Two weeks to my BIG birthday...
Cat and Dog Friends
Yikes! August is nearly finished. That means it's less than two weeks to my BIG birthday! Wow - time to get my presents list published, I reckon! Hmm... That's sixty rugosa roses, or sixty loads of compost, or a voucher to buy sixty new plants from the nursery...
Friday 28th August
Today I worked in the new Cabbage tree grove sawing down gum tree branches, laying path edges (pieces of firewood) and planting the last seven Cordylines. There's even room for a few more! It's been incredibly noisy underneath the trees.
Rusty the dog has been barking at the wind, while Minimus the kitten has been staunchly keeping me company. Whenever I bend down to do anything garden-wise she pops out and smooches my nose. My garden life would be boring - do I mean more boring? - without my cats and my dog.
Blossom
I've got room for probably three or four more Cordylines, and then I might plant some Choisya Ternatas nearer the fence-line to give some textural relief. But whatever is planted in here has to get on with its own growing, and not cause a fuss.
Saturday 29th August
Ha! It's going to be a huge day. A new rhododendron is arriving at lunchtime, having been retired to a good country home (i.e. Mooseys) by my cricket friend. I also have a new large monster rose (having won another online auction, hee hee) which I think is Nozomi.
Lemon Primroses
Organising Non-Gardening Partner
But my most challenging work will be to sweetly organise Non-Gardening Partner. Three things, really - chain-sawing down dead gum trees, getting me a trailer load of compost, and moving the railway sleepers into place by the vegetable garden.
And I've also thought of a fourth - last weekend I bought some rustic garden seats and a bench. They need to be checked for any repairs, because I'd like to put them out in the garden. I mentioned to NGP about buying me sixty new roses for my BIG birthday. 'But you've already got over three hundred' was his tricky reply...
I also have to take loads more spring photographs (I've decided it jolly well is spring). The last days have been shining and sunny, too much glare for good garden pictures. Three more large prunus trees are blossoming - two pinks and a white. Very stylish! And I've just thought of even more things (today in the garden is becoming complicated). I need more perennial Lupins. I love these plants, and I want to mass plant them in a scruffy garden on the sunny side of the house. A prerequisite of mass planting - a mass of plants! Hmm... No time to waste! Out I go.
Later...
Hmm... I did work really hard. And NGP did chain-saw my trees down and get me compost. My cricket friend brought me two pink Azaleas and a Kowhai, as well as a lilac rhododendron. I planted Nozomi by the Shrubbery courtyard. I've spread half the trailer-load of compost on the new Cabbage Tree grove. I'm building a path which encircles it and pops back out on the driveway. That's tomorrow's job.
Sunday 30th August
I woke up early, all excited about the new Cabbage Tree grove. I'm hoping to finish the area today. But when I spend all my time digging and creating new rough-tough garden areas I miss out on other more girlie things - like the red rhododendron flowering, and different patches of pretty daffodils. Perhaps some little weeding sessions in random places would be in order, to check what's up and freshly growing...
Violas Covered in Pine Pollen
But first I have to send my seed order. Looking ahead, looking ahead... And I must slice off more Lupin shoots and pot them up. Looking further ahead... I forgot to do that yesterday. Looking even further ahead... But surely gardeners who look too far ahead trip over (or stand on and squash) all the beautiful things underneath their very eyes?
Much Later...
Wow. A great working day, helped by a friend who I bossed into doing the mainly boring things (spreading the newspaper and the compost). The path around the new garden is finished, edged in firewood logs, and I've cleared the route out into the driveway. Just a few small self-sown Pittosporums got the chop, nothing too serious.
Monday 31st August
Ha! It's the very last day of the month of August. And what a brilliant month it's been. That over-used word 'beautiful' springs to mind. There are more blossom trees in the Hump than I remember, and I've spied many patches of spring snowflakes. Cute. And great weather news - it's rained on my new garden all night.
Another Prunus Tree is in Blossom
Today I am supposed to be hiking in the mountains, but severe gales are forecast 'on the tops'. Our track is arguably 'on the sides', a distinction which the wind may not recognise. So I'm spending the morning in my glass-house doing Lupin cuttings - I have two huge bags of potting mix - and also potting my pelargoniums. If I get bored (?) I might go to the Harry Potter movie.