Lenten Roses

One of my favourite spring fowers has to be Helleborus sometimes known as Lenten Rose or Christmas Rose. Mythology states that a poor shepherd was travelling to Bethlehem. As he did not have a present for the Christ child he was sad and he wept. Myth has it that as the tears touched the ground flowers as beautiful as roses sprung from the ground. The flowers were hellebores. The shepherd picked these Christmas Roses and brought them to the Christ child as his present.
They can have white or green flowers but I love they pink shades best.

The best place to grow Hellebores is close to the front of a flower bed as they only grow just over a foot tall and their early spring colour can be appreciated. They need very little attention once you have found a place in your garden that they love. Just some leaf mould dug in when planting.

Helleborus viridis

Helleborus are able to reduce cell pressure in cold weather. This effect can be reversed with increasing temperatures. You can see this phenomenon in the morning after a frosty night when the leaves and flowers are hanging limp on the ground and with increasing temperatures they straighten up completely.

Like Monty Don another Spring favourite of mine is the Primrose.

I have variations from white/yellow to pale pink not sure how they arrived in the garden may be they have seeded from cross pollinated flowers.

I just let them seed where the please, they love to grow in the gravel paths, on rotten tree stumps anywhere that is damp and has a few hours of sun shine.

Well I'll end this post with a beautiful sunset seen last week 

'Red sky at night Sheppard's delight' 

Running Blue Birds

At our allotment last week I had an amazing encounter with a young Robin.
He was hopping around my neighbours patch looking for worms as she forked the soil through ready for planting.

We stood chatting for a moment and my friend remarked at how close the Robin was getting. As I had my camera with me I slowly moved to the ground and the Robin came even closer and end up on my friends Wellington boot, but only for a few seconds so I had a luck shot.

Robin on the look out for lunch

Yesterday as I walked through my gate I heard a hollow tapping noise very close to me and at first thought it was the Woodpecker I had heard every morning for the last two days on the tree next to me. But the sound was too close, then I realised it was coming from the nesting box we had put up last year. A blue tit was busy spring cleaning it for a new brood.

All this bird activity has inspired my new bunting these are some of the fabric cut outs:

.  After some happy hours sowing they became this:

Joined together they follow one another like this:

You will find my 'Running Blue Birds' in my Etsy shop.

I will end my post with a picture of the March Moon taken on the 19th at 9pm an hour before perigree when it was at its closest to the earth.

photo by my husband Paul

It will only appear this close again in 16 years time.

Blue Daffodil's?

No surely not. But the flower on this fabric does look a little bit like a daffodil head don't you think? Or maybe a Canterbury Bell, sometimes called the 'cup and saucer' flower (Campanula medium var calycanthema)?
This beautiful cotton fabric was given to me years ago by an elderly neighbour and I have used it to create some heart bunting with other blue and white fabrics. I have decorated each heart with vintage pearl buttons given to me by my mother. Bunting will be listed in my Etsy shop soon.

Blue and white heart bunting

"Yellow yellow daffodil dancing in the sun.
Oh yellow yellow daffodil, you tell me spring has come.
I can hear a blue bird sing, & hear a robin call.
But yellow yellow daffodil I love you most of all."              

Daffodil Song, Author Unknown

My daffodil's looking at the grass waiting for the sun

Local daffodil's on a brighter day

A robin following me around at my allotment

But the mystery still remains as to what flower the fabric designer had in mind. Can you help? If so post your comment here.

New season at the allotment begins

Being very keen on flowers I have always been reluctant to make space in the sunny spots of our garden at home for vegetables. So last year my husdand convinced me that applying for a local allotment was a good idea.
We were lucky enough to get one straight away in early May 2010 and as it had been dug over by the previous holder we were able to start planting and got a reasonable yeild of potatoes, onions, lettuce, courgettes, swiss chard and runner beans by the end of the year.

Small plot June 2010

It was only a small plot and a little shady so when we were offered an additional one in June we took that on as well. It was rather over grown but was a in a lovely sunny position.

Medium Plot June 2010

We set to work first removing the weed tops as they were beginning to seed everywhere.
After digging it over and adding horse manure in September we planted onion sets, shallot sets and garlic in October which have survived the coldest winter in 100 years very well.
We also planted broad beans even though neighbouring allotment holders said the mice would have them. Covering them with fleece they too have made it through the winter but only time will tell if they will produce any beans.

Broad beans February 2011

At the moment we are forking over areas where we plan to plant potatoes. We are chitting (sprouting) seed potatoes indoors in a cool, light place and will plant them out in the next couple of weeks once frosts have stopped.

Medium Plot February 2011

 Only10-15 minutes walk away from home our allotment is giving us great pleasure, keeping us fit! and there are always beautiful things to see on the way there.

Forsythia

Crocus

Follow my blog to get further post on how our allotment devolops though the year.

Family visit to Wells Cathedral

Half term week was rather dull and wet here but the sun did make an appearance once or twice on Thursday the day we picked for our trip to the City of  Wells. The Cathedral seen above is beautiful, we climbed half way up the tower for this view from a small window.

Near the Cathedral we discovered these splendid Almshouses.

Like all almshouses, the Wells almshouses were built to provide housing for those who, through no fault of their own, found themselves homeless or living in poverty.

This week I am back on my own again as the girls are back at school.

Its very quiet here as it felt like I had Steven Fry staying for the week because the girls listened to the audio book 'Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince' all week.

I have been busy making some Blue and White Mushroom bunting.

 Thank you for looking.