Wednesday 31 July 2013

GREAT! Dixter

 
Our annual garden trip last week was to my favorite garden in the world, Great Dixter. The garden is a magical path of colour and aromas, it really does overwhelm your scenses.  The volunteers wandered slowly discovering a different flower around each corner.
 
It was a beautiful sunny day, one to remember.
 
Great Dixter was the family home of gardener and gardening writer Christopher Lloyd – it was the focus of his energy and enthusiasm and fuelled over 40 years of books and articles. Now under the stewardship of the Great Dixter Charitable Trust and Christopher’s friend and head gardener, Fergus Garrett, Great Dixter is an historic house, a garden, a centre of education, and a place of pilgrimage for horticulturists from across the world.
 
 
 


















The borders are mixed, not herbaceous. I see no point in segregating plants of differing habit or habits. They can all help one another. So you’ll see shrubs, climbers, hardy and tender perennials, annuals and biennials, all growing together and contributing to the overall tapestry.













 
 
A little from the head gardener on colour...
 
There are no segregated colour schemes. In fact, I take it as a challenge to combine every sort of colour effectively. I have a constant awareness of colour and of what I am doing, but if I think a yellow candelabrum of mullein will look good rising from the middle of a quilt of pink phlox, I’ll put it there – or let it put itself there. Many plants in this garden are self-sown and they often provide me with excellent ideas.
 
 





 
 
Thank you for all of the gardening volunteers hard work in the garden over the year.
 
We couldn't do it without you!
 
 
Fancy a visit? Click here for the Great Dixter website... 
 
 

Tuesday 30 July 2013

Fairwell flos botanical beauties

 
THANK
 
YOU
 
FLO
 
Flo(who sadly finished in the garden last week after a year with us)was a ray of sunshine in the garden. I would like to say a huge thank you for all she has done in the garden and with the volunteers over this time. Come back and visit us!
 
A few snippets from the year...   
  
 
 
Flo - her first week in the garden
 
 
 
 
Last day - Trip to Great Dixter


 


 
Flo and her favorite flowers, Digitalis.
 
 

 
 

 
 
Our trip to the Natural History Museum 2012
 
 

Flo up the allotment
 


 



 
The last week in the garden 
 
 
A
 
HUGE
 
 
GOOD
 
LUCK
 
FOR
 
THE
 
FUTURE
 
FLO!
 
x
 
 


Tuesday 23 July 2013

we LOVE our spoons

 
 
 
Our spoon carving workshop happened over the weekend, and what a super one it was! It is amazing what you can do with a knife and a chunk of wood.
 
 
 
 
These are our finished spoons all with there own little beautiful characters.
 
 


The amazing Barn who guided us beautifully through the whole spoon making process.


 
 
These blocks of wood were the very begining of whole spoon making adventure.
 


 
Barn showing us how its done. 


 
 
Barns beautiful spoons and butter spreaders, that he bought in for us to whoo and coo over.
 
 




 
Getting close.





Just starting. 
 
 



Long woodshavings are a good sign of a good carver, small are not so good...




 
Lots of differnt carving techniques to be used and new tools to become aquainted with....


 










 
 
WE LOVE OUR SPOONS!
 
 


To see more infomation on Barn the Spoon, where his shop is and other spoon workshops visit http://barnthespoon.blogspot.co.uk/


Thank you Barn for teaching us the fine art of spooncarving.


Wednesday 17 July 2013

Sheds Sheds beautiful sheds

 
 
Building our Shed over at the allotment the other day we thought we might investigate into what other shed inspiration we could find. Here are just a few wonderful creations that we thought were particularly interesting .....