Getting Ready

Where did the first three months of the year go?

Here we are on the verge of April and the first visitors are due tomorrow.

One of the scarecrows has had a make-over.

She was in dire needs .... a new head, a new hat and new clothes.

I suppose I should say recycled.

She`s still indoors so far.

I used to wear my hair in plaits but they weren`t mauve!

 

Today I set up the craft stall in the Wool Barn.

Some new crafts and some old favourites.

I put the finishing touches to the fairy garden, having found a gnome 

and a frog in local charity shops.

Most of the special pieces are stored indoors over the winter but the bare bones of the miniature garden are now well established.

I use spaghnum moss to fill in the awkward corners.

My last job of the morning was to plant up another seven huge dahlia tubers in the raised bed.

 Around the rest of the garden the kingcups are glorious.

The forsythia, strangely out of fashion at the moment, is a wild splash of sunshine even on a dull day.

The artichokes are budding up and what buds.

The damson is in blossom.

There is jam for sale in the Wool Barn from last years fruit.

 And finally two of the tortoises are awake and trundling round quite happily.

We are all looking forward to the first visitors.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Biting Bunnies and Bursting Buds

Well, today is the Spring Equinox and there has been a very distinct feel of Spring in the air.

Is it the birdsong?

Is it the two frogs plopping into the pond or the first kingcups opening?

Or a pot of violets whose fragrance fills the air when they are touched?

Perhaps it is Tim and Anne, trundling by on the workmax, laden down with the yurt contents, making them cosy and comfy for the first campers, due on 1st April.

Could it be that the first tortoise has woken from his Winter sleep?

(The other two are still dozing.) 

 

Well who knows? It is just in the air.

 

I think the garden is beginning to look ship-shape though I do have to blinker myself and stick to the jobs I`ve planned.

 

 Everywhere I look there seem to be tasks that are fairly urgent so it is a matter of which is the most pressing.

There`s a predominance of yellow.

 

 

Buds are bursting.

Bunnies are biting.

 Beds are being planted.

Onion sets are in.

 

Oh yes we`re definitely all go, here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Denim Stash and Pink Daisies

After a holiday in Fuertaventura, we are happy to be seeing the colour green, not to mention trees.

Thank goodness for our trees.

And our daffodils, camellias and pansies.

Much as I love that early Canarian sun, there is nothing quite like an English spring.

Our gardening year has begun.

Today I potted on 73 successful geranium cuttings.

I did a little experiment putting some cuttings in terracotta pots and some in plastic. I have to report that the ones in plastic pots, made more roots.

 

On the left terracotta and on the right plastic.

We have a great deal of tidying up in our own garden before much can be planted in beds but we made a good start today.

I sorted all our green stakes sawing off rotten ends and Steve began a new woodshed.

The sun was shining and the birds were singing.

Around the garden the camellias are beautiful.

The magnolia stellata living up to its name.

 Bellis daisies in the pink.

Our euphorbium is colouring up well.

And the choisya has new bright red growth.

Indoors I am on a quest to stash bust my denim.

I had not realised I `d accumulated so much.

(Thanks Julia.)

The scraps are for the childrens` nursery.

Tonight I have pieced the patches together.

Quite a lot of pressing to do tomorrow.