Ooooh.....lucky Sharon ~ very lucky!

You may remember that I went mad last year and bought 15 dahlia plants from Marshalls when they were on sale.....

I was thrilled that 14 of the 15 survived, and they produced some lovely blooms.  I was full of good intentions to cosset said dahlias, fully intending to lift the tubers come autumn and tuck them away in the greenhouse for the winter.....

alas, however, I left them in their pots outside for all those wet and cold months 😞 I finally got tired of seeing the mess every time I looked out of the kitchen window and took the first pot into the greenhouse to empty it out.  I tipped out the cold and very wet compost, fully expecting to find a nasty slimy mess of disintegrated tubers ~ boy, was I in for a shock!

  Despite the harsh treatment the poor plants had suffered, almost all the tubers in every one of the 14 pots were firm and unblemished 😮 I only had to pull off three or four squishy tubers in total from all the plants ~ amazing, right? I decided that the best thing would be to temporarily repot each plant in a smaller pot and because I still wasn't convinced they would survive, I simply reused the compost they had already been in.  I figured that way I wouldn't be wasting fresh compost if they didn't make it 😉    

To give them some shelter, I put the pots in the arbour seat to help the compost dry out and hoped for the best.  I'm very pleased to report that so far 7 or 8 of the 14 are already sending out new shoots.  I will pot them on into larger pots when the plants are bigger.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they will all come through ~ I will keep you posted in due course.  This coming autumn, all the survivors will be lifted and stored in the greenhouse over winter 😄    

Moving out to the front garden for a moment, I'm pleased to report that the starlings have taken up residence in the wall again this year.  They have been very busy, back and forth with beaks full of nesting materials. 

And here's Miss Bluebell, who lives a few doors down from us, in one of her favourite bird-watching spots in our garden!