Hobbies and Crafts

Hopefully the rain will have loosened the weeds Kandj. Good luck with that and take it easy.

I do take it easy Ann. I have no choice to be honest as I have little energy these days.

It is looking pretty with all the Spring bulbs I planted last Autumn. They cheer us up.

The tulips are almost in bloom and some Daffodils in a shady spot are also about to flower too. The strong wind and rain has battered and flattened the dwarf narcissus that are in the side border. I need to cut them all and bring them inside now.

There are several clumps of bluebells (I think), lots of dark green leaves but little else.
All very interesting. Isn't nature wonderful? Especially on a sunny day like today.

It's been a beautiful day here though it was a bit nippy in the wind. I would have liked to get some gardening done but had other commitments today. I did manage to take the dead flowers off the daffodils. An osmanthus is just coming into bloom and the garden generally looks as though it is beginning to wake up a bit after the winter. OH even thinks he can see some shoots that might, just might, be the anemones coming through at last.

My only worry is the asters we put in as plants in flower in September. They were OK but not brilliant and they have looked very dead all winter. I know they should shoot afresh this year but does anyone have an idea of when they are likely to show a bit of green? Other plants that died back are beginning to show little green shoots or leaves at the base, but the asters just look dead. All advice welcome please.

Ann, I know you are off to Madeira some time this month so I hope you have a good journey and a great time while you are there. I'm sure you'll enjoy all the plants and flowers.

Raining heavily throughout the night and still raining now. Forecast to be a wet few days here in Yorkshire, so no chance of continuing weeding the back garden border.

Vera, it is very many years since we grew asters, a good variety of colour and good cut flowers to have indoors. I'm sure others will answer your question though.

I don't know anything about Asters Vera so sounds as if it is wait and see. I sort of thought they were annuals or biennials.


Madeira we go to in two weeks Vera :-)

The asters we've got are meant to be perennials. I've looked at lots of websites about them but none seem to say whether they are meant to die back completely or when the shoots are supposed to reappear.

It's been a lovely day here again. We had to go out this morning but managed to get an hour or two in the garden this afternoon and got quite a lot done. We planted out four beautiful big hellebores OH had bought for me. They have been in their pots since he brought them home about six weeks ago and they are still in full bloom.

As the frog was AWOL we took the opportunity to clean the "pond" together. That means I got my hands in and pulled out all the dead leaves, muck and gunge, then I cleared out all the dirty water and wiped round the bowl. Himself then levelled it a bit where it had sunk further into the ground on one side and refilled it with water. Fair division of labour? Huh!

We also did a general tidy up of several plants. So the whole garden is looking a bit better.

Yesterday we had a visit from a friend who hasn't been since just after we moved in and couldn't believe how much bigger the garden looks compared to how it was. It's amazing what you can do with a better layout :-D

EDIT: a piece broke off one of the hellebores so I put a picture on to show you how well they are blooming. Unfortunately I am not a good photographer and it is a small picture :-(. This one is a beautiful deep purple red.

Pretty Vera we have lots snd like that colour.

We haven't had any that colour Vera, ours were mostly pastel colours.

The green leaves that I thought might be bluebells have actually flowered and
they are grape hyacinths...... silly me, I had forgotten all about them.

There are several clumps of darker, broader green leaves and so these
must be the bluebells??........ time will tell.

We actually have a helebore that is almost black. It was out the front and got too big so OH split it and gave a small part to our neighbour. The bigger piece heput in the back garden, neighbours is lovely, our is not good at all and this is three years on.

Vera, just having a slight moment of panic. When we get back from here we have7 days to get ready for Madeira and not a clue what clothes to take. Any tips? :-D

It should be fairly warm Ann, but not over hot, somewhere between 17 and 20 degrees. The temperature only drops a bit at night so even at the end of February I got by with just a warm cardi in the evening. One of the reasons I like Madeira is that it never seems to get really cold or too hot.

Changing the subject, has anyone noticed how many ladybirds there are around this year? We seem to have loads in the garden at the moment.

Thanks Vera that is a help, I am pleased that there are a lot of those lightweight cotton trousers around this year. Ideal, I think for the evenings. Shorts or crops in the day. Tee sirts and a few long sleeve light weight tops with a cardigan or two should do it.


Not seen any ladybirds so far though. :-)

We shifted two tons of topsoil today. It has gone to make a nice new border along the new fence along the front . Our side, so we can see it.

I have planted it up with some new plants in blues and pinks. It is a nice long bed, around 75 - 80 feet so I have had to put lots more new plants in !!!! Delphiniums, Lupins, Campanulas, Lavenders, Geraniums, Veronicas, Foxgloves,Roses, Nepeta, Holyhocks and Clematis to name a few.

It's the best bit of soil in the entire garden so I hope they do well.

I also got loads of daffodils in flower in Homebase really cheap so have put them in the grass with the others to boost the display a bit. It's good at this time of the year as you can see where they are planted already and you don't chop them in half when you dig the holes to put the new ones in.

The grass seed on the verge is coming up nicely too, except some idiot in a van felt it necessary to park on it yesterday morning.

The back garden now looks a right old mess ...............

M.

That sounds like hard work Maryanna but a good ongoing project in retirement.

I am sat with a cup of coffee looking at the Pieris Japonica Forest Flame in the front garden which is a mass of new red leaves each Springtime. Absolutely beautiful and admired by all who walk down the street.

Love Pieris Kandj, we lost ours a few tears back when it caught the frost.

You need to put some rocks along the verge Maryanna that would stop the parking.
That was a big job you did with the top soil, I hope all that effort pays off.

Nice and sunny today and so I am continuing daily to weed the back garden border.
Can't really see where I have been, although the green dustbin is half full.

Well, we had a busy morning then a hair appointment at 1pm so after that came back and put a wash load on aiming to go out in the garden for an hour. and it suddenly (after a dry warm morning) chucked it down with thunder. So that was that idea! :-( Still we have got the garden more or less ready to be left for a couple of weeks.

It was the same here Ann. Lovely sunny morning when we had to go in to town and be indoors most of the time, came home and got a sandwich and then, just as we were going into the garden, the thunder started. It seemed to be right overhead and went on for quite a while though there wasn't a lot of rain. It has brightened up again now so OH is outside spraying the weeds that are coming up between all the paving.

Yesterday was a beautiful day and himself split my big hostas for me. As well as a few in the garden I've got 9 in very big terracotta pots that sit on a long path down the side of the house, but they had got enormous and I couldn't move them. I thought we might have to break the pots but OH managed to get 8 of them out without any damage though he did crack the 9th pot. He split them up and put bits back in fresh compost so that job won't need doing again for 2 or 3 years. The leftover bits were potted up and are being given away to various friends and neighbours.

Everything is beginning to grow now and various shrubs are blossoming or are about to bloom. I love this time of year. All the new growth looks so fresh and bright that it makes you feel brighter yourself :-D

Yes we did manage to get back out and the sun shone again, although everything was very wet. I need to take the moss of the top of the Hosta pots but it was too wet to do that. I did get some seeds (lettuce etc) planted in the window boxes that sit along the ledge of the conservatory and OH spread fertilizer/weed killer stuff on the lawn, we needed it to rain to do that, then he cleared the algae out of the pond and did a bit of weeding. My sunflower seeds in the greenhouse are looking very leggy so not sure what to do about them.

Vera, last (I hope :-D) question.
Are pool towels provided at the hotel?