A Lovely Day today...

I know I have this obsession of going on about loving being away from the corporate world, but today was a day I would have thought was only possible in my silly dreams just 3 years ago - can't believe it's three years since SchmArgos "did the dirty on me", but it is and what a relief!


Who would want to sit in front of a computer staring at JML Fast Fit Ironing Board Cover - Pawprint, catalogue number 850/1116, checking it for colour just so Mrs Miggins won't be disappointed and return it? Yep, who would want to do that as against looking after this?

Finally got rid of the roots to a poorly placed hedge today, it's taken me forever, but the area will be planted with lavender to match the other side of the steps.

Moved all those hellibores and ferns middle left of picture a few weeks ago, they've settled in well. That whole area was pretty much over grown with ground cover, I want to reproduce a sort Jekyll (Gertrude that is) effect in the shade if I can. There's anemones in the back and I want to plant up some foxgloves as well, few more ferns too...

Also dug out a couple of medium sized shrubs from a small ornate-ish border in the main lawn area (NB: don't know why this has gone to double line spacing). I have also been working on this for a while. A tree specialist moved the two ash trees on either side, I did the topiary(?), ha ha!

Nice bit of work that should look really good come the summer - I hope!

This is where I moved the shrubs to. It's at the top of a little hill that drops down to an area we are going to plant up as a wild flower meadow and then down to a dried up stream.

The wild flower meadow is inspired by Sarah Raven's series, Bees, Butterflies and Blooms. Her best bit of work ever I think. If you didn't see it it is actually worth doing an iPlayer visit, at least on the last episode shown last night. Suffice to say I am really looking forward to starting work on the meadow, I
feel a song coming on:


Ohhhhhhh, There's a bright golden haze on the meadow

There's a bright golden haze on the meadow 

The corn is as high as an elephant's eye, 

An' it looks like it's climbin' clear up to the sky. 




Well there we go, you even get a blast of Howard Keel on here! Also cut back 


some grass from the edge of the pond, so it truly was a busy day, but so worth 


it. Oh and a bay tree that blocked a view across Aylesbury Vale towards Oxford. 


This is another area of the garden that will be worked at some point this year. 


Exciting stuff.

Front door - there are plans to make it more obvious!

Finally, some lovely flowers in the front garden:

Exquisite hellebore - I really think they are my favourite flower and not just because they are so easy to grow!

Beautiful iris in amongst my obsession at the moment, some snowdrops

And after the digging and moving and re-planting, here is a picture of the sky between a redwood and a yew tree - yep, I was flat out on me back!

Happy, happy!

Coming soon...

...reality. Yes the real world has interrupted as usual and I really have to get cracking and get some new clients and fill the coming weeks up with lots of lovely work.


It's all very well sitting in doors looking at the snow, wind, rain and other stuff mother nature chooses to throw in our faces

- lovely girl that she is - not overly fond of green myself, but there you go - but there's a time to get back to where you once belonged; out there with your thermals, woolly hat, hoodie and steel toe caps, wielding clippers, trimmers, loppers, secateurs and every other sharp tool one has at one's disposal. Actually Friday was spent doing exactly that and I got rather hot wearing the aforementioned clobber.


I have the last dregs of photos from the cold snap - I truly hope I'm not tempting fate here - the first picture is from Monday last week:

Chicken prints on the roof of our rabbit run - I do believe that chicken shit on the right hand side, but I think we'll ignore that, eh?


Next is from Monday, when I peered into Pat's huge living room in her house at Berkhamsted, thought it was funny to see me staring back. Well mildly funny. Don't ask me what I was doing peering in there, I forget.

On Wednesday I completed the sorting of the compost at Julie and Andrew's place in Buckland, near Tring. I have managed to compost about a third of the flower beds with it. It's taken me about 8 weeks to finish it. This included the now famed "fire in the face" episode, you may remember (http://simonmurraygardenservices.blogspot.com/2012/02/happy-new-year-if-tad-late.html). Death defying, that's me. This is the final cleared bin. I had to grub out an old tree stump too, which was difficult because I don't have any tools anything like robust enough to do that, but there it is, gone!

And finally on Thursday, a visit to Quainton and the picture I took of the pond in the Autumn, all nice reflections and stuff, was like this:

Slightly distorted with ice. Just as beautiful though.


This is my design idea for my new one page website:

Alison's new website launched this week. I'm going to get her web designer to have a look and hopefully within the month mine should launch too. Here's a link to Alison's Crimsoncandy Cakes website:


http://www.crimsoncandy.co.uk/




There you have it! Onwards and upwards, probably over on the allotment for a while tomorrow, continue the tidy up for the oncoming beauties of Spring and the longer and longer daylight hours, so I can become something akin to human again...


Happy browing!