Bye, bye my sweet garden

 I should now be moving house shortly and I'm going to miss my little garden.  

I've enjoyed making it mine, full of roses and other cottage garden plants, slightly shabby around the edges, a little oasis of green for me and the boys. 

But a new garden awaits, with a lawn, which will be a novelty, never had one of those before.  It is all shrubs around the outside, very much as this one was, so some structure but crying out for some flowers.  Also I'll have two gardens, one front and one at the back, a north and a south facing, so that should be fun.

Can't wait to get started!

This little beauty is coming with me

Roses Patchwork Cushions

I've been attempting to use some of my fabric stash and came up with making these simple patchwork cushions.

Take tapestry roses from the charity shop....

                Add some fabric scraps and hey presto!  

You have a couple of cushions in a couple of hours!

Floral Abundance Continues

 Floral abundance continues sounds so much better than the wet season shows no signs of stopping!  June has been a washout and July is following in it's soggy footsteps.

Last week came the heaviest rains I had ever seen, at some points you couldn't see more than a few feet in front of you, it was that heavy.  Hail stones fell like ice cubes from the sky.

 But my little garden continues to flower it's heart out, despite the rain beating it down

 Jasmine, now scents the air with it's heady perfume

 and I continue to delight in the different shapes, textures and hues of pink, white, blue and purple.

Maybe the weather will change soon?

Floral Abundance, Machete Soon Needed

 The heavy rainfall and the relative warmth of the season has meant that the plants in my garden have just grown with abundance.  The borders are full to the brim and I love it.  All the shapes, colours and perfumes are a delight so I thought I'd share a few with you

 The first year my poppy has flowered.  Parts of it look just like velvet.

 My alltime favourite rose - Jubilee Celebration, I bet David Austen's sold a few of those this year :)

 My astrantias, unassuming but so exquiste, think these are Roma.

 Just a rambler from the local DIY store, so clean, crisp and perfect.

 My long awaited peony, normally well over by this time in the year.

 Pretty ground cover with this hardy geranium.

 This wonderful dark leaved shrub is flowering, no idea what it is but I love it

 My varigated jasmine is in bud.

And I had to finish with another rose, this time St Swithun, softly perfumed.  Now I just need some warm days to get out there and enjoy the garden :)

Scrappy Journal

 I've finally got around to binding my Scrappy Journal, made using scraps of fabric and scraps of coloured watercolour paper left over from my larger journals.

The paper on it's own would have made tiny signatures so I used lengths of scrap fabric sewn on as kind of hinges.  I like how when you turn the pages you get flashes of these fabric scraps as well as them being visible on the outside.

 I used a combination of binding techniques from Mary Ann Moss on the Full Tilt Boogie class and the very helpful instructions supplied by Lynn Holland, photoing pages from a book for me, so kind.

 Whilst I love this little book I feel it is somehow naked and in need of either a little sac bag, so I can carry it with me easily, or maybe a wrap so it can be carried with some art supplies.  I feel another project coming on.....

I picked the first roses from my garden yesterday - St Swithun and Zephirine Drouhin, both beautifully perfumed, ahhhhhh.

Strange Weather this Autumn

"What have I done now? Not me, totally innocent me! Nothing to do with me." And this time Billyboy's right, the weather is just plain freaky.

Rosehips are to be expected but what's that in the background?

A delightful rose, with more buds forming! By now flowering should be over and the roses losing their leaves


but they are putting on new shoots and growth where I tidied them up a couple of weeks ago.

My cosmos are still flowering their hearts out as well.

Mary of Tin Can Tart fame was also commenting on this strange weather on her blog. It's been warm again in the sun today, warm enough to sit out and read but it's beginning to turn I think. I had to have the heating on for the first time last week, we are on the way to how it should be I think. I'm hoping to get to the local Botanical Gardens this week and see the leaves turning.

I decided to update my blog look for the autumn and found this lovely background and header on Shabby blogs - see link in the top left. Still floral and birdy but more autumnal colours I thought. Just wish I knew how to use Photoshop properly as it took me over an hour to resize and write on the header - but I got there in the end :-)

Enjoy your autumn, whatever the weather!

Mad Dogs and English Women....

Myself and a group of friends must have chosen the hottest day of the year so far to go for a ramble in the local countryside, we must have been mad but off we went, setting off from a local pool, notice the flotilla of birds heading our way looking for food, they were out of luck.


The skies were glorious and we set off across fields in the baking sun, water bottles at the ready.

The acorns are just forming and the teasels are still green.

These archetypal stripey caterpillars were making light work of this plant, munching away.

After a pit stop at a local cafe, sitting out the midday sun, we set out again with the sky hazing over, thunderstorms had been forecast for later but they didn't materialise.

I can't resist roses and these were hanging over the footpath from a garden.

Note to self - must take along wild flowers book next time and do some identifying as no idea what the pretty flower is below.

This church had roses all round the doorway, so pretty. I had no time to go into the graveyard but I'm hoping to visit on of the big seven cemeteries in London later on this week so I'll get my fix then :)


A lovely pretty cottage, how I'd love a house like this, maybe one day...

And back to the pool and a delicious picnic lunch. My legs are still aching but it was a great day!

Roses and Pomanders

This is one of the first roses out on my St Swithin bush, a lovely delicate pink with a soft scent.

Dear fellower bloggers and surfers of the net, do you recognise the above paper napkin? I got a couple of these in a napkin swap a while ago and I'm trying to find out where I can buy some. My friend who is getting married absolutely adores it and would love some to use at her wedding reception so if you know where I can get some I would be really grateful if you could drop me a line.

This is one of my favourite pomanders, egg-shaped with a sweet little forget-me-not flower on it.

These three are also favourites, two with Scottish themes with the Trossachs on one and heather on the other, and a lovely pink backgrounded one with flowers including roses.

Talking of roses I couldn't not show you another St Swithin bloom, just so perfect!

And my all time fave, a heart shaped pomander that hangs on my toilet cistern, with a very seventies boy and girl.