A beautiful Spring

This spring has been weird for us all.  It has been lovely to be able to get out and enjoy the lovely fine weather in my garden.  With us all stuck at home my neighbours decided to remove most of the overgrown holly hedge the previous neighbours had planted about 20 years ago which had been totally blocking out the light and leaving our garden in deep shade. The result has been an utter wonderful transformation.  The plans I had for my garden which I left feeling despondent can now be resurrected once I've managed remove the huge mass of ivy which is swamping the area I gave up on all those years ago. I think I'm going to be busy for the next year or so re-finding this area of my garden.

My old gate to the veg patch

Lovely sun entering my garden again after many years of shadow.

What to do with these pebbles?

My beautiful fern unfurling

Beautiful bluebells but so much ivy and nettles to remove.

My long wisteria is beginning to bloom

I spent some time down at the allotment last weekend.  It was the first time I have used green manure. As it was just beginning to seed it was time to chop it down ready for new crops to go in in a few weeks.  I was amazed just how strong the roots were.  They took lots of digging out. Hopefully I will have nice fertile soil very soon.

Green manure ready to cut

Green manure chopped and dug in

The rhubarb at the allotment is growing up like mad again.  We inherited 13 plants of the stuff and we rarely eat it.  Just as well my friends like it and it keeps the weeds off the soil as we have plenty of other patches to tend. I planted the orange and white onions which I had started off at home in the greenhouse. Last year I put some in a wet area and they just rotted.  Hopefully this year I will have loads.  We love onions.

Rhubarb growing full speed at the allotment

Onions planted at the allotment

Back in the garden I found some long lost treasures which had completely disappeared under the overgrown hedge and ivy.

My long lost owl I forgot I even had!

The centre of my planned patio abandoned 20 years ago.

My long lost half finished patio seeing the light again.

The rest of the garden is full of spring flowers and now the bay tree is gone theres loads more sunny flower bed to fill soon.

The irises really loving the sunshine after years hidden under the bay tree.

Once this wonderful wisteria has stopped flowering I shall trim it back as it had been struggling through the bay tree and has become gangly.

The tomatoes and chillies are doing well in the greenhouse too.

A busy week in the garden blooming and compost making.

I love dandelions they have such bright faces to welcome us into spring. 

These lovely bleeding hearts are coming into bloom in the courtyard. They are such a wierd shape. 

 

Just as I was taking this shot a huge bee landed on the lower flowers. Can you spy him?

As the garden centres are shut I've decided to make my own compost this year so I've been round collecting from all my bins. This is from the wormery below and is very wet and gloopy but full of nutrients.

This is one of my lovely Acers which is coming into leaf.

This is another with such different colour leaves. I love them both.

This is the woodland area of my garden. Soon it will be bursting with bluebells and foxgloves. 

To finish this week's diary I've included some more flowers blooming this week.

Time to resurrect my gardening blog. Veggies have been started.

Yesterday, in the biting wind I sheltered in my greenhouse and planted the onion sets I've been meaning to plant art the allotment. At least they can get going. 

My tomato plants are coming along and are nearly ready for potting up. I'm a little bemused that last year's expensive seed is haphazard in germination whereas the saved seed and old Henry Doubleday is doing really well.

Last week hubby and I made a start on cutting down the bay tree which has got hugely out of hand. We chopped down each branch and shredded the leaves before cutting down each trunk. We've now got to wait for the brown bin to be emptied before continuing but our work has opened up the garden such a lot already. We couldn't even get down the path easily. Hopefully it will shoot from the bottom and we can keep it under strict control.

We managed to save the wisteria which was climbing through it and will trim it back once it has flowered. It has 1m long flowers and is absolutely wonderful so I wanted to save as many buds as possible. 

I managed to harvest a few bayleaves to dry for cooking. 

I've spend a couple of hours weeding the veg beds her at home which I intend to fully use this year instead of the allotment just in case we aren't allowed there for a while. Its become hugely shaded in the 25 odd years since I set it up due to a huge sycamore growing in another garden so I've tended to only use my allotment but I've decided to make the most of what I have and grow shade tollerant plants like parsley, peas, lettuce and spinach in it.  I've also put my strawberries into new grow bags and they are down there too at the moment. We might move them temporarily to a sunnier patch as they begin to ripen.