Happy birthday to meeeeee...
Blue Muscari
Happy birthday to meeeeeeeee. All I'm hoping for is another productive (and groovy) day in my beautiful spring garden (wind - please don't blow the blossom down yet). There are lots of daffodils flowering now, plus the first of the little blue Muscari and a few stray weakling tulips. The dark pink Azaleas by the little pond behind the cottage are flowering, too. They look gorgeous against the strong green Phormiums. Pink and green - I love this colour combination in the garden.
Saturday 8th September
After swimming we are off to a Birthday Breakfast, and Non-Gardening Partner has been told he must choose a nice weekend shirt, and wear his weekend socks. I need my 'walking wallet' to look semi-stylish on this special day!
By the way, my spring garden is the best birthday present ever. What more could I want? Hmm - maybe a trailerload of river stones, or compost...
Miniature Daffodils
Later...
Ha! Birthday gardening - what do I feel like doing? I've got the hoses watering the Driveway Border and the Shrubbery, so some weeding in location would be a good idea. The wind is very gusty, and every now and then there's a tinkling sound as a broken branch falls off a gum tree. As long as there are no crashes...
Oh, I forgot. In order to justify the acquisition of eight more garden gnomes (all of whom are now painted, ready to be placed lovingly by my pond) when I already have over eighty (oops) I've made an executive decision. They are my birthday presents to me, hee hee...
Late Afternoon...
I didn't last as long as I should have, but I've finished weeding the round Driveway Garden. The Camellia Cinnamon Cindy with the tiny whitish flowers is flowering, and gorgeous pink Nonie Hayward has lots of buds. Mind you, weeding on one's birthday seems rather mundane and unfair. Shifting hoses around is fairly time-consuming. One has to get the angle just so, and then check to see that the spray is reaching choice plants. This then affects the weeding momentum. That's a load of compostable rubbish, by the way!
Spring Greenery
+2Lilli-Puss has been keeping me company, with much loud purring and leg-rubbing. She's kept me on the hop, though - Lilli climbs up legs if they stay still for too long, and that hurts. No wonder she loves me - I sneaked her a secret dish of gourmet cat food.
Spring Lambs and Gnomes
Regarding the ewes with spring lambs: Non-Gardening Partner has done a proper check. We have four lambs, with one set of twins, and one rather oval-shaped ewe still to go. I hope she has her lamb(s) while the weather is still warm.
Blue Rhododendron
And regarding the new gnomes: my new chaps are now all in position by the pond, and they're happy. I'd like to go on record and state that there's still plenty of water-side room for more. Hmm...
Rhododendrons Flowering
Regarding the Driveway Garden: the red and white rhododendrons (President Roosevelt) are flowering, as is the yellow Forsythia, and a beautiful small blue rhododendron on the far edge of the lawn. It's all so colourful, and my purple wooden garden seats look amazing, if I say so myself. This is their first spring, and so the general colour combinations are fresh and new.
And finally, Regarding the birthday day: I've enjoyed myself, even the weeding, and the garden birthday blossom has been really beautiful. I can't think of anywhere I'd rather have been.
Sunday 9th September
First, chamber music, playing those lovely Bach trio sonatas. Then I took my flautist around the garden for a quick guided tour, and picked her a bunch of mixed daffodils - yellows, creams, lemons, apricots, whites...
Lemon Rhododendron
New Flowers
New flowers we noticed include the following: the lilac Spring Dance rhododendron behind the pond, clumps of cream Bressingham hybrid Bergenias, pretty Hyacinths in pots, the odd random tulip, the pale lemon rhododendron by the Willow Stump (see photograph), and the first Iris confusa with their smallish blue-white blooms.
The woodchip surfaces on my paths get a big blousy tick - they are very soft and pleasant to walk on. And there's nothing like taking a visitor around the garden to notice new things!
+2This afternoon I enjoyed a slow-moving, rather dreamy session of weeding by the water race, watched by Little Mac. This cat has always been fascinated by water, and even fell in the pond when a small kitten. She followed me as I sloshed up and down shifting stones, rebuilding underwater stone walls, and trimming ferns. My day finished down at the river collecting a trailer-load of stones for tomorrow. Yippee! I love building small scale things with river stones.