Wedding Wonders

Again this week we have had rain and some cold nights down to 7C. I have discovered a rabbit in the garden. Despite surrounding the garden with rabbit wire it tunnelled in under the bent wire on the field gate. It is now munching away on my bedding plants in bunny Utopia. I am not a happy bunny. Watch out bunny.

Luckily I had only planted out a few of these bedding plants

These are the flowers I did for a friend's wedding. Using the church window ledges was a new technique and a challenge for me.The bride and her mother were very happy with the final result. I was able to use foliage from the Artful Garden and my home garden.

A display in the church entrance

White, pink roses and stocks, a lovely perfume

I decorated the altar vases with lace

Bracken, ivy, euphorbia just some of the foliage I used

The display compliments the window

The May blossom is just coming into flower such an intense perfume of sunny days and cloudless skies.

Will May flowers bring forth sun not showers?

Cow parsley is now in flower on the verges.

Cow parsley heads nod in the breeze

The dandelions have turned to seed.

Yellow dandelion buttons

Feathery dandelion clocks. Blow the seed heads away to see what time it is.

One o'clock, two o' clock three o' clock four?

The broom is a bright acid yellow splash in the verge.

Yellow beads

Beautiful water buttercups such a rich golden yellow.

Golden stars

Deep maroon cosmos.

Feathery foliage and red jewels

This rhododendron is just smothered with blooms.

Pink personified

Delicate orange welsh poppies.

Fragile and dainty

The farmers are ploughing their fields. 

Plough a straight furrow

This tree trunk looks like a gnarled giant's hand.

Witches fingers 

Look at the variety of edible fungus for sale at the greengrocers.

They look like sea creatures

Home grown rhubarb.

Delicious

I have emptied my plant pots and put the bulbs to dry in the greenhouse. I have labelled the different varieties hoping the labels stay in place for next year's planting.

Daffodil and tulip bulbs

A pottery lady has appeared in the Artful Garden.

It's frightfully cold out here and I've got rather a stiff neck 

At dusk a lone swallow sits on my washing line and chatters like static to it's friends.

Chit, chit, click, click

Various Veg

Again a mixed week of weather, rain and sunshine and still the occasional cold night.

The greenhouse is bursting with plants that need to be planted out.

Can you see the paraffin heater?

I have started to stake some plants and have used my pottery heads.

I say what a wonderful view

Has anyone seen my trowel?

Should I have eaten all that rhubarb?

A pottery sunflower brightens the flower bed.

Sunseeker

Bonny violet violas.

Violet faces

The bluebells form a blue carpet.

Blue hues

The apple blossom is very delicate.

Dainty shades of pink

The leaves on the grapevine are just beginning to open.

Last year we had a small grape harvest

The peas I planted two weeks ago are just showing.

Hunt the peas

I have had to earth up the potatoes.

Earthing up is putting soil over the potato leaves as they grow

My asparagus bed got hit by the frost so I only have about 2 stalks ripening.

Not a lot

A wonderful coloured evening sky.

Golden hues

Fantastic Flowering

Another week of rain warm days and cold nights. Everything is growing very fast including the plants grown from seed in the greenhouse. I will have to wait a couple more weeks to avoid the frosts before I can plant them out. I have planted out the cabbages and cauliflowers. I have spent several days weeding flowerbeds and under the fruit trees. Yesterday I sowed a bed of wild flowers and a bed of calendulas and poppies.

The dandelions are now gracing the verges.

An army of golden spiky discs

Such an intense yellow.

Vivid acid yellow

Dainty Welsh poppies are in bloom. They love to open their petals to full sunshine and close up at night.

Fragile beauty

The aubretia is looking very striking.

A purple cascade

The rhubarb and cardoon are responding to the manure feed.

Rhubarb, rhubarb, rhubarb

The strawberry plants are in flower.

We will know that summer is here when there are strawberries to eat

We have cut back the Autumn raspberries and applied a liberal dose of manure.

In a season the raspberries grow to the top of the posts

The aconites love the sunshine and only open on sunny days.

Starry, starry white

My red rhododendron is in flower. 

Very frost sensitive

I have been dead heading the daffodils.

A stew of daffodil heads

On a trip to Skipton I saw the converted former water tower that has been featured on Grand designs.

A glass viewing tower on the top. Situated next to Skipton station

Yarn bombing in Skipton.

Spinning a yarn

How to brighten up a fence

What type of shop is this?

Not any old cobblers

Shoes from a former era.

Do we have your size?

A selection of old fashioned sweets. 

Tasty

Can you see your favourite.

I love the designs on the tins

Plastic strips on a maize field look like a silver lake.

 A plastic lake

Rust in many guises.

All these objects have been dug up or found in the Artful Garden