My Sunday Photo

Creating Areas in Your Garden

When we moved into our house our garden was a mess, it had vast amounts of decking, but it was built up really high on a platform, with a huge shed on. You could see straight into our neighbours gardens from the decking, which as you can imagine they hated. One side of the garden was lined with huge conifers; which absorbed so much space, and light, they had to go. Other than that the grass was half dead, and there was not a single plant or shrub. Yes, it was a blank canvas, but it has turned out to be a money pit that had to be completely deconstructed. We had to start from scratch. It has taken years to get it right, we are not finished but finally feel like we have a usable garden

When you are planning your garden it is important to consider many factors. For us the main factor was the sun, and creating areas where we can enjoy the sun throughout the day. We have a long garden but it is very narrow, because of this we spent ages thinking about how to set the garden out, where to put sitting areas to get the best out of the weather. 

Now I need to make this clear, I cannot garden at all. Chris is an expert gardener; he spends hours in the garden. My involvement is much more on a consultancy basis. He would never let me hear the last of it f I gave the impression that I was anyway involved the building or planting. 

Our first area gets the sun from sunrise, and enjoys the sun until about 2pm, lovely for breakfast and great for entertaining when friends visit. It is framed with flowers and shrubs on three sides. This gives colour all year round and has been designed in such a way that there are always different flowers in bloom up until October.

100 Happy Days , Day 99, Orange Lilies

For today I have chosen these beautiful orange lilies. The are one of my favourite flowers. And I absolutely love the colour of these ones. 

I tried taking the photo from a different perspective as an experiment, but haven't made my mind up if it works for me or not yet.

100 Happy Days, Garden Update , Day 93

I have photographed my flower bed on two other occasions on the last 93 days. This is my last flower bed visit. I am glad to say it is looking beautiful. I wish it stayed like this all year round. 

100 Happy Days,Day 91 Lodgers in the Birdhouse.

Not the lodgers I expected, however; we do have lodgers in the Birdhouse. I felt very brave taking this photo. I am not sure if these are Honey Bee's or Wasp's. Can anyone tell me please. 

I can't believe they have filled the house with a nest you can see it peeking through the hole. Still I suppose any life is better than nothing. 

100 Happy Days, Day 50, My Lilacs are Flowering

Wow I cannot believe I am at day 50, half way through 100 Happy Days. And do you know what? I am so enjoying appreciating the simple things in life. For day 50 I have chosen my lilac bush in the garden. It has just started to flower; I hope to get a picture of it in full bloom in a month’s time. It is so stunning, I love the scent and the colours; it really is spectacular when in full bloom.

100 Happy Days, Day 44, I finally have Aqualija growing.

I love Aqualija they are so delicate and pretty, I had them in my last garden and have desperately tried to grow then here. I have planted a few and they have died, this year my mother in law bought me some which are just starting to grow. 

But then today I notice these growing hooray after 3 years of trying I finally have some Aqualija, they self seed so in a few years hopefully, my garden will be full of them.

Signs of Progress in the Garden.

The Garden is now now starting to show signs of growth and summer, I took pictures of my flower bed on Day 11 of my 100 Happy Days Journey, and looking back it has started to flower. However in full bloom this bed is jam packed full, and stunning. 

I bought these winter flowering pansies in August, they have been great and continued to flower all winter and survived the frost. I was sceptical when I planted them that they would survive the harsh winter. 

100 Happy Days, Day 26, Garden Chill Out Area

Hoorah my bean bags are here from Made.Com,I am so pleased with them  great quality. So my chill out area is ready for sunbathing, reading and enjoying the odd glass of cold wine.

100 Happy Days, Day 22

Today I have chosen my new bird house, I bought it from work for £10.00. It was made by the bridge students for their enterprise project. And they were very proud selling them.

Chris put it up today next to Joe,s homemade bird house. Which he has done a great job of building a painting, I hope we get some residents soon. 

100 Happy Days, Day 18, My Rhododendron Has Flowered

I woke up today and my Rhododendron bush has flowered. We have been in our house for nearly 4 years now, when we moved in I was so happy to see the garden had a Rhododendron bush. 

When my Granddads ashes were spread my Nan planted a Rhododendron bush with them as they flower in April, this was my Granddads Birthday. I always feel so happy when I see the first flower on the bush as it makes me think of my Granddad Tom. And every day it flowers after that it just makes me smile and feel like he is near.

I don't think it should be a morbid thing to remember people, but should make you happy. And looking at these flowers does. Granddad was a real mans, man. So not too sure he will be loving the pink ha ha. But he did love his garden, when I was younger he would spend hours walking me round his garden telling me all about it. But of course I was younger then and never got the garden loving thing. But I loved the fact it made him so happy.

100 Happy Days, Day 11, My Garden is Growing

Today I am putting a picture of part of my garden. When choosing plants and flowers we seem to have used hardly any evergreens. As a result in the winter the garden just dies back.

 We really need to think hard and choose some plants and bushes that have colour all year round, so our garden does not look so drab and sad in the winter. It is now starting to come back to life and we can see signs of growth. Hopefully by the end of my 100 Days I should get a picture of it in its full glory.

Signs of life in the Garden

Sheila's Summer House

My Mother and Father in law have recently created themselves a garden room/summer house. It is so beautiful that I just had to put some images on.

They had a summerhouse built and were left with a blank wooden canvas, which they decided to plaster board and white wash. They wanted to go for a beach hut style so stuck to neutral colours with pastel blue and green for accents. 

The whole family got involved buying them gifts to furnish it, my brother in law took some beach scene photos and had them put onto canvas and Sheila and Peter bought furniture that was comfortable to enable them to spend lots of time in there. They are keen gardeners so will get many hours of pleasure sat surveying all their hard work in the summer house and over their beautiful garden with the wonderful views as a backdrop.

My Summer Garden Wish List

Happy Mothers Day.

We have decided we need new garden furniture this summer, 2 years ago we bought white bean bags, big,big mistake you can imagine the state they are in now ! I love the whole concept of garden bean bags they are so comfy to chill on, on  a hot day. 

Our patio set also looks like it has seen better days, so I have been looking for something to replace the lot, but wanted it colourful and fun with not looking to owed the top. I have decided on green as it will match the garden, I have started to compile a wish list.

The patio set and umbrella are all from  the Janeiro range at B & Q we bought a set similar to this 12 years ago and it has lasted really well.

The clock, mirror, cute gnomes(as a rule I am not into gnomes, but these are so cute) ornamental spheres and picnic set are all from Next

And last but not least the piggy green bean bag is from Made.com, and bargain the bean bags are currently on offer at £59.00 so think I will get my order in today.