Garden Shuffle

Tuesday's highlight was re-enacting the first part of the story of Jonah, complete with much rocking and swaying, as we acted out the storm with Key Stage 2 at the after school club.  Wednesday morning's excitement was King Saul 'resting' in the cave, while David chops of the corner of his robe. One of our team members did a most excellent job of attaching the corner of a 'cloak', which David had to remove by pulling a thread attached to tacking stitches.  David looked pretty impressed, as the stitches unraveled, leaving him holding the corner of the cloak, but this Disney Generation didn't bat an eyelid.  An arc of glittery stars with accompanying sound effects may have got their attention. A piece of orange cloth just didn't cut the mustard.

Wednesday afternoon was more down to earth - garden earth to be precise. After the dizzy temperatures at the beginning of the week, the mercury has dropped to a more autumnal 10 degrees centigrade, with a seasoning of gentle drizzle. The window of plant moving opportunities is reducing, as the ground will be getting steadily colder.

A couple of years down the line we can see some planting has not quite worked out as we anticipated. The rhododendron, which was looking rather miserable in a large planter, has already been liberated.  Today was Plant Shuffle day 2.

Step one - a grass which doesn't like the dryness under the trees, was dug up and planted where the lavenders were...

Meanwhile, the lavenders are still in their tub, but currently residing on the path while we try and decide what to do with them.






Step 2
The pheasant berry was dug up, as it was far too dominant for the narrow side border and completely overshadowed one of the white japanese anemones - no bad thing some may say ;)

We did doubt if we would manage to successfully extract the pheasant berry, as it was difficult to get sufficient leverage, without the threat of destroying either the path, or the fence, or both...

Step 3
The pheasant berry was replanted at the bottom of the garden, close to where the grass was, but a bit further back... It does look better in a bigger border. The obelisk was rather disturbed by all this digging and is currently undergoing therapy....



Step 4
Meanwhile, the pink japanese anenome adjacent to the garage door, had grown far too big and stopped us using the stepping stones across the flower bed. This has been given a free transfer to where the pheasant berry was....  It has been joined by a couple of young verbenas.  They are young and full of enthusiasm, thinking they can make a difference - they will soon learn....



The bed by the garage looks a lot better now, and you can actually see the planters and contents. Before they were just hidden behind a screen of japanese anemones!

At least two sections of japanese anemone remain and we haven't decided exactly what to do with them, yet! Will they go, or will they stay?

One nice discovery was that the cyclamen planted in the bottom border have naturalised.  White ones have been planted there over the last two years. We will wait to see what colours will appear!

The successful germination of a packet of seeds earlier in the year means that there are sixty odd white foxgloves to plant along with some dwarf lavenders. The bulbs dislodged by the upheaval to the centre bed, also await our ministrations, along with a few more verbenas and the odd grass. In garden tasks always seem to take longer than we anticipate. A good looking garden doesn't happen by magic, it is the result of squelching around on soggy days, and the liberal use of compost.

Meanwhile, the squirrel watched on from his vantage point in the oak trees, eagerly awaiting our retreat so he can get on with the important business of foraging.

Gosh, we must have reached the sixth day by now. A pity they weren't consecutive... ;)