A little bit of gardening

I've been longing to get out and do some gardening, but every time I do go outside I wonder why I bothered because it's so cold and the ground is muddy and really there's not very much I can do.  But it is good to get outside in the fresh air, wander around the garden and see what's growing, even if I don't do much actual gardening.

Saturday was a lovely sunny day although very cold and frosty.   I wrapped myself up in several layers of clothes, put on 3 pairs of socks and my wellies. I took a mug of hot tea and a buttered scone with me. Sounds cosy? Well yes it was.

The ground was frozen  and  you can do a lot of damage to young growth if you try to dig or hoe the flower borders at this time of year so I just did some tidying up.   There were still lots of leaves on the borders from the autumn which needed clearing up and putting in the leaf bin. Also the dead plant debris which I had left in the autumn for the wildlife needed cutting back. Clearing up the borders of all the leaves revealed some surprises. I found a clump of snowdrops nestling under the weigela bush.

 

I also found primroses

cyclamen under the laburnum tree

and crocus in the woodland garden

Happy birds

There's a blackbird in our garden who is very brave and hops onto the bird table as I'm putting the bird food out every morning. I always say 'hello' to him and then he gets a bit scared and shoots off into the hedge. There's a robin too who follows me around when I'm gardening. I see him perching on the wheelbarrow or pecking away at the newly weeded soil and he makes me feel quite happy, like he's looking after me.

The robin and the blackbird are just two of the many birds who visit our garden every day.  There are some collared doves  who arrive as a group, they're fairly calm and quiet. Unlike the very greedy starlings who seem always to be squabbling. The  magpies are like bovver boys, strutting across the lawn, wobetide anyone who gets in their way!  The  woodpigeon is another scary bird who will perch on the nearby garden chair or table surveying the scene as if he owns the place.  There are blue tits, coal tits, long tailed tits, sparrows, dunnets, a chaffinch and the robin, who wait until the big birds have gone before they come to feed on the remaining food.  Then there are the occasional visits we get from a thrush, a couple of nuthatches, a jay and some goldfinches ( I wish they would stay, I really do).

I suppose I feel like all these birds are part of our family, because I know them so well. They seem to be very happy, as my daughter commented the other day when she heard the noise of twittering birds coming from the holly tree. Because they seem so happy and because there are so many of them  makes me think that I must be doing all the right things. Well I spend a lot of money on food for them. My husband says they are better fed than we are!

We have feeders in various places around the garden.  Some are in the apple tree at the top end of the garden. There is a bird table with feeders on nearer the house and another feeding area, a stone platform which was originally intended to be a seat for us but the birds took it over (sigh).

The garden itself has plenty of mature trees, shrubs, and a hedge where the birds can hide, nest and feel secure.  The apple tree provides enough apples for us to share, we leave a lot of the fruit where they fall. There are plenty of perennial plants in the borders which I don't cut back in the autumn.  I leave them until late winter, so that the birds can find food in the winter from the seedheads and insects.

I put out sunflower hearts ( not the black sunflower seeds which make a lot of mess), dried mealworms, suet pellets and the 'no mess' bird seed. There are feeders filled with peanuts, mixed seed, niger seed (for the goldfinches) and fat balls. Feeding areas need to be kept clean because birds can get all sorts of disease, so I clean the feeders and feeding areas with disinfectant every so often.

We get a really good view of the birds from our dining room window and I love to sit there with a cup of tea watching them.  There are squirrels too, their antics are quite amusing, but we could do without them really, they eat a lot of the birds' food and dig up the garden.

Next weekend I am taking part in the RSPB Big Garden Bird Watch. If you want to take part just click on this link   http://www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch/

For more information about feeding the birds in your garden click on this link
http://www.rspb.org.uk/advice/helpingbirds/feeding/

or  :http://www.wildaboutgardens.org/thingstodo/allyearround/feed-the-birds.aspx

Pots of spring cheer

One of my favourite plants at this time of year is the dwarf daffodil, Narcissus Tete-a Tete.  They are available now in pots to buy from garden centres and florists. I have them in the garden and in containers with spring bedding and will probably be planting out more in the next few weeks.  They are so colourful and will brighten up any dull spot in the garden.

They can also be grown indoors and that's what I have been buying them for this week. At this time of year when the days can be really dull and dreary they are great for bringing a bit of spring cheer to the house.
I re pot them into clear glass vases, pretty pots or even jam jars and they look lovely.

When they've finished flowering I just plant them out in the garden and they'll flower again next year.

A sadness

At this time of year around  January and February I start to feel a little bit sad.  Each year when I start to feel this way I wonder why.  And then at some point I remember.  I don't know why that every year, and it's now after 30 years, I should forget and then remember.  

But when I realise why I am feeling so down I always start to feel a little bit better in myself.  And I do something to make me feel better. I buy some flowers, because she loved flowers. I buy  not just any flowers but  flowers that she would have liked.  She wanted garden flowers at her funeral, but she died in February a time when there was little in the garden except snowdrops. So I buy or cut from the garden snowdrops and early daffodils and they remind me of her.

Preparing the ground

It's amazing what a bit of sunshine can do to lift the spirits and give you a bit of enthusiasm to get out in the garden.  We have had weeks of rain  here in Lancashire, the days have been so dark and dreary, but this weekend we had sunshine and I couldn't wait to get outside and do a few jobs in the garden.   It was quite cold and frosty so there was some doubt as to whether we would be able to do any digging.

My daughter and I went  to the garden centre first and bought our seed potatoes. We bought Foremost,  Maris Peer and Arran Pilot. These will be grown in tubs, potato growing bags and old compost bags as we don't have enough space to grow them in the ground. We  find this a good way to grow them. I've got plenty of egg boxes in the shed ready for when we start chitting the potatoes and we'll start on that soon. When we've harvested them all the old compost goes on the beds, so nothing is wasted.

At the allotment we picked some brussels sprouts and pulled up the rest of the beetroot and parsnips. There was a pile of manure left for the allotment holders to help themselves to so my husband  filled several bags of it. My daughter and I dug over the cleared areas of the  raised beds and manured. At the end of the summer I had dug over the areas where the vegetables had finished and covered them with membrane.  So despite the frost this weekend I found that when we took the membrane off that it was quite easy to dig over. The soil is now exposed so that the frost can do its work on breaking up the soil and killing off any bugs.

 I'm feeling quite pleased with the work that we have done this weekend.  It  looks well prepared and tidy now ready for the spring when all the work will commence.  Now we need to think about what we are going to grow this year and start buying seeds.

Plans and projects

This week we're back to normal with everything. My husband is back at work after taking a longer than usual Christmas holiday, the grandchildren returned to school and so I am needed again for grandparent duties.  Holidays are great but it's good to get back into a normal routine. Not just with domestic duties but with eating, exercise, shopping etc. It's like the new year has just started for me this week, and I can now make plans and get more organised.

I'm not one for making resolutions. But I do think of the year ahead as a fresh start, to make plans, think about new  projects.  Some of these plans and projects I might not start until later in the year, some things which I abandoned last year I might pick up again. But I don't think I've failed miserably if I don't do some of these things.

So first of all I'm planning  to get back to normal with my  healthy eating and my regular walking exercise to regain some energy and lose those extra pounds I gained over Christmas. These are things which got put on a back burner for a few weeks. We are hoping to have a new kitchen this year (about time, I can hear some of my family saying!), so there are plans to be made there. A project I want to tackle is to tidy up and declutter an old chest we have which is full of family memorabilia.  That will also lead to another project --to sort out the family photos.  I'll probably blog about that later in the year if it gets done. There will be knitting and sewing projects, I know, but I've not thought those out yet.

If it ever stops raining for long enough (it's doing a lot of raining here in the north at the moment), I want to get out into the garden to clear away leaves and tidy the borders.  Then I will go round with a notebook and pen and make some plans for the garden.  I'll decide if any plants need moving or dividing. I've got a dry shady corner which needs redesigning. Some trees need cutting back and I need to decide what to do with the raised beds at the top of the garden. I also want to go down to the allotment, dig, put down manure and plan again. But one thing I want to do is visit the allotment more often.  My husband retires at the end of March so we should have more time together to be able to do this.

What are your plans for this year?

A muddy walk

We went for our second walk of the new year today.  We set off in a different direction this time, up the hill from our house. This walk had some steep bits, although wherever you walk in our town it's difficult to avoid hills.  We headed up the lane in the direction of our local Scout Camp and Activity Centre. There are some lovely views when you get to the top.

Walking through the Scout Camp brought back memories of when our daughters were in Brownies and Guides.  Noticing some recent developments of obstacle courses we thought of our 2 grandchildren who live in this town.  One of them is in Brownies and the other has just started in Beavers. They're going to have great fun here in a year or two!

Leaving the Scout Camp we came to the river which looked fairly calm.  

There are always lots of damaged and decaying trees along this walk which are quite interesting.

This one had fungi growing on it.

 The name of this section of our walk is Allsprings because of the number of natural springs in this area.  It's always very muddy in places.   Here in Lancashire we have had an amazing amount of rain in December so today it was really wet, muddy and squelchy, in fact some places were really difficult to cross.

This stile was swimming with water from the stream, but it gave us an opportunity to clean our boots!

Our boots were still very muddy when we got home. Some drying out and cleaning is required!

Taking the Christmas decorations down

 

According to tradition your Christmas decorations should come down by  twelfth night or you will suffer bad luck, although  there is some confusion as to whether twelfth night is 5th or 6th January. 

It is thought that the bad luck tradition originates from the days when people brought greenery into their homes at Christmas time. They believed that tree spirits lived in the greenery and bringing the greenery inside protected the tree spirits during the harsh winter months. The tree spirits had to be released back outside into the countryside after the Christmas period otherwise they could bring mischief into the house and crops would not be able to grow again.  Read more about it here

We have taken our decorations down now,  it usually takes us 2 days to do it, but we do have a big house.

I know many people can't wait to get their decorations down and out of the way, so much so that they usually have them down by 1st January. Not me, I cling on to them for as long as I can.

I love Christmas and all the sparkle, glitter and twinkling lights and when I finally have to remove it all I feel really sad.  For me those decorations are full of memories.  Memories of  the past few weeks--cutting greenery, making wreaths, arranging flowers, buying and decorating the Christmas tree, but most important, memories of family time together. But I also think of past Christmases, as many of our tree decorations go back not just to when our children were small but to my own childhood.  And as I pack everything away I'm  thinking of what the next year will bring.

But once everything is packed away and the house it back to normal, I'm fine, ready to start the new year, to look ahead and plan. And in the next few  weeks  my house will be filled with the fresh new  spring colour of snowdrops, daffodils and hyacinths.

The tree spirits have been released so I am hoping for some good crops in the garden. 

A Winter walk

It seems to be a popular activity for many people to go out walking during the Christmas and New Year break. After all the extra food and drink we have consumed  and all the busyness of the weeks leading up to Christmas it's always good to go out, get some excercise, burn off those extra calories and blow the cobwebs away.  A good walk leaves you feeling refreshed, spiritually, mentally and physically.  Well that's how I feel about it anyway.

It seems to have done nothing but rain for the last few days, but today was dry and sunny so  R and I set off out for our first walk of the Christmas break. It was very cold, a sharp contrast to the mild weather of the past few days, but we were well wrapped up.

We are lucky in that whatever direction we set off from we can be in countryside within 5 or 10 minutes of our house. The walk we took today was along the course of an old railway line.  It's a walk we always seem to do after Christmas, I don't know why. And every year I say we must come along here in the summer when the trees are in leaf and there will be more colour.  But we never do.  It is a lovely place to walk with marvellous views across fields and the starkness of the bare leaved trees has a special beauty.  I do love trees without leaves.

We were back home in just over an hour, it was long enough to be out in that chill wind, but we both felt refreshed and full of enthusiasm to do some more walking another day.

Looking back, looking forward

I'm not a great fan of New Year's Eve celebrations. I prefer to slip quietly and gently into the new year.  I'm not sure why I feel that way, perhaps it's because I'm not a party person and can only tolerate being with large numbers of people for a small amount of time. But that's the way I'm made and I'm quite happy being like that.

I also get a bit tired by all the looking back that goes on just before the new year.  You open a newspaper and it's a review of the year.  You watch TV expecting your favourite programme and again it's a review of the year. But then I suppose we need to look back in order to be able to move forward. Looking back at how we've progressed in the past year is good for our self esteem. Looking back at mistakes we've made might help us to make improvements.

So as the fireworks go off around our house and we move into 2012 I will perhaps look back on the past year and think about all that I have achieved, enjoyed and loved.  I will think about my successes and failures and I will thank God for the many blessings he has given me. I will also look ahead and make some plans. And I might share those plans with you.

May you have a happy, peaceful and blessed new year.