and Peacock Orchids to the front of the garden as it seems a little bare of colour just now. My mum loved the Lily's and I liked the little white flower of the Orchids. No sunflowers this year so there will be plenty of space. I picked the Dahlia's for it's deep red colour.

I couldn't resist this little heather shrub. Our other Heather shrub is looking a little worn and this is brightening up the place already. Hopefully it will do okay. I don't have much luck with plants that are already grown.

I also decided to expand my mum's rockery and added a few more plants to it. This is my favourite. It's called a Primula Victoriana Gold Lace. I am hoping this one will thrive (still waiting for the heather I planted to make any sort of an appearance).

There are already a lot of yellow flowers in the rockery so I picked this Mossy Saxifrage. I like it for it's star shaped flowers.

 Last but not least, this little plant is an Aubrieta. The blooms should be a deep pink. I think it looks rather interesting as it is. Fingers crossed the survive my dad. I am sure I mentioned before that when my mum first planted her rockery my dad came in all pleased with himself. Said that he had got rid of all the weeds from the side. Those weeds were my mum's rockery plants which had just been planted that day.

Some of the other rockery plants are growing back with the spring with a few crocuses among them. My dad asked if I was going to get rid of the bits (his words) round the purple flowers. He has since been warned to leave them well alone. Especially since little yellow flowers have begun to appear.

Finally I leave you with my favourite image of one of those purple crocuses. To the left of the flower you will see little shoots of green peeking into the photo belonging to one of the plants my dad felt should be destroyed.

March WIP

The shawl is back out. I finally went back and fixed the mistake. I contemplated not doing it. It was only half a row but I would see it in the pattern. Not worth the irritation. I then finished the last few rows of the pattern and started picking up stitches for the border. I was so excited. Then I realised I was going to be short of stitches. Back to the instructions I went to discover I had another whole repeat of the pattern and then another repeat less three rows. To say that I was annoyed at myself is putting it mildly. Thankfully you don't break the yarn before starting the pick up for the border. It was just a case of taking out those stitches and going back to knitting the pattern. Which I did and I am half way through that first repeat. I will get this finished yet!

I took a break from the shawl to get a start on my sister's Easter presents. This year she is only getting two pairs of socks. I was planning on finishing her hexie cushion too but since Easter is this Sunday that ship has sailed. Two pairs of socks and a bag of chocolate and goodies. I'm sure she will still be delighted. Her second pair of socks is the Jaywalker pattern and I used For the love of Yarn sock yarn. Very fitting with Spring. I will give more details and link everything when I finish them.

Does planting count as an WIP? I did some planting last week. I have little seedlings on the kitchen window ledge and I will be able to plant them in the garden next month. I actually have a monthly update on my mum's garden so I won't say much more than that for now.

Since yesterday was the first day of Spring I will leave you with this image of an open crocus. There was a bee in there but it disappeared by the time I got my camera out.

Mum's Garden, Spring 2016

I've noticed a few signs around the garden that Spring is coming after all. I was remiss last autumn and didn't plant any of the spring bulbs that I had bought in and yet there are some flowers there. I know that I definitely did not plant any crocuses last year and I don't remember them being there before and yet there they are. The first colour in the garden this year.

The rest I am sure was me and I had given up all hope that they would grow. It must have been that they only needed a year to think about it. Weather permitting, my plan is to get into the garden over the next week or two and get it tidied. It's too late for spring flowers but not for the summer. Sadly I will be handing over the garden to my dad as I hope to move to a place with my own mini garden in the next few months. Maybe he will be more attentive than I was.