Quietly, gently...
Quietly, gently, with minimum fuss and maximum efficiency I am going to have the best winter gardening day ever. And so far during the month of July I've set a pretty high standard...
Blue Wall on Garden Shed
Tuesday 20th July
I'm mentally fresh from my non-gardening day - four hours of up-and-down walking along the cliff-tops on what must be THE perfect winter walk. My old-lady knees are feeling somewhat interesting, since they've not seen sloping ground or hillside steps for five weeks.
Image is Sometimes Everything!
My plans are as follows. It's a wonderfully mild day, so I will dig the post holes for the shed verandah first, and realign the path which passes the shed side. I will clean up the building debris and weed the surrounding garden. Image is sometimes everything! Counting myself lucky that I didn't win an auction for ten eighteen year-old roses (eek! I am now imagining their knobbly thick necks) I will content myself with planting my six Glamis Castle English roses (fresh young things, waiting in pots). There's Mugsy the cat's Black Boy peach tree to plant, and my strawberries.
Glamis Castle Roses
And I really must do some kneel-and-weed sessions. The ground will be wet, those rather worn knees will get muddy, but I need to pay attention to some little things. And I promise myself to take lots of real winter photographs. Right. I'm off outside - there's no time to lose. I am certainly overflowing with garden promises and grand intentions.
Post Holes
Later, Mid-Afternoon...
Ouch! My shed's three post holes have had their dirt dug out (clawed out might be a better description). I've done a long session of weeding around the house gardens. Two of my new steak knives have proved invaluable in trimming dead flax leaves. I've had lunch and hot coffee, and now I'm off for a final short session. I intend to burn all my rubbish. And if my hands get too sore, too bad.
Much Later...
I did heaps. But I decided not to plant anything - in a frenzy of fern trimming I wondered about planting some roses in their place at the side of the house. When I have too many places to plant roses, I need to step back. Either I'm kidding myself, forgetting the sun etc., or I genuinely have lots of room, and that means another buying spree. Any new rose spending has to be seriously justified.
Sorry, but I spent the last two hours poking at and feeding my bonfire. The light got gloomier and gloomier, and so no photographs could be taken.
Wednesday 21st July
I'm taking my dog for his morning walk down the road - we will discuss the sensible positioning of my Glamis Castle roses. So when I return I will know THE SPOT! I will take some garden photographs today, though they will be of dampness and gloomy greenery. And then I will plant, plant, plant...
Winter Phormiums
Ha! I'm back, all coffee-ed and iPod-ed and ready to go. In honour of winter I have my camera in my hand ready to record what is out there. Hopefully when I report back I will have squillions of accomplishments to list.
Late Lunchtime...
I am very proud of myself. I've stayed in one garden area (the Glass-House Garden) and weeded, planted four of the new roses, pruned last year's rescuees (one of which I think is Just Joey) - and taken the hedge clippers to all the Hebes. As an experiment I've trimmed all the leaves off one of the coarse Carex grasses - if the regrowth is swift and pretty, then I'll do this to the others along the water race. Their roots stabilise the banks, so I don't really want to dig them out and start again with smaller, nicer plants.
Carex trifida
And in honour of summer I have just won an online auction for a disgracefully tubby garden gnome wearing shorts and jandals. He will need painting, and perhaps I could make him a little vest, to cover his podgy tummy... Is this the subtle start of senility? Next I'll be sewing clothes for a roomful of teddy bears...
My family already thinks I'm showing signs - they laugh at me watching the summer cycling on the Tour de France. I have finally made it to some mountains, which mapwise seem to be at the left-hand side of France, and the forests are beautifully light and leafy. My own 'forests' are evergreen and tend to be beautifully but densely green, and often wet. Of course it's different going TV-couch-cycling - I keep being swept up in a helicopter and flown along escarpments and up green mountains (and last week over chateaux). Hee hee...
Winter Garden Gnome
Right. I probably have two more hours left in me, so I'm off back outside. Then I'm taking Rusty the dog (such a good gardening companion) for a cycle ride to look for roadkill for my hawk. I think she's back - well, a rather dark brown hawk has been circling overhead for the last days, and she might be having trouble again finding food.
Later Still...
No roadkill. But my last gardening session was super-productive. I planted the last of my white Glamis Castle roses by the water race, just along from the others in the Glass-House Garden. I put my strawberries, Italian parsley, and Hakenchloa in large pots, and raked another barrowful of gum tree rubbish for the bonfire. The second new big pink rose is planted on the fence-line behind the pond, while the third is - oops - still missing, floating somewhere downstream in the water race.
Shush...
And, finally, allow me to present some genuine 2010 July winter garden photography throughout this journal page, including my second to latest garden gnome (pictured asleep on the top of the yellow recycle bin). Enjoy!