wendyswonderlandgarden

So I’m very aware that I haven’t blogged for a while nor wished my lovely readers a happy new year! Sorry I’m late, happy new year folks!

I have been very busy working on a house refurbishment project and have had little time or the right   weather for gardening. I do, however, need to decide what should be done about the overgrown and untidy large garden associated with this project and to add to my difficulties it’s not for me a garden lover who would love the chance of a massive garden I could resign but for a yet unknown tenant. So grass, paving and hopefully some plants it is then! 

I don’t have any pictures this week either, however, my hellebores are mostly in flower now and my bulbs are showing themselves in the pots. 

Anyway, just wanted to check in with you all and I’ll write again very soon. 

We are nearly at the end of my first year of blogging and I’ve had 358 views from the uk, Ireland, Canada, America, Australia and the phillipines. Wow, I’m so pleased. I want to thank everyone for reading it and any comments you’ve made. I hope that you enjoy it and please feel free to ask questions, and share it with friends and family.

I wanted to do a little review of how things have gone in the garden this year. I have tried some different seeds this year with varying degrees of success. What I would say is, the newer the seeds the more likely they are to germinate. Any seeds over 3 years old for me just aren’t as successful. My sweet peas were amazing and grew much taller than expected so I will give them a bigger  stake next year. 

I leave you for now with a picture of a hellebore currently flowering. It’s a bit early, normally they flower in February.

If you’ve read my blog before you will likely know that winter is not my favourite season of the year. Mainly due to the fact I can’t get out gardening as its too cold. Now this winter so far it’s not been too cold but very wet so I still can’t get out.

I have, however, done the majority of the tidying up and all the plants that live in the greenhouse in winter have now moved in there. We are hoping to have some heating in there too this year if we can get them to work.

I like to try and post some pictures of what’s in flower at the moment and it’s been a bit of a challenge but I’ve got a couple for you. 2 pansies/violas. Such cheerful little things and the last one is a calicarpa with purple berries and dogwood on the background.

So it’s November and warm enough still to be able to get into the garden to weed and tidy up. I’ve not done much in my garden for weeks although I have been helping to clear and tidy a patch of mums friends garden for the past few months on a nearly weekly basis.

As it’s not been too cold there is still quite a bit in flower in my garden. The first is an acer tree mum was given about 30 years ago by her father and for some years was growing well with a takeover mission on its part of the garden. Sadly its suffering from die back which is a disease and can be caught by other acers but still looks good  

Also in flower still is a penstemon called ‘strawberries and cream’ bought on the early summer and  flowering for a second time  

Lastly is a dogwood that may be moving home next year as it’s taking over more than its allocated space and other things can’t see the light.  

It was lovely to be able to spend time in the garden this morning in October with no coat on. I guess I won’t be able to do that for much longer.

I was planting tulips in pots. They are one of my favourite bulbs and I like most colours. This morning I was planting the following: 

Tulipa ‘Margarita’an early double which is cerise

Tulipa ‘Ice wonder’ which is white with pink underneath 

Tulipa ‘Christmas pearl’ which is two shades of pink

Tulipa ‘National Velvet’ a dark red bulb

Tulipa ‘Cum Laude’ dark purple/blue

Here is a picture of them

Contrary to popular belief in my house I do actually like roses. When mum was younger she wanted a house with a rose garden and when they moved here over 40 years ago there were approx 100 roses in the garden. We probably only have about 5 of those left, many were old and past it and therefore dug out. When I started planning how to plant up a new garden bed I decided I wanted to plant a couple of roses I it, there hasn’t been any before so I should be OK. You have to be careful planting roses in the same spot as a previous one as it could get diseased.

Anyway I bought one after the Tatton Park flower show and also got a catalogue for other roses at this specialist garden centre. I went through it with my marker pen selecting any that were any shade of  pink, red or white, that stated a good fragrance and disease resistant. This week, probably a bit late in the season we returned to the garden centre to look and smell the ones I had selected and purchase 2. In hind sight it’s best not to wait until the end of the season for this as many didn’t have any flowers left. However, I selected  two, one called ‘Cranford’ which is pink with a lovely fragrance but sadly no flowers left. This was planted this morning and one called ‘hot chocolate’, with orangey red flowers and amazing fragrance not of chocolate I have to add! This is the first picture.

Here are some pictures of roses still in flower in October in my garden

The picture above is nostalgia the rose I bought after tatton park flower show   

Incidentally with all the strange weather we’ve had lately one of my poppies has got confused and there is a new bud on it, be interesting to see if it flowers. I’ve never seen this happen before. 

This is one of the busiest seasons in my garden with lots of perennials to cut down and tidy up.

There is still quite a bit flowering including a couple of dahlias which are really a bit late but ‘better late than never’ as the saying goes.

Some pictures to finish

This first one is actually where my gardening began. At primary school (just a few years ago) we had to make a mini garden in a box for a competition I think. Anyway, I didn’t win but a patch that had been dug out of the ground and previously used for vegetables was given to me. We’ve tried lots of different things in thee with varying degrees of success but the heather and a few others have been there most of that time 

Next is a lovely pale peach hollyhock from the original Wonderland garden now rehomed  as the garden was built over  

A scabious grown from seed earlier this summer 

  
A lovely white Japanese anemone also originally from the Wonderland garden  

Lastly a lovely small hydrangea 

Last week we went to Harrogate for a couple of days to visit the RHS garden there, Harlow Carr which I had been wanting to do for some time.

It was lovely, they are celebrating Alice in Wonderland at the moment with themed gardens and childrens play areas. For me the best parts were the long borders, they were so full and brightly coloured and the plants that I like so much, the wild flower meadows full of poppies and cornflowers and also the scented garden.

Its worth a visit if you are in the area ever.

I will leave you with some of my many pictures:

A few more pictures from my garden 

Red annual poppies grown from seed

  
Echinacea pow wow wild berry planted this morning