A Garden Update

Hello Lovelies, I wanted to give you a quick sweep around the garden because I have to say that it brings me so much joy.

In our home, it used to be me who was the gardener, but over the past year my husband has become a keen gardener and it all started with him putting in that pond and the firepit garden. He is hooked and there is not a weekend that goes by that he is not doing something in the garden.

He does more of the heavy work while I like to potter about, grow things from seed and then plant them to see what happens. Most times I am successful but sometimes I am not. That's gardening for you!

I mentioned on Monday's post that I planted out all my little seedlings. So far so good - no snail munching has been going on!

I have had a few shrubs that I planted out at the beginning of lockdown. They seemed to take an age to get established but this year they are just on a whole different level. It's like they have woken up and said, "Oh right, look where we are! Let's get on and live life!"

This shrub in the foreground is flowering for the first time! It's been here for over two years and was a twig of a thing when I planted it. I was THRILLED to see the first sprays of white flowers. This plant get's huge! I had one in our home in Plymouth and loved it...

This was the one from our home in Plymouth - look at those flowers!

Our secret woodland garden is looking lovely. We placed a bench in there over the weekend and sat for a while. It is SO peaceful. You are enveloped in green and birdsong. I'm looking forward to knitting or stitching here in the summer.

This photograph does not capture all the growth in the beds but I can assure you that there are lush ferns, hellebores, primroses, cyclamens and a rhododendron that are all doing very well!

Here's a little zoom in on one little corner...

The pond garden has exploded too - it's so lush. We put the pond in last year if you remember and the planting although pretty looked new. Now it is looking well bedded. We've even had a frog lay frogspawn in the pond this year!

The Summer house now has electricity so my daughter and I are busy moving in all our arts and crafts things. The idea is that this will be a combination of her art studio and my sewing space. We still have to insulate and then board the inside up but that will happen in the next month or so.

Now a new addition to the garden...I am experimenting with growing veg in the little courtyard between the garage and the house.

It's a little suntrap and I have to say that in all the 11 years that we have lived in the UK I have not had much success with growing tomatoes. The growing is not the problem. Neither is the fruiting. It's the ripening that just -does - not  - happen!

But my lovely neighbour showed me her tomato plant late in the season last year. She has it growing against her garage wall and it produces the most wonderful ripe tomatoes. 

The heat from the wall apparently makes all the difference.

So in this little spot, I have a pot of carrots, 4 bags of potatoes and 4 pots of tomatoes. Watch this space! We shall see how successful my little veggie patch is this year!

I've also sown a whole lot of lettuce in this pot on my deck and I have to say I love the result so far! I started some seeds in trays indoors which did okay. I planted them out a few weeks ago and decided to just scatter all the empty space with more seeds and voila! How amazing does that look!!

In the garden I have 1 mangetout plant - it's the only seed that germinated and I have 1 fine bean plant although something is nibbling at it! I think I may start some more seeds just in case.

I also have two courgette plants which I have planted in a bed near the garage - there is space and it is sunny. Last year we were moderately successful with courgettes but they were planted in the regular bed's traditional cottage garden style but they were a bit starved for space. I think I only got about 7 courgettes off the plant.

We have got so much squeezed into this garden at the moment. My husband was just saying that we still need to find room for all the tulips that were in pots this year. I think we are either going to have to start broadening the beds a bit or get a bit more creative in our planting...like maybe we do a vertical wall garden or a rooftop garden on the potting shed! That would be fun!

The roses are full of buds - I cant wait for them to be in full bloom!

I hope that you are all having a lovely week and are still finding joy in the small things in your own homes. 

May you continue to be blessed and feel God's peace and joy in your homes this week!