In the garden drinking coffee

 

Loving these balmy early mornings. Coffee at 7.30! (I was up early and breakfast was before six).

Heaps of gardening last week.

Some more new plants in the mail. 

One of my favourite things.

#1 Seven dwarf white agapanthus to go across the front of the potting shed.....

 

#2 Eight Italian lavenders to go across the front of the house as part of a revamp there. 

I have constantly struggled to get this area how I want it to look ( in my garden dreams ).

I dug up all the red salvias.

Bill helped me dig out and relocate two of the carpet roses that were all too close together and I've covered the whole bed with a mix of sheep manure, pulverised horse manure and compost from our garden cuttings.

 Having a mulcher is like having tank water. It feels great to make use of all the garden clippings we  chop back and the water that falls from the sky. Both free. 

 It's been a while since this long, narrow bed had been given any sustenance so I don't blame it for not living up to my expectations. 

I will gradually add cuttings of lots of grey leafed plants that I have propagated from the garden.

Like this beauty that I've given huge acclaim to several times before.

Marrubium scallop shell ( with the mauve flowers chopped off ).

 

....and cotton lavender ( with the yellow buttons chopped off ).

And this great carpeting ground cover...

Silver carpet artemisia

These three greys are already doing well in the garden so it should be a no brainer really. 

 

In my mind (¥€£#!!!....always dreaming!) it will end up being a hotchpotch of lavenders, purples, greys and a pop of dark pink from the carpet roses dotted along in random spots. That'll be the summer look anyway.

 Sounds great doesn't it!!!!!! Stay tuned.....

#3 And four penstemons to add to the cottage garden bed. 

All these plants came from an online plant shop called fernview.com.au 

The plants are all in tiny tubes and many of them are less than two dollars fifty each. Excellent packaging as well. 

All the plants from Diggers have been planted too in various parts of the rose garden. I will nurture them for a few weeks and then they'll be left to their own devices.

Around the garden path last week....

A hollyhock that has come up in the native bed outside the rose garden looking very happy with itself. I've been pulling them out of the rose garden to try to break the earwig cycle. This one has escaped the compound and the foliage looks okay actually.

Verbena bonariensis doing it's thing. Never planted. Just appeared, left for a few years and is back again.

 

 

I adore the colours of the bark on this tree. I gaze at it every day.

 

Pink ladies starting to look pink.

 

Fennel going to seed and looking gorgeous. It's dotted all around the rose garden too just to add that lacy look.

 

There has to be some Fibonacci going on here....

 

Pretty lemon aquilegias.

Second blooming....

 

A pink lupin in the mix.

Both salvias....Ostfriesland and Mulberry Jam.

 

One of my library borrowings. 

 

They talk about a different way of watering.

 

Makes sense to me.

Thanks Jamesy. 

Equal parts of borax and icing sugar mixed with water to make a paste.

Ants will be beside themselves they said.

 

Half way through the feasting Bill came out and squirted surface spray everywhere! 

I'll do it all again tonight. The tiny ants are everywhere. 

The travellers.

Amy and Helen will be home in a couple of days.

We can't wait to see them.

Dipping their toes in the Ganges. 

 

 

Two nights with a local community in Nepal.  

A favourite.

Can't begin to imagine this view in real life as they saw it. Simply stunning. 

Special mail delivery last week.

 

All the size of a teabag. No covering letter. Just this. Little nature boy.

Twenty more bales of peastraw delivered yesterday. 

Some more mulching over the next few days.

 

This makes me smile.

 

 

Hope you have a great week everyone.