Autumn leaves...
Autumn leaves, autumn leaves - I remember now. The yellow leaf fall comes first - the elm leaves turn the colour of ripe corn and the driveway gets its soft golden leaf carpet.
Bengal Tiger Canna Flower
Sunday 18th April
I sang in a concert last night. Definition of a really nice singing friend: not only do they have rhythmic integrity (great pitch and warm tone, naturally, are taken for granted) but they offer to come out and help the Head Gardener plant a thousand daffodil bulbs! This is such a nice thought, but today the Under Gardener (me) has promised to get the remaining bulbs into the ground.
The Black Singing Pants...
And never mind the singing friend - how about the loose black singing pants? Thanks to my Shape Up for Life Campaign they almost slithered to the ground in the middle of 'The Lord is My Shepherd' - granted, it was the Vicar of Dibley version. Oops...
Yellow Roses
It's been a funny old weekend, and the garden has been really quiet, with no Non-Gardening Partner to organise. I have more horse manure to pick up, and I've bought some daylily clumps in an online plant auction. The internet is down so I can't get up to any more auction mischief - or check my spam (springtime in the northern hemisphere means the resurgence of certain spring accessories on offer). Anyway, I'm springing out into the house gardens.
Morning Coffee Time...
+20Totally catless, I've cleared around the decking, dug in more bulbs, and weeded. I've also raked up a thousand gum tree leaves (the first of many more for today). And now I am having a gentle rest with my dog (he's bored again). I've had great musical bellbird company - they've been flitting around the branches high in the big gum tree, and I'd love to think they were whistling at me...
My latest gardening book is a large, overweight treasure called 'Extraordinary Gardens of the World' by Monty Don. I am collecting quotes (I like the one about planting for mass, not mess), and getting a healthy dislike for trimmed shrub globes, regardless of them being sensitively manicured with an electric hedge trimmer - no petrol or diesel, thank you very much! India's temple gardens and Japan's serene raked sand and rock gardens have washed right over the top of my head.
Autumn is Here
Now it's back to the real reality - gardening on one's own underneath gum trees with a bored dog and a huge bag of daffodils still to plant (I reckon the numbers multiplied in the night). Time to forget communing with the genius of the place, or being blithe and quirky...
Late Lunchtime...
Hee hee. I am naughty, typing with grubby fingertips. I've done a huge amount of clearing in the top of the Jelly-Bean Border, with more pockets of mixed daffodils planted. I'm trying to put them all in the slightly new garden developments, where I can see them from the house.
- ‘Let your private garden evolve through your whims and caprices.’
- -Monty Don.
Late lunch will be taken on the rustic garden bench, when I will visit yet more extraordinary gardens with Monty Don. There'll be moon gates to peep through, and stone sculptures to admire. I'm going to let my private garden evolve through my whims and caprices (I pinched this phrase from Monty Don).
Monday 19th April
Right. I've already been around the big country block cycling with my dog. The hoses are on. I have a half a normal bucket (?) of daffodils left to plant. They are going near the Glass-House, whose garden is a disgrace. Some silly gardener thought she'd weeded it about three weeks ago, but didn't take any mulch-action. So a new generation of little weedy green things is happily growing in the soil spaces, grateful for light and room to breathe. Hopeless! How many times have I told myself - take a barrowful of weeds out, and put a barrowful of mulch on. Aargh!
New Garden Chrysanthemums
I'm so fired up I'm taking my morning coffee out there immediately. The word in the paddocks is that the fire ban will be lifted at midnight. Phew! I can start my major clean-up (which I thought I'd started, but never mind).
Lunchtime...
Prepare for a long story. I got as far as the back door, and then saw the Allium bulbs I hadn't yet planted. Idea! I would dig the coarse Carex grasses (who on earth planted those in here?) out of the middle of the roses and perennials garden to make Allium space. Horror! Weeds everywhere. The dig-out took ages. I then saw old plants which I needed to collect the beans off, a raspberry which had thrown its roots out of a large pot and was building little raspberry plants for me all through the vegetable garden (thanks a bunch), phloxes and scrophularias which needed trimming...
Only A Rose...
Then I found lots of little pieces of nasty creeping grass, seedling Aquilegias, silly tomatoes fallen over covered in green fruit (I don't make green tomato anything)... AARGH! My garden is too big? My garden ideas are too big? I have mass AND mess?
Two Hours Later...
Sorry about that petulant, bold, upper case outburst. I have taken matters into hand by planting the Alliums and the remaining daffodils. I am now going apres gardening - I will have a calming drink of Chamomile tea and finish reading about all those 'Extraordinary Gardens of the World'. Nobody writes gardening books about 'Ordinary Gardens of the World', do they? Hmm... Might be a good idea for gardening self esteem - pictures of weedscapes and forgettable paths which lead nowhere interesting...
I finished my up-and-down day taking photographs of roses in bloom at the moment. Ah - such beauty, such strength, such gentleness... I am re-inspired (it doesn't take much).