Garden at the beginning of June 2017

The garden is beginning to look summery as all the bulb foliage has died down.

Looking across the patio to the lawn  with the herbs in the foreground 

Both of the apple trees have plenty of fruit forming despite some low temperatures when the blossom was  there.

Escallonia ‘Apple blossom’ bought on a holiday a few years ago and covered in flowers despite a lot of pruning earlier this year!

We spent the bank holiday Monday last week at the garden centre buying container plants, which I then planted up that afternoon. LO was meant to be helping but had an epic three hour nap instead!

Some of the containers in situ. Just have to remember to keep them watered but luckily LO is a keen plant waterer so it shouldn’t be a problem.

Salvia flowers- a present for LO’s Christening last year.

This rose is always covered in flowers each week too. I like the contrast between the flowers and the purple Physocarpus behind.

The blackcurrant and gooseberry bushes are covered in fruit and the rhubarb is getting huge.

Garden at the beginning of May 2017

Bit late for the beginning of May! I took the pictures then didn’t get round to blogging. Until this last week the weather had been unseasonably dry, the water butt was heading for empty and the grass had stopped growing… 

Here we have the back garden with LO very busy getting on with some gardening.



The Aubrieta is almost over but was very pretty whilst it lasted.

The newly planted Lavender just beginning to flower. It loved the dry weather!

This border is done in purple and yellow- Physocarpus and Euonymus ‘Emerald and Gold’ plus Heuchera ‘Chocolate ruffles’. Oh and a mini wheelbarrow belonging to LO.

The Ceanothus is covered in flowers and that’s an allium beginning to open up just in front of it.

The Dicentra is just about over, but the Heuchera leaves are looking lovely in the sunshine.

Days out: The Savill Garden

Thought it might be fun to share some of the days out we’ve enjoyed with LO on here in case others are looking for inspiration. We’ve enjoyed a few days out to The Savill Garden, after we received a year’s membership as a Christmas present. The membership covers the cost of car parking and also admission to the garden, which means we get access to walks in Windsor Great Park too, where there is a playground and acres and acres of space to roam in.

In the garden itself there is plenty to see. LO likes standing on the bridges over the little streams (there is a small lake as well), looking at the huge fish and the ducks and geese.

We concentrated on the Spring Wood this time, for obvious reasons! The Magnolias were just coming into flower. LO liked running around on the grass underneath.

Plenty of space to gallop in whilst the adults admire the gardens

The spring colours were amazing

Plenty of paths to explore if you’re an Intrepid Explorer

On a more practical note:

The Garden is accessible, so there are plenty of paths you can get a pushchair down, even a non-off-road one like mine. There is a good baby change in the main building, and it’s in the accessible toilet, rather than the ladies(!). There are plenty of high chairs available in the restaurant in the main building, and a nice range of children’s food on offer.

Garden at the beginning of April 2017

The lawn is looking nice and green again after rain in March. This is after I’d solved the immediate problem of gardening with a toddler by booking some annual leave and doing lots of gardening whilst LO was at nursery! 

So, the beds are looking tidier, perennials cut back and weeds removed. Plus beds mulched. 

Getting the bulk of it done on annual leave (I estimate I did three hours a day over four days) meant I could get all the patio containers repotted, and also prepare a few to grow herbs in – LO then enjoyed helping to plant those. She especially enjoyed watering. In this pic the front four haven’t been planted yet. 

I had nine bags of compost delivered from the garden centre and used six bags of it for mulching, and the rest for repotting. 

Tulips flowering and the (self-sown) lavender beginning to emerge amongst the sedums. That container is almost entirely gravel but those plants seem to love it there. 

View towards the shed. The tulips here flower above the raspberries which will then grow past them. It’s a nice way of getting a couple of seasons of interest from one bed. 

And I got the lawn edges done too! 

Close up of the raised bed, freshly mulched. I didn’t divide the Heuchera Marmalade towards the front, but it started heading off in different directions so I waited to see what would happen. It looks great mingled with the sedum there! 

Primroses. These are all self-sown from one plant I purchased in, I think, 2013, from a lovely garden centre near my Mum’s. Cost £1.50! I think I should probably divide these and spread them to some other places.

And, finally, lots of apple blossom! 

Socks finished!

Finished the Broadripple socks in Cascade Fixation. They have turned out well and are comfy to wear. I’m still not sure what I think about the yarn but it’ll be nice to have a pair of knitted cotton socks when the weather gets warmer. 

It’s DK weight yarn so they are quite thick to wear but fit inside my trainers ok. I hope the thickness won’t make my feet hot though! That used up almost an entire two balls of Fixation from my stash. 

So, it was time to cast on something other than socks. I’d had Hey Teach in m queue since it was published on Knitty and Pakucho Organic Cotton yarn in my stash since I ordered it from Elann a very long time ago when interest rates made North American yarn very bargainous. Must have been pre-recession in 2008?! I think it must have been in my stash for at least eleven years as I definitely bought it before relocating south. 

LO thought that winding up ten skeins into balls was very exciting and insisted on helping. Consequentially it took ages. 
What have you knitted from your stash that’s been there a while?! 

Baking

I wanted to get started doing some baking with LO now that she’s big enough to kneel/stand on a stool in front of me and ‘help’. Until now she has done some supervising from her high chair, although that generally means she’s seeing how many times Mummy will retrieve her spoon from the floor before getting fed up! 

These heart shaped biscuits were in a Beaming Baby leaflet so I thought we’d give them a whirl. 

Before:

After. I altered the method as I only had a small heart shaped cutter, whereas the recipe was for 6-8 bigger biscuits. Didn’t want LO eating one that size! And you’re meant to put a dollop of cherry jam on top of each but I didn’t have any, and thought it would be unnecessarily complicated for biscuits this size. Plus, she doesn’t actually need the extra sugar! 

The biscuits taste really nice – they are shortbread and very almondy. LO loved them and also enjoyed rolling out the dough, and pressing the cutter in to cut out the shapes. 

As we didn’t really need a huge pile of biscuits to eat at home(!) we took them to church next day where they were much appreciated. 

More socks

Finished the Tootsie Rolls socks and got them to match as well! They are comfy to wear although I’m glad that I didn’t do the rolls on the sole. I have called them the Very Hungry Caterpillar socks as they bear a strong resemblance to one of LO’s favourite books. 

This is my latest pair of socks- Broadripple. I made a pair several years ago but wanted to use the Cascade Fixation I had in my stash which the pattern actually calls for.

Fixation is weird to knit with. It’s cotton with a small amount of elastane in for stretch so you have to be careful not to pull on it too tightly when knitting with it, otherwise the finished knitting will be distorted and not stretchy. As you can see in the picture above, the slightly rippled look to the knitting is where I’ve pulled a bit too hard! 

Beginning to feel like I want to knit something other than socks…