Skywatch Friday - in the mist.

  

 The last few days have been very atmospheric, with a heavy mist each morning, slowly lifting through the day and then creeping in again before nightfall. It feels more like November than spring. The weather report was for a week of warm weather but it hasn't happened in this part of the country.  I'm not complaining because at least it hasn't rained and yesterday evening I finally managed to light the bonfire.

 

I started off with a great heap of debris and it burnt away beautifully - so satisfying!

 By this morning only a small heap remained.

9 am and a murky start to the day for Skywatch Friday.

 

I rather like it!

But colour is creeping into the garden, the pear tree is springing into action, although the 'St Patrick's Day' daffodils planted underneath will never manage to flower for the saint day on the 17th.

Just look at the moss and lichen, you can tell that we have had months of wet weather.

 

 I walked past this wall of aubretia while visiting a friend this morning, a glorious burst of colour, just the thing to lift the spirits!

Vegetable garden

At the beginning of the week I popped into The Pig to thank them for last Saturday's party.

I was keen to have a nose around the newly reworked vegetable garden. Last week's advertisement in the local paper said the following, so I wanted to see what was growing.

The delightful Steph, she with the lilting Irish voice, gave a warm welcome and showed us what has been done so far.

It was impressive. "How come the pigeons aren't eating your brassicas?" I wanted to know.

One of the gardeners said, "Because we are here all the time!" But I'm sure they are not working at first light when the pigeons like to come and breakfast on my greens.
They have transformed a sadly neglected space and it's a pleasure to see.

Although there is still plenty to be done. This area was a central walkway between herbaceous borders.

I've always been rather envious of these beautiful greenhouses. For years they stood neglected and unused. In the past I've sketched and painted in the garden.

Even in its neglected state it was a lovely place to be, with fragments of statuary that displayed its rather grand past.

One summer a young couple  went over the ground with a metal detector and unearthed various items. My favourite objects were these fruit tree labels with their wonderful names. I don't know whether these varieties are still in production - I wonder what a Pitmaston Duchess tastes like!

Everything was flourishing and looking so neat and tidy that I thought of my own vegetable plot with  dismay. I'm still having treatment for my neck and back following from last autumn's car crash and the poor weather has also kept me from attempting any work outside. But, if I don't set to work soon then it will be a disaster.  There is still plenty to gather and eat, parsnips and chard,

 and new season rhubarb coming up.

But, oh, what an untidy state of affairs. Things are much better in the greenhouse, buds forming on the Chinese peonies,

the auricles recovering from their attack of vine weevils,

citrus fruiting,

and the bonfire getting ever higher as I wait for the wind to start blowing from the west.

Watch out!

Seedy Saturday

The snowdrops have come to the end of their flowering. Such good timing! This morning I dug up a generous bunch and divided it into twenty pots to take to the local seed swap. Twenty little pots to exchange for twenty packets of seeds - can't be bad! I also packaged some of the most prolific seeds gathered from the garden last autumn.

Let the swapping begin!

It was a well attended event.

There were also seed packets to buy,

books to tempt,

peaches,

and goose eggs

and all sorts of delights.

What did I get with my swaps?

PLENTY!

Spring feels as though it's here at last. When I got home I put some compost in the greenhouse to warm. I'm going to be busy sowing tomorrow!

Vanilla wondered if she could help.

but her heart wasn't in it.

I've lost the label from this citrus tree and am not sure what it is. The fruits are swelling 

but some of them are also splitting.

'Oh, how boring,' says Vanilla. 'If all you are going to do is talk about plants then I'm going outside to sit in the sun.'

It's a hard life being a cat!