Garden Bloggers Bloom Day April 2010

y second GBBD, hurray! I've been kind of ill these past few days, so hopefully a post full of flowers will get my immune system heading back in the right direction. First up, the daffodils. My golden trumpets are on their way out, I had to start dead-heading over the weekend. Dead heading the daffodils has always been my job, ever since I was little and my Mum would send me out to do hers. It's not a particularly labour intensive job, but it is a sad one. I spend weeks watching their slow ascent very impatiently, and then they're gone. There are still one or two left to enjoy for now though.

he very early red tulips are also taking their last bow, petals bent right back and giving a rather revealing show. Their are stands of white, yellow and red tulips waiting to take the stage though. Dan noticed I'd snuck a couple of red tulips into the blue corner over the weekend - I never could stick to a colour scheme.

he swathes of forget-me-nots I have draped around my flower beds are turning blue at the tip one by one. Forget-me-nots are up on my list of all time favourites, I suspect I give them too much leave in the garden, but I love the billowy clouds of green and blue - always have, from the time I first dead-headed daffodils in fact. To a lot of people I suspect they're a weed, but I can't be without them.

his is the first year for grape hyacinths in the garden. These were salvaged about this time last year probably, from the old family garden back home. These are another favourite, from foliage to flower. There was always great drifts of them in my Mum's garden. The first thing that Dan said to me on the subject of grape hyacinths was that he hated them when he was little, because he always thought they were going to be bluebells (his favourite), but was eternally disappointed when they weren't. I love them for almost the same reason - because it takes forever for bluebells to turn up and these were always early, with a more concentrated blue.

ow, we hit an issue. Both the pictures below are some variety of primrose, also salvaged from my Mum's garden. This first I've had three years now and I've split it two years running, so I have a fair approximation of a drift - all profusely flowering this year, which I was a bit surprised at cause I thought I'd been quite mean to them with all my splitting. Now I thought these were primrose, and those below I thought (when I grabbed them last April/May, based on the seed heads) were cowslips. But you can see that the flowers aren't umbellified. I am pretty darn confused about this, so if anyone passing by wants to enlighten me, that would be great.

n more productive quarters of the garden - from top to bottom - we have, gooseberry flowers, apple blossom and blackcurrant flowers. Tasty treats to come. And to finish, for Dan, the first signs of the bluebells. First open flowers this weekend I should think.

Garden thoughts

life in the cold frame

he sun has been out the past couple of days and the forecast is good for the weekend. Walking out the back door into the warmth and bees and flies and birds is about the only thing stopping me harrumphing around the house about thesis writing. Almost over, have to keep telling myself that. Have to keep stopping myself from playing in the garden too. I could spend all day out there and not run out of entertainment right now.

e watched Alys Fowler's "The Edible Garden" last night on iPlayer and now all I want to do is sow more pea seeds... It was a very inspiring show really, apart from having a bit of a girl crush on Alys. Basically she mixes in her veg with her flowers and everything lives together. I've been heading towards this way a little, which is why I've got garlic in my flower beds right now, swiss chard in the cold frame for colour in the borders, and artichoke plants waiting to be delivered.

riginally I was inspired by reading Dennis Cotter's description of a friends garden he visited in "Wild garlic, gooseberries... and me", hence the chard - which I've not grown before. The artichokes were bought to replace the cardoons I had originally. I love cardoons and their ridiculously exuberant silver grey foliage, but the ones I grew from seed were subject to the worst blackfly attacks I've ever seen on anything for two summers running and havn't returned this spring. I reasoned that trying again with artichokes - given that they look near identical - was probably better on the feeding us stakes.

ow all I have to decide is where to put the runner beans... I shall not fail for a crop two summers running!!

New hat and awesome knitwear

his fell off my needles a little while ago and has been on my head since. Couldn't effectively take pictures of my own head though, so I had to get Dan involved. A combination of nice light and time was achieved on an Easter Sunday ramble up the Heath. His instruction from me was "take a picture of my hat, but don't get my head in." - I think he performed admirably!

am pretty darn chuffed with the hat, the temporary difficulty of separating the two strands to float a band of colour over the top was really worth it for me - you get to admire all the colours in the Alchemy Haiku without being overwhelmed. Such a great pattern too, the Waffel hat (rav link). It's nice and big and slouchy, fits over my hair and still covers my ears AND has some seriously elegant decreases in the top. So simple, but brilliantly effective. The girls at Pickles are doing very cool things indeed. My project is ravved here.

y endpaper mits got some new nice shots too, and Dan was wearing his favourite socks. It's now almost impossible to go out without wearing a hand knit of some description, a happy place to be.

Spring terrarium

ncluded in the spring time decorations over the fire place is this wee feller. A spring themed terrarium, happily egg shaped. Dan thinks it's a bit odd, but I've been after the perfect vessel for a terrarium for a while - finally managed to find this blown glass egg shape in one of KTs fine charity shop establishments. Terrariums are all the rage on the design type blogs, and the gardening ones too. You can still open up etsy with a good chance of seeing funny little mushrooms and other more eccentric miniatures for decorating your moss. Dan ain't seen nothin' when it comes to the weirdness of terrariums out there...

t's not a particularly complicated offering of terrarium design. A convenient place to put some of Dan's rock haul from our day trip to Aldebrugh for his birthday. A lump of moss from the garden (not short of that either). Placed a few of Dan's smaller stones on top and nestled in my Wade lamb for a touch of spring time fun. I doubt it will live in this form long past the end of April. There might be some retro-inspired air plants in it's future.

Egg-tacular

Worlds collide

hat happens when a Dan and an Ali come together. Hardly a collision, we've been living together for three and a half years, but a chaotic coexistence. Planting schedules and seed packets up front, Bob (the bike) magically suspended in mid-air by Dan's new bike stand. The bike frame collection and sewing machine in the background.

End of the month garden view: March 2010

n line with the number of gradening blogs I've been trawling through recently I've decided to join in with The Patient Gardener's end of the month garden view - mostly because it's a really brilliant idea! So here we are, these pictures are actually from today, the first of April, because I forgot that I wanted to join in until the post popped up in my Bloglines feed. Besides, the sun is shining today.

bove - The current stars of the show are the daffodils, and they're really putting it out there today. The last few have opened up in the sun and there's almost a carpet of gold. Below - the veg patch is coming into it's own, new paths are looking good, radishes are germinating and the peas are climbing....

bove - fruit corner is coming on apace. Buds are broken on the currents, apple tree and the gooseberry bush. Rhubarb is rising rapidly and the alpine strawberries of putting on fresh growth. Below - from the back door to the end of the garden. At least with a slender long city garden you can fit it all in one shot!

inal picture. Really looking forward to the things to come from this corner this year. The iris have passed but the grape hyacinths are just warming up and there are lots of new things waiting to be enjoyed for the first time, as well as the golden oldies that survived in the garden. The cold frame is packed with yummy things to eat later in the year...

Present to self

his oh so fabulous and aesthetically pleasing creature is the new water butt. We don't have an outside tap, so regardless of the environmental disaster that is watering with tap water, this baby will save us traipsing through the house with the watering can, and thus general muck spreading involved therein. Dan's key disappointment on it's arrival though was that it was too small for him to get inside of it and pretend to be a Dalek. Water butt was necessarily a slim line model so we can still sit out on the patio with it. Better luck next time love x. Dan did get to buy a new drill bit to install it though, and there are few things that make him grin more than a new drill bit...

he butt is actually fuller than it looks in this picture and working rather well. Dan was dubious we'd get much water from the small bit of roof it was attached to, but you should never underestimate the British climate... There was an even more auspicious event over the weekend. The first harvest - so here's to fresh salad leaves from now until October.