Wednesday 21 September 2016

Spring - the Best Time of the Year in the Garden

I'm continuing to spend a lot of time out in the garden. Spring really is the best time of the year to enjoy the outdoors. New leaves are emerging, buds are turning into flowers and the weather is simply glorious. I know it's only a couple of weeks since I showed you photos of our garden, but today I'd thought I'd share some more.


I've tried to grow wisterias in the past, but this is the first one that has ever flowered. Sadly, each new shoot that reaches the top of the pergola is eaten by one of the resident possums. Somehow or another I'll have to work out how to train the vine so it spreads where the possum can't reach.


Once a weedy, dirt walkway, Mr TMW's brick path is now finished - PERFECT!!!


Bromeliads, another favourite, require next to no care, and they keep on multiplying. I have them spread throughout the garden in shady spots.


On the one bush, buds are about to open...


... whilst others are already out in flower. A native to Australia, the birds love our bottle brush.


Back to the wisteria climber. 


I'll always have a soft spot for May bushes. When I was in hospital after having given birth to our second child, Mr TMW and our daughter brought me a bunch of May bush from the garden. 

Originating in China, May bushes flower during September when grown in Australia.


We can successfully grow many South African plants, Dietes being one of them. Even though the white flowers are quite striking...


... it's actually the seed pods that appeal to me. 


The statice flowers last a long time. I've heard they can be used in dry floral arrangements, but have yet to experiment with that.


The drought tolerant lavender self seed, so I have many of them dotted around. The bees love them, too.


I have no idea what this ground cover is, but I do love the delicate, blue flowers.


Many Dianella are native to Australia - not sure if this one is or not.


My Mum often tells me I should keep plant labels, but I never do. Consequently, I have many plants whose names I have totally forgotten. This is one of them. Ha, ha... maybe Mum is right.


And last today, is a photinia coming into a flower.

It's not all gardening - I've been sewing, too. This evening I brought the shopping home in four reusable grocery bags. I've made a couple as presents, too. 

It's been good to have a break from sewing almost every day. I'm not ready to sew at that pace just yet. Previously, a million ideas were swimming around in my head, and I was flitting in my mind from project to project, not actually committing to much. My thoughts are now clearer, I'm more focussed with less self imposed pressure and I'm enjoying the sewing more.

Are you an even keel person, or do you go through cycles?

... Pam




13 comments:

  1. love the path. You could be dorothy in the wizard of oz with a bit of gold spray paint!!!

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  2. My lavender is in it's last bloom while yours are just getting started! Your flowers and pathway are lovely.

    I am definitely not an even-keel person. I tend to get almost too involved in most projects. I have trouble stopping and usually wind up doing too much. If I stop for too long, though, I have a hard time starting up again. Wish I were an even-keeled kinda person.

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    1. I wish I was also. I flitter from one hobby to the next and like you, if I stop for long, I have a hard time getting back into it.

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  3. Beautiful flowers! Yes, spring is the best!
    I did not know that bottle brush is a native Australian plant. Our bottle brush seems to attract more bees than birds!

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  4. Nice walkway! Your garden is blooming beautifully:) Best flowering season in India is from Dec to Feb, I am in the process of sowing seeds right now.

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  5. Your brick path definitely calls for a pair of sparkly red shoes to.click Pam :) What a riot of colour your garden must be in the height of summer

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  6. I do envy you your huge garden Pam, you have such a choice of what you can put it in it. It takes me 2 minutes to walk mine and I love trees and flowers.
    Re your wisteria, the main stem needs to be either kept firmly attached to the post so it can climb high or over an arch, trellis, even tree. Wisteria usually flower high and I noticed your is twisted low around the post not climbing. They do like a little prune every year too.
    Maybe you should show your garden every month, it would be nice to see whats growing.

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    1. I am very lucky, Moh. Thanks for the tips on the wisteria. This is my first time growing one. I'll re-tie it to the post. Maybe I need to prune the bits near the ground to encourage it to climb. I'll try that when it finishes flowering.

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  7. Your garden is so lovely! You are blooming and today is our first day of Fall. As I was reading your post about forgetting the names, that would be me too. Then I thought, whenever you get something new that is labeled, you could take a picture of it and have a file on your computer to refer back to. That way you don't have to have a label in your garden if you didn't want to, but always a handy reference elsewhere. Of course, if I tried to do this, I'd probably remember a week or so later that I forgot to take a picture before tossing out the label. ha ha

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  8. What a lovely garden! I'd love to send you the too-warm weather we are having on our first day of autumn, I am ready for fall color.

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  9. I love seeing all of your flowers! So many different varieties than what we have here. I love wisteria, too, but only have a wild one near the barn. Your path looks so lovely, too! I am currently in a non-sewing phase. It is fall here and I am busy canning the harvest from our garden. I miss my sewing machine.

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  10. Gorgeous photos Pam - I love seeing your garden, so many pretty flowers just now. We have both spring flowers and trees shedding leaves like it's autumn just now! I think those must be trees imported from the Northern Hemisphere, stubbornly sticking to their own seasons! :)

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  11. While your garden is coming into beautiful flower, ours is gasping out it's last breath :D Our vegetable garden did really poorly this year - I guess because of the heat and the lack of rain. Hubby will be outside today throwing dirt down and reseeding big sections of our yard (fortunately it's not a BIG yard, hehe) to try to fix the damage from the grubs - they made a right mess out there. Our small flower garden did beautifully though, which is good. I have tiger lilies in the front that my late brother brought me from his garden 20 years ago - we must have picked exactly the right spot for them because they bloom magnificently every year :)

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