Hobbies and Crafts

Happy new year Kandj and everyone. May your gardens all blossom and give you great pleasure in 2016.

I noticed some daffodils in bud out in the border today. They are the February Gold variety. Much too soon to flower yet! What will we do in Springtime when the bulbs have flowered and we will have little left to cheer us up after "Winter"??

And, as ee are told to expect a cold spell next week,mwhat will happen to all the plants floweing or in bud. Some of our daffs have already flowered and gone over. Very confusing for nature. Listening to the birds singing today, I am sure they think it is spring.

Men! Grrr!

Apologies to any male gardeners looking in. It's just my man who has got me grinding my teeth.

Because our garden was newly planted this year I've been a bit late with doing any Autumn cutting back. It's been so mild that it hasn't mattered much but I have been trying to catch up over the last couple of weeks. Two days ago I went to deal with some perennials that are supposed to be cut down to just above the ground when they finish flowering. Did that OK but was puzzled because there was no sign of the hemerocallis in front of them. Mr Tidy Garden had cut them completely down and there is no sign of them. He assures me he didn't pull up any roots so I hope they are going to shoot again.

Then I noticed that another bed had some suspiciously bare patches. You're ahead of me aren't you? That's right, Heavy Handed Harry had been at it again and the Achillea had been for the chop.

At that point he thought he had better mention that he had pulled up some dead flowers.

Me: We only planted shrubs or perennials. Are you sure they were dead?
Him: Well, they looked dead
Me: What plants were they?
Him: Flowering plants. I don't know what they are called.
Me: You'd better show me where they were.

Yup, he's pulled out some asters that had died back and not yet thrown next year's shoots.

I used to think he was quite good in the garden but in our old house we had a very large garden with lots of mature shrubs and trees and surrounded by a big hedge. He could chop away at those without doing much damage. He also did a fair bit of weeding and if he sometimes pulled up a flower by mistake it didn't notice amongst so many. In our newly planted little garden, mistakes show :-(

Rant over. At least he's a good decorator and has promised to start on the bedroom next week. That'll keep him out of the garden for a week or two :-D

Vera
I feel for you. ;-) ;-) ;-)

My mister interferon is only allowed to prune under very close supervision :-D :-D :-D

Actually we've reached an agreement now that he does the landscaping and I do the planting :-D :-D :-D

:-D :-D my man who does is banned from anything that involves identifying plants that have to be left/dug up except under supervision. But I daren't plant too many seeds in the ground, he has not grasped the concept that all seedlings are not necessarily weeds.

Oh dear Vera, I also had my very own "Master of Disaster" who would pull up anything dead looking and once demolished a beautiful 30yr old Hebe shrub...... don't ask!!!!!!
Now he isn't well enough to do damage to the garden (or anywhere else to be honest)
but he admires my humble gardening efforts with the very limited time I have just now.

There are very many bulbs showing in the tubs and borders. I hope that the frosts won't harm them at all. The Seasons are all over the place and it is just not natural.

Kandj, perhaps I should be grateful then that my man who does is still fit enough to cause mayhem in the garden!!! I am sure that yours gets pleasure from looking at the garden though. <3

Yes Ann (Von/Vera) be happy your husband's are well enough to "help" ha ha.

We still have a chuckle about the many times hubby messed up big time in the garden and I blew my top. It seemed very important back then. Now I think differently.

Trying to snow here. Very dark we have the lights on. Could be a long day hey ho.

You're right of course kandj. I am thankful that OH is still in pretty good health and able to create havoc in the garden. It would just be nice if he wasn't quite so "hands on" and would either ask or check with one of our gardening books before pulling plants up

He has started on decorating our bedroom and I know he will make a good job of that :-D

Always nice to have a newly decorated bedroom vera, makes you want to rush out and buy new curtains, bedding etc. Not that I want to encourage you of course :-D

I don't need any encouragement Ann :-D. I'm planning on new bedding. We don't have curtains anywhere in the house - we bought the existing blinds from the previous owners. I did consider putting some curtains up in the bedroom to brighten the room up a bit. Although there are 3 windows it doesn't get the sun at all but I was afraid that curtains might make it look even darker, and anyway they would only work on 2 windows so the other one would have to keep the blinds.

Now, a couple of nice bright pictures on the walls is a different matter altogether. I shall be taking himself and his wallet on a tour of the art shops. ;-)

and getting the ones you like no doubt :-D :-D :-D

We have just been round to the garden centre where they half price seeds sale. also bought a half price rhubarb in a pot, thought it was worth risking £2.99. also with the seeds, if you bought two packs you got a free pack. We don't grown many seeds (although they are tempting, so many different sorts) but we did get two sweet pea, a baby carrot and tom thumb lettuce, then free French marigolds and another free pack of reddish marigolds the same height as the french ones.

good to see all the potatoes on sale too, it does make you think that spring is not so very far away. I think we may go to another local nursery tomoroow where they specialise in potatoes this time of year, be interesting to see what new varieties they have.

Just been to buy our second early potatoes from a local garden centre that has potato weekend. Not a garden centre we go to often because it is quite a small one but have made a mental note to go back in the summer, or warmer time. They have a charity there called the butterfly garden, Young people mostly who are disadvantaged in any way, disabled etc go to 'help' with the butterflies. so there were a couple of areas selling things to support the butterfly garden. We don't grow many potatoes so just bought 3 tubers of four different varieties but it was fascinating to see how many varieties there were, I didn't count but way over 100 different. (also bought a book, a pack of dinasaurs and one of the photo 'things' that you plug in a USB to see photos displayed, for the charity). We did have a cup of coffee but weren't impressed with that, cheap instant in paper cups. still it was hot and cheap. It is sooo cold out there though so we were glad to get home.

No prizes for guessing who the dinosaurs are meant for Ann.

I do miss going to browse around garden centres. A gardening catalogue came in the post this morning, so I will enjoy finding five spare minutes to lose myself in the pages.

I do like the idea behind the butterfly garden and the special charity Ann. Well worth supporting I would have thought.

Hope you had a good browse through the catalogue Kandj. Just back from three garden centres, OH managed to get some of the large wicker hanging baskets in a sale for £2.99 each, I got a pair of gardening gloves for £2 in the sale and I also got a rather nice lightweigh jacket, material but unlined, an indoor one really in a sort of maroon/black tartan type design (sounds weird but difficult to describe. It was half price and I thought a good buy for holiday evenings. That was all in one garden centre, the other two we just called in to see if they had any window stickers, the decorative type, they used to be all over the place one time but none of them had them today. Never mind I shall look on line. I want one for the shower sceen because if it is left open it is easy to bump into. (I know, it would be easier if not left open, tell my OH that! :-()

Not got around to finding time to browse through the gardening catalogue yet Ann,
it is still on the worktop and looking tempting!

Your jacket sounds a good buy..... I do like a bargain. £2 for gardening gloves is too good to miss. I have several pairs myself but would be tempted to buy more at £2.

I noticed that there are 3 daffodils in bud in the border, but being blown about today.

We have some winter aconite in bloom and a couple of viburnum shrubs and the earlier of our two witch hazels, a coppery red one, looks as though it is going to break into bloom very soon.

I went to the supermarket yesterday and got tempted to add a white agapanthus bulb to my basket. I have three big pots of blue agapanthus plants of different heights and they do really well and look a picture when they are in bloom on the patio so I thought I would try a white one.

I'm feeling very pleased with myself at the moment. I have made a "Plant Care Schedule", a table with headings: Plant Name, Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter and Notes. On it I have listed all the new plants we have put in - it goes on to several pages; I didn't realise how many different plants we had bought. Under the different seasons I have put notes in blue for when it flowers, red for when and how to prune, green for when and how to propagate and black for general notes.

The idea is that when himself gets the urge to swing the shears or secateurs around I can thrust it under his nose and make him check the list. Hopefully that will avoid him demolishing too much but I am not optimistic. ;-)

Horrible weather here today, yesterday was almost spring like today we are back in winter with a vengeance as it is very windy and wet. No birds and the crocus have all shut their flowers back up.

Kandj so you still have the pleasure of the garden brochure to come.

Vera, that is a great idea. Make sure your OH knows it exists so he knows to look first and chop afterwards!!! :-D