Silent Sunday in my Garden Today

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Fennel and Irises

My daughter and her family have been away for a few days and I wanted to put some flowers on the table to greet them on their return, but right now my garden doesn’t have much to offer. (Must do something about that for next year.)

Sometimes something quick and simple hits the spot nicely.

and I like the way the fennel echoed the spectacular light fitting in their sitting room

Fascinated by the delicate lines of the fennel flower heads I had a play with them against a rust-dyed background

Placing a piece of glass over them to flatten them against the fabric.

Now it is decision time – do I recreate these shapes in stitch, or paint, or try some other method, using them as a resist. My sister suggests Brusho paints – I had never heard of them before, so that is an exciting new media to experiment with.

I am also wondering about using the Cyanotype Process, but that would take some practice. I am going to allow the thought to bubble away on the back burner of my mind for a while.

Onto the Irises – I am including this bit as a Garden Diary entry to help me remember the names of the new Irises I have just received from Chailey Irises

4 new Irises

Grindelwald,  white, fragrant, mid to late flowering with some blue markings

Hi, white, mid season and fragrant

Summertime Blues, pale blue and highly scented

Raspberry Blush, pink with a long flowering season

Irises are my favourite flower, especially when they are scented. I love their sculptural shapes and the way they look like flamboyant dancers with wide wavy skirts. I have cleared a patch of ground to fill with irises and bulbs, these are the first ones to go in – looking forward to Spring!

Now to think about planting for some colour in August. I look forward to seeing what others have in their vases for inspiration – I need something perennial, bug and slug resistant and low maintenance.

Joining Rambling in the Garden and other garden bloggers for In a Vase on Monday.

 

In a Vase on Monday

I was standing at the kitchen sink wondering what to put in a vase today and saw these 3 right in front of me on my windowsill – odd bits and pieces, picked up at various times as I wander round the garden and a cutting from a succulent house plant.

On the left, in a Chive vase, is a perennial white wallflower, grown from seed harvested from a friend’s garden. The scent at dusk is divine.

My sister and I were amazed and delighted to be photographed for the Chelsea Flower show magazine and website when we were on the Chive Stand in 2016

I didn’t take the name of the photographer, so I can’t credit her, but she took the photo because our colours matched the stand.  🙂

Oh, that was such a special day. A day on which I was so excited to meet Dorris!

The feather is from the guinea fowl who often visit from a neighbour across the field.

One on my roof one frosty morning in March

Strange creatures! Making strange noises ……..

and there is a pigeon nesting in my bay tree, constantly cooing all day

Sparrows are nesting in the cotoneaster and under the tiles on my garage roof, twiitering away …….

I have had to get the tinsel out to stop them from eating my salad leaves

April and May are my favourite months in garden

It is all very sensual and sexy out there!

This year I am missing the Brompton Stocks and wallflowers which provided so much colour last year, but my new long border (see the the beginnings of it here) still gives me huge amounts of pleasure as it wakes up in the warmer weather.

I am joining Cathy and her happy band of gardeners from around the world for this week’s In a Vase on Monday, pop along over there for a mass of floral delights.

Also joining in with Cee’s Flower of the Day with my very favourite scented Iris, smelling so sweetly of pear drops

Stick your nose in here!

Hubble Bubble

 

Some dark and dastardly flowers have appeared in my light and airy, cheerful and prancy pinks, blues, purples and whites – they look like the sort of flowers dark and eeeeeeevil witches would grow

they actually have BROWN petals (I know – they are really sepals but …) BROWN!

Brown and purple together – so 70s!

They look so witchy I have marked the plants cut all the flowers off and put them in a cauldron. Now to create a suitable spell! Wwwwwahhh-ha-ha-ha…….ha!

The cauldron is a tar pot I bought at an agricutural museum auction about 30 years ago – it came in very handy in my white witch hippy days of affirmations, incantations and making powerful wishes.

It is not very often I can say I do not like a flower but I don’t like this one – is there someone out there who does? I will wait til flowering time is over and then I am happy to pack them up and post them to anyone in the UK who would like them.

I can turn my hand to a few spells should spells be needed, but only of the White Witch variety.

What spell would you like me to make for you?

Join gardeners creating magic over on Cathy’s blog as she puts blooms In a Vase on Monday. Cathy has a much more comforting and genteel offering today.

Wordless Wednesday: Dark Beauty

In a Vase: Irises

I am still completely captivated by the irises in my garden

The scent is so delicious! I wish I could bottle it up and send it to you.

Just imagine putting your nose to this gorgeous thing and getting slightly heady from the pear drop-like scent

Cutting them seems almost a crime, but having the scent indoors to walk past is a real treat

They are with Weigela and Nigella and some of the bottles from last week

I’m besotted by their shape and sculptural form

and can’t stop clicking

 

My favourite so far ~~~   Title: Mother and Child.

Joining Cathy’s In a Vase on Monday meme

and

Cee’s Flower of the Day

 

In a Vase on Monday

Mmmmmmm ….. those irises – the colour, the shape, the markings, the scent – I greet them each morning with my first cuppa,

and couldn’t resist bringing one inside …

to go with a collection of other plant shapes

From left to right

1. A local farm shop has started selling milk in returnable glass bottles Hurray! In this one are rooted cuttings of my spectacular epiphyllum
2. A miniature bottle of wine, so cute I couldn’t throw it away, with Mare’s Tail that is rampant in my front garden – I love it’s shape and design and the way it captures the dew in the morning, I respect that it has been on this planet much longer than humans – if only it did not want to take over the world.
3. A chirpy marigold in a teeny Victorian bottle with NOT TO BE TAKEN moulded into the glass – but I will be eating the petals of the flower sprinkled on a salad later.
4. Another miniature wine bottle, bought for the bottle’s shape this time. With chives.
5. Miniature wine bottle which came as a ‘favour’ at my son’s wedding, with one of my beloved irises in it.
6. A bottle which held an organic fruit drink now holds a sprouting acorn, which I pulled up from my lawn. Squirrels bury them in autumn, and I have never seen one being retrieved. A mini forest grows at this time of the year.

Do you have anything to pop in a vase (or a bottle) this Monday? If you do, how about joining in with Cathy and her pals over at Rambling in the Garden.

Also joining Cee who has a glorious photo of a beautifully flouncy Bearded Iris for her Flower of the Day

Have you seen any of these little white spiders in your garden? I’ve seen a few recently having never seen them before. So cute!

I had to look it up and believe it is a Crab Spider.

They do not make webs but lie in wait for their prey. Some can turn yellow or light green if necessary to merge with their surroundings.

 

Wednesday Walk-Along at the Old Mill

The Old Mill, Netherbury, Dorset.

Joining in with Wordless Wednesday.

And for somewhere completely opposite, join Mary in Kentucky at Walking My Path

I’d love you to leave a link to one of your walks, could be recent or archive, it would be great to be able to walk-along with you.

Blue

Raindrops on petals                                                                                                          Iris and limnanthes bloom                                                                                                In perfect harmony

 

For bluedausyz 52week photo challenge, this photo was taken some years ago in a former garden of mine – I miss those gorgeous irises and hope to grow more the garden I have now.                                                                                                    The woman we bought that house from, Mrs Barnes, was a farmer in her 80s. As she showed us round the house, before we bought it, she said in her broad Dorset accent,  “I’m not one for dusting, dusting takes your life away, but you can grow with a garden” – a woman after my own heart!

We have 6 regulars in the challenge now, it really is such a lovely thing to share each week – want to join in? We’d love to have you along!                                    Next Week’s subject: Create

Jamie’s ‘Blue’, Roz’s Blue, Erika’s ‘Blue’, Melissa’s ‘Blue’, Garry’s ‘Blue’