Pictures and a few words from the past
Serene Sunday – Sunlight and Shade
gardens
Happy Solstice
For those of us in the northern hemisphere this will be our longest day, though as some bright spark is bound to point out, days are always 24 hours long. In my garden we should have over sixteen hours of daylight and rewilding will be at its peak. To celebrate the solstice our guest blogger Florascribe allowed me to share a few snippets from her new podcast.
‘When I look out of my window I feel I am living in the middle of a field, though my neighbours may not feel so joyful.
While they are busy jet washing their brick paving and vacuuming their artificial lawn, I put pots and tubs everywhere to hide the weeds, or rather the plants that identify themselves as wild flowers.
What is that irritating buzzing while I’m trying to enjoy my breakfast in the garden? Oh yes, it’s the bees I’ve been attracting to the garden. My wildflower meadow now has a solitary cornflower.
I managed to photograph this special rose which only lasts one day before its petals fall off.
Rewilding your gates is an excellent idea if they won’t close properly.
Dandelions thrive if you don’t mow your lawn, in fact judging by my neighbours’ front gardens, they thrive even if you do mow your lawn. Dandelions have lots of medicinal qualities and there is only one downside…
When the sun goes in their radiant beauty disappears…
All sorts of flowers might appear in your wild garden, but Do Not proudly share your pictures on your local Facebook pages, just in case you have grown a prohibited invader that is about to rampage through the neighbourhood.’
My thanks to Florascribe and our thoughts go out to her family who have just reported her missing, believed to be lost in long grass.
Thursday Tiny Trail
Silly Saturday – Garden Guide
The antidote to the Chelsea Flower Show
Didn’t get into the Chelsea Flower show again this year? Your hydrangea not quite ready? Never mind, just have your own show at home. No garden is too small or too untidy to join in.
Show gardeners spend all year and vast amounts of money to recreate that shabby corner of your garden where last year’s plants are trying to regenerate.
The Garden of Good Intentions
Let nature take over and who doesn’t love to be welcomed home by their pet dandelions?
Put pots everywhere and never mind the weeds, some of them will turn out to be flowers.
You can never have too many pots and tubs, or can you?
No Mow May
No need to do any gardening, just call it your woodland corner. How tall will grass grow if the cats and foxes don’t flatten it?
Answer: Grass will reach for the skies, the more obstacles, the taller it will grow.
Happy Gardening
Thursday Trails – Buildings in Bits
Be careful where you go.
Serene Sunday – Floralia
Floralia was an ancient Roman festival in honour of the goddess Flora. We have a lot to thank Flora for!
Tuesday Tiny Tale – Gardeners’ World
And now we visit another viewer’s garden, someone who has created an interesting garden around his self built home on a brownfield site.
‘This is a small, unusually shaped piece of land surrounded by a main line railway, a motorway and a huge Amazon Warehouse. The house itself is certainly unique. Did the house inspire the garden or the garden dictate the house design?’
‘I created the garden first while we lived in the tiny caravan that is now my potting shed.’
‘How long have you been here?’
‘Two years.’
‘That is amazing, the luxuriant feel, the fact we are unaware of the outside world, shielded by mature trees and interesting boulders and you did all this by yourself?’
‘Yes, never done any gardening before, just went on instinct, buying plants and searching scrap yards to create unusual features. It’s been so good for my mental health, creating a garden that would bring joy.’
Two Weeks Earlier
Marcia peered out from the grim unfinished interior of Harry’s unfinished self build house, wondering how she ever got involved with him. The continuous rain had made his so called garden a quagmire; the new plants had given up the struggle to survive amidst the rubble. At least she had insisted on keeping her cosy flat. Marcia had no intention of staying in the squalid caravan he called a park home. As a high speed train raced by she missed half of what Harry was telling her.
‘Camera crew in two weeks’ time, what are you on about?’
‘Don’t you remember Marcy, I told you I had applied to feature on Gardeners’ World?’
‘But you haven’t got a garden, what on earth possessed you…?’
‘I couldn’t get on Grand Designs so I thought I’d show him, Kevin Grand McCloud. Just needs a bit of tidying up, didn’t know all the plants were going to die, a bit of topsoil should do the trick.’
‘Just cancel it Harry and concentrate on finishing the bloody house. I’m going back to my flat right now.’
‘I’m not going to cancel, they do those Flower Show gardens in a couple of weeks. Rick’s mate does Chelsea, or at least he drives the huge trucks that deliver trees. Don’t you worry your pretty head Marcy, I’ve got a plan. A bit of disruption, but we haven’t got any neighbours to annoy.’
Luckily for Harry there were major works going on at the motorway junction and nobody took any notice of the succession of trucks, cranes and pantechnicons making there way to the patch of wasteland that motorists and train passengers thought was part of the creation of a new slip road.
Harry got some of the blokes from work over to help and Rick got some blokes from goodness knows where to help with deliveries. The endless rain at least meant new trees and plants did not need watering in.
Two Days Earlier
‘There we are Marcia, all we need now is an adorable dog to complete the cosy scene.’
‘We haven’t got a dog.’
‘That’s okay, Rick knows where to get one.’
Two Days Later
Police are investigating a series of reports of audacious burglaries from country estates, professional gardeners and quarries. It is not known if they are connected. The thieves took mature trees, plants, sculptures and a Great Dane. One theory is that professional gardeners preparing for the garden show season have been targeted.
Tuesday Tall Tale – Slow Radio
And finally in breakfast news a surprising hit. Slow Radio slots have become popular as calming moments of bird song or rowing boats. The latest is a continuous live broadcast 24/7 from a quiet little road somewhere. The location remains secret to protect the inhabitants, human and otherwise. Listeners have been tuning in to hear everyday sounds of hum drum life, dogs barking, people chatting. In the dark watches of the night insomniacs and night workers say there is still plenty to hear, the haunting cry of foxes and the whisper of the milkman’s float.
As residents fetch their bins in on Monday morning there is plenty to hear so let’s drop in.
I found your food bin in the middle of the road.
Oh thanks, did you hear the wind last night?
Yes, my lid blew open, cardboard and paper all over next door’s lawn.
There’s a nurse going in over the road, she was there yesterday.
Is it him or her?
Goodness knows, haven’t seen either of them for ages.
You never know what’s going on with that high hedge.
Do you mind taking a parcel for next door?
Sure, certainly won’t fit through the letterbox ha ha.
I’m not carrying your scooter Dryden, I’ve got the buggy to push, you wanted to ride it to school. BRANDON, stop at the corner. BRAANDON WAAIT. Dryden get on that scooter and catch up with your brother.
Yes of course, I’m not using it today, still not fixed then?
Not coming till Friday now and I‘ve got to get their PE things washed, thanks so much.
Those strange people are across the road again. I call them the creepy couple, coming this way since lockdown. At first I thought they were trying to steal Truffles when I saw them squatting down poking their hands through the fence.
Pity they didn’t steal him, we would have been saved all that barking.
He ran straight in my house the other day, nearly caught the cat.
Aren’t your daffodils looking good.
Yes, despite being battered by the wind and rain.
So what do you want at the greengrocers today?
Some of those grapes as long as they don’t have pips, one banana, not too big, not green, but not too ripe. Can you manage potatoes a well… oh look he’s on the roof again.
I don’t believe it, she must be away, surely she wouldn’t let him, what if the ladder blows down while he’s up there.
I reckon you’re right, he is rebuilding that chimney stack.
How old do you reckon he is?
Well he was retired when we moved here.
I can’t see him, hope he didn’t fall down the other side…
Truffles, Truffles, come here at once… sorry, sorry, are you okay?
I can’t talk now, I’m out in the street, no it isn’t a good time, how did you get my number anyway?
Truffles, come out of the lady’s nice garden. Sorry, sorry, yes I can see what he’s done I’ll just pop home and get a bag to clear it up, once I’ve caught him…
Oh here he is coming round to the front, he must have a ladder at the back as well. Was that Truffles running by?
The producer of Slow Street 24 is in the studio with us. Why do you think this has become so popular?
People need a break from their frantic lives, they just love to hear from somewhere where nothing is happening.
And do the residents mind being recorded, doesn’t that mean they are guarded in what they say?
Not at all, they don’t know they are being live streamed.
Monday Madness – Febmas
How was Febmas for you?
Strange guests?
Or a touch of spring?
The traditional Febmas morning run?
What is the most unusual cheese you had for Febmas? Answer to this one at the end.
How many Aliens came to your garden?
The traditional Big Shop for Febmas. How much does this box weigh?
For most of us Febmas is over now and time to get ready for spring.
Answers, not necessarily in the right order…
6.5 kilograms
One
Chocolate, Cheshire cheese and brandy.
Tell us about your Febmas, strangest cheese and visitors…
Tuesday Tiny Tale – Under The Weather
Fliss pulled open her bedroom curtains and sighed with delight. The rising sun set a rosy glow over the garden, it was going to be beautiful for her day off.
She waved everyone off to work and school and settled with her coffee in their so called sun lounge, the make shift extension her husband had cobbled onto the back of the house. With the autumn sun streaming in sideways, as she sat in the rickety cane chair, she could imagine herself to be in a posh conservatory.
The garden called, but so did the common. She felt so energised she could easily do her 10,000 steps, come home, plant all her spring bulbs, quick lunch then take her mother to the garden centre as promised, lovely relaxing afternoon tea and a good gossip. They could go in that farm shop and get some nice things for dinner.
Everyone was out on the common, walkers, joggers and dog owners; lots of people she knew or at least familiar faces who always smiled and waved. She should get a dog, why not, just because the rest of the family protested and vowed never to walk it if she brought a dog home. She would walk it herself twice a day, while doing her 10,000 steps, or 20,000, she was ready for 20,000. She smiled at dog walkers, already feeling part of the canine community and just laughed when a muddy retriever jumped up and left paw marks on her clean trousers. A labradoodle or springer spaniel would be perfect.
Back at home she scattered the bulbs all over the lawn, no more mowing, wildflower field with naturalised bulbs. Fliss dug enthusiastically into the tough wet grass; she could send a video in to Gardeners’ World, the new puppy trotting through the flowery meadow, perhaps she would get two dogs. She could take them into work, it was a wonderful company she worked for, very welcoming to children and pets of staff members, all part of looking after colleagues’ mental health.
Without warning everything suddenly went dark, Fliss looked up. The blue sky had disappeared and dark clouds rolled over the roof of her house, large rain drops landed on her nose. She looked at her watch, that time already, why had she agreed to take her mother out on her only day off? No doubt her mother would spend the afternoon complaining about anything and everything.
Fliss rushed to put the tools away and on impulse tossed the rest of the bulbs in the compost bin. The garden was a mess, John was right, might as well cover it all with a useful patio and he could knock down his dreadful extension at the same time. She stormed indoors and consumed a whole bar of her daughter’s chocolate while she threw on some clean clothes. If her mother commented on her choice of outfit she would definitely lose her rag. No time to think about this evening’s dinner, she wasn’t going to waste her day off cooking, they could take a turn in the kitchen for a change and if Johnn didn’t start doing his share of housework she would hand in her notice at work. She hated the job anyway, whatever possessed her to take it?
As Fliss opened the front door the rain lashed in; all she wanted to do was go back to bed, what a dreadful day.
Times and Tides of a Beachwriter 