Little words of wisdom

 

Garden catch-up

image from Clipart Library

As per usual I'm very behind with my blogging ~ these photos were taken some months back, before Christine and John visited 😏

Last year we had really got the soil mountain whittled down, and this new area in the back garden set out.  I did manage to have a tidy up in the kitchen courtyard earlier in the year, and moved the raspberries into these very much larger containers.  The variety is Summer Lovers Patio Red and Patio Gold, and they are ideal for growing in pots.

This galvanised water tank had previously been in the front garden.  We replaced it and the two planters that are now in the kitchen courtyard with large wooden half-barrels.  We could have made a long raised bed along the boundary wall but wanted to make it easier to get to it if necessary, hence this container filling the gap beside the raised bed to its left, and the raspberries in their tubs.  The shrub is an escallonia that I moved from elsewhere in the back garden.  So far it seems happy in its new home ~ no doubt the generous handful of chicken manure pellets is helping it feel less resentful at being moved 😉

I'm really pleased with the little solar fountain, it's lovely to sit and listen to the gentle sound of the water.  At night the water stops but the fountain lights up.   I wasn't happy with the way the wind blew it around the container, though, as I was losing a fair bit of water when it came close to the edge.  I was able to solve this by winding some thin garden wire around two of the pieces of plastic tubing protruding from the sides of the fountain, and then wrapping the wire around a small piece of broken slate roof tile to anchor it in place.  

I'm really glad we kept so many of the old broken slates from when we had the house re-roofed ~ they've really come in handy over the years, not least for keeping the cats off the soil until we've got the new beds we've been making planted up!

All the plants in this raised bed (along with the bed behind) have been moved from elsewhere, from both the front and back gardens.  They were looking a little sad when I took this photo, but have really perked up now they have had some time to settle in. 

My poor hare has two broken front legs, so will need some repairs when I get a minute.  I recently bought a concrete epoxy resin stick but I'll probably leave it until the winter now, when I won't be feeling so inclined to work in the garden ~ I'll let you know how I get on with the "surgery" in due course!

Oh glorious day!

image from Clipart Library

We had a long wait from when the porch was decorated in November until the railings outside and the vinyl flooring inside were finally fitted.  Still, that's been the recurring motif of the "saga of the porch", has it not my lovelies 😉  No one's fault really, although our to-ing and fro-ing at the start of the process probably didn't help.  We had a fair bit of family stuff, not to mention our own health issues, going on in the background, too.

Still, the grand day did finally dawn when all the work that other folk had to do was complete 👏    

George had to order the made-to-measure railings from a company in Glasgow, and it took nearly three months before they made it up here 😯

When they did finally arrive in February, George had to ask one of his mates to give him a hand lifting them as Adrian and I just couldn't manage it.  After all neither of us are getting any younger you know 😉 and it was an accident just waiting to happen, what with Adrian's dodgy knees and elbows, and my dodgy back and hip!

Because of the corrosive effect of the salt-laden air up here we decided to go with plain galvanised railings, in a very simple design.  We weren't sure whether they would look rather utilitarian, like the handrail that was already here, but we're glad we chose not to have them painted as the plain galvanised finish helps them to blend in nicely.    

I'm sure you can well imagine how happy I was that there was no longer a potential "drop" from the path in front of the porch!

We knew when we ordered the vinyl flooring late last year that there would be a delay in it being fitted because of Christmas and the New Year.  We ourselves had to delay it further due to the various things that were going on.

It was finally laid in early April ~ no more bare concrete floor to tramp over!  Mind you, the design of the vinyl is rather reminiscent of concrete I think 😄  We considered going with something darker but in the end decided this shade was a good compromise ~ it's not quite as light as the photo would suggest.

Then it was just furniture and bits 'n' bobs to be added ~ the fun part 😊

Peace...

www.allposters.co.uk

Father, Mother, God,

Thank you for your presence during the hard and mean days.

For then we have you to lean upon.

Thank you for your presence during the bright and sunny days.

For then we can share that which we have with those who have less.

And thank you for your presence during the Holy Days.

For then we are able to celebrate you and our families and our friends

For those who have no voice, we ask you to speak.

For those who feel unworthy, we ask you to pour your love out in waterfalls of tenderness.

For those who live in pain, we ask you to bathe them in the river of your healing.

For those who are lonely, we ask you to keep them company.

For those who are depressed, we ask you to shower upon them the light of hope.

Dear Creator, You, the borderless sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the world that which we need most.....PEACE.

Maya Angelou

(4th April 1928 - 28th May 2014)   

The final push

 

I don't know if you can make it out very well, but we had a lot of condensation on the windows whilst Mark was decorating.

I guess it was a combination of it being November, the porch being unheated, and the use of water-based paint.  It was only on the glazed areas of the windows and door, though, and thankfully didn't affect the painting at all.  Bruce set up his dehumidifier, which helped considerably.

And then finally, the top coats had been applied and the decorating was finished!  The colour is Ivory from Lakeland Paints, and is a washable matt wall paint.  In fact all the paint we use these days are from this company as I have horrible difficulties with other brands; I end up with streaming eyes, nose running like a tap, and terribly itchy skin ~ it's all very unpleasant to say the least😧 

I confess that when I was first looking at the Lakeland paint chart, I initially picked out the Clotted Cream shade.  Of course, I didn't make a note of this at the time and ordered the Ivory instead😏 Thankfully it turned out to be one of those "happy accidents" (as the late, great Bob Ross would have said) ~ I really love the shade, which the chart describes as "pale peachy yellow", and the gentle warmth it brings to the porch.

The heater had originally been in the hall but we decided to replace it with a slightly larger one.  It can get quite cold and draughty in there, and as that's where our computer lives, it's not always very pleasant sitting there to use it!  Because the porch is a relatively small room and is extremely well insulated, the old hall heater works very efficiently in there.  I don't think we had to set it above 17℃/18℃ even during the coldest part of this last winter, and it mostly chugged along at 16℃.

It was so lovely to have the bulk of the work in the porch finally finished 😊 Now we just had to wait for the vinyl flooring to be laid ~ oh, and the railings for outside to turn up, of course!

Even more mess

I can only dream of having such a neat and tidy greenhouse like the one above, even though I say to myself every year that I will make sure it's all spick and span in there before winter sets in 😏

Naturally this last winter has been no exception, and my poor greenhouse spent months in disarray!

However, despite my failure with the dahlias, I did remember to bring some of last year's "summer bedding" into the greenhouse, to see if I could overwinter it successfully. 

Whilst they were sold as bedding plants, they are in fact tender perennials ~ well, certainly they are up here in Orkney ~ hence my overwintering experiment.

Some of the plants weren't rescued in time but even though it is an unheated space, a fair few spent the winter quite happily in there.

I also brought in some strawberry plants that I wanted to move but didn't yet have the bed ready to move them to.

I thought that these two fuchsias were going to die, but they settled down and steadily put on new growth.

This fella even put out flowers!

Some of my messiness problem is that the potting bench is too high for me to work at whilst sitting on my little stool ~ but standing for too long really makes my back ache.  So I've been improvising by resting my enamel bowl in a plant pot, which I then had to balance on the container of chicken manure pellets in an attempt to raise it up somewhat!  It was in fact still a little too low and the bending forward wasn't stopping my back from aching either ~ plus I kept spilling compost on the floor 😖

Why it hasn't occurred to me before now to move the bloody potting tray to the lower-but-not-too-low staging I have absolutely no idea 😳

This works so much better than my Heath Robinson set-up, as I'm sure you can imagine!  I've had a proper tidy-up in the greenhouse now, because it was really getting on my nerves to see the mess every time I went in there.  Another prompt was that I needed to get Laura's ctenanthe divided and repotted, and that really wasn't going to happen with the bucket-and-bowl configuration LOL

These are this year's greenhouse crops.

The three cucumbers, Party Time, are looking happier since I put them in larger pots. The sweet peppers are Sweetonia Chocolate.  I lost one of them and was a bit concerned that the remaining two looked a bit peaky.  Now that they have gone into larger pots, they too are looking much happier.

Adrian had to pot up the tomatoes for me, as they arrived whilst I was down south with my Dad.  There are two varieties, Summerlast and Orangeto, and I bought them as packs of three super plugs from Marshalls.  I potted them on when I came back home and two of the Orangetos were in fact two little plants, so I split them and now have five! 

Little words of wisdom

 

All very messy ~ yet again *sigh*

image from Clipart Library

Quite frankly, my lovelies, the lady above looks very much how I feel every time I look at my garden at the moment 😒

With all that's been going on these last few months, keeping on top of the garden totally got away from me.  Both the rosemary and the bay (in the terracotta-coloured pots) got somewhat crushed when the thick layer of snow on the roof finally slid off and fell on top of the poor little buggers 😟

I left the dahlias out in their pots all winter again, and as it was very wet I didn't hold out hopes that any of the tubers would survive.  

I did have the foresight to move this handful of plants into the arbour seat, where they were a tad more sheltered.  It's a crappy photo, I know ~ think it was probably spitting with rain when I took it!

Since I've been back from spending time with my Dad, I have made a start on tidying up.  I've had a bit of a rearrangement in the area near the kitchen.

Miracle of miracles!  Quite a few of the poor dahlias managed to survive another winter outside ~ ten altogether.  I didn't think many, if any at all, would have made it so back in January I cheered myself up by ordering some more from Marshalls.....my collection has now grown to 18 😀 (Two were still in the greenhouse when I took this photo).

The planter contains cut-and-come-again lettuce.

I gave the bay and rosemary some TLC before moving them.  The rosemary had a trim and I removed the yellowing/crispy leaves from the bay.  They are both too large for me to attempt a complete repotting so I simply scooped out a good half of the compost in their pots, refilling with fresh compost and a sprinkling of chicken manure pellets.

The pot in front of them contains mint and I have a second, different, variety beside the arbour seat.  As they are in smaller pots I was able to completely replace their compost, although I've kept them in the same pots.  They too had a good trim and a sprinkling of chicken manure pellets.

I also had a rearrangement of the planter, again replacing some of the compost and adding chicken manure pellets.  

This pretty little lenten rose is in the front garden.

As you can see, the front ornamental borders are absolutely overgrown with weeds.  Still the peonies we inherited with the house were lovely, as were the poppies.

This poppy was absolutely glorious but omg, just look at the size of the weeds ~ so much work to be done out there before this coming winter 😟

Light at the end of the tunnel

As I mentioned before, I didn't take many photos of the internal work done by Shug nor of the electrical installation come to that.

These photos give some idea, though, of the sockets, etc, we had fitted...

...along with the new internal walls.  Because the porch is now very much narrower than the old one, it's not that easy to take photos in there!  I also had to brighten them up a tad when I added the watermark on PicMonkey as there was no lighting at that point 😄

Behind the plasterboard is a good layer of rockwool insulation.  We'd edged into November by this time, so it was good to get the insulation in even if we didn't yet have the heater installed.

There was no more for Shug to do for a little while...

...as it was then over to Bruce to tape and fill all the joints.

Once that had all set, Mark (Bruce's son) got the walls primed.

Shug could then finally finish the woodwork, although he did have to come back later to fit the correct lower panel in the door.  We decided to have uPVC windowsills fitted as I wanted to put some of my houseplants out there in due course.  Beneath them are thick pieces of chipboard to give an additional layer of sturdiness.

I'm sure you can well imagine how good it felt to finally be on the home stretch!