brick path – Page 2 – derrickjknight

New Roses

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This has been a day of varied activities. This morning involved various administrative phone calls; a trip to Lymington to confirm the order and pay for Jackie’s new laptop; and a drive among the lanes around Sway.

Other road users somewhat impeding our leisurely progress included a horse and rider;

a group of cyclists consisting of a gentleman and young girl lagging behind two boys pausing on the brow of a hill;

and a truck bearing a precarious looking wide load of hay.

Coombe Lane, in particular, is home to Long Cottage, the garden of which contains a row of sunflowers fronting a rather wizened little oak tree bearing large clusters of cupped acorns.

Further along this road a group of inquisitive young Friesians thronged to their gateway in order to enquire what we were doing there.

Hordle has its own Scarecrow Trail, but since we followed the Bisterne one thoroughly, and parking is quite dangerous alongside the exhibits in the more populous village, I will simply photograph those we come across in our wanderings. The first of these are outside Hordle Parish Church of All Saints. They have been created by the children of the nearby Nursery School.

Early this afternoon Jackie dug the first hole for the roses that will ascend the now unclad Gothic Arch seen at the far end of this section of the Brick Path, alongside which stands the Nottingham Castle bench with its attendant sweet peas.

The rear of the bench can be seen in this shot of the Star of India clematis in Margery’s Bed.

The elegant forms of white gladioli take centre stage on this view of the Dragon Bed,

while, to the right of them, the colours of Japanese anemones, fuchsia, and lobelia form a similar sinuous shape.

Later, we visited Otter Nurseries where we bought two roses for the bare arch. We have examples of these elsewhere in the garden. Penny Lane wanders over the potting shed in the Rose Garden, and the bright red Super Elfin has taken off like a rocket in the herbaceous border.

Here Jackie, having planted Penny Lane, starts on a hole for the heavily pruned Super Elfin. I helped out a bit with that one, but the Head Gardener refused to photograph me on the grounds that my minor effort didn’t warrant a presence on the blog. Frankly that seemed a little harsh to me.

In a short while we can expect to see a difference.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s brilliant beef pie, with meaty gravy, boiled potatoes, spring greens, and bright carrots. The Culinary Queen finished the sauvignon blanc, and I finished the Fleurie.

In The May Garden (2)

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Among his other tasks this morning, Aaron finished weeding the original section of the Brick Path,

and sprayed herbicide along the gravel of the Back Drive where an old gold iris has bloomed.

Many plants, like this pansy-like mimulus, have happily self-seeded from last year,

others like two mulleins threatening to dwarf the roses among which they have taken root, may themselves be quite content, but their neighbours are not so.

We may have left it too late to move these two giants to the rear of the Back Drive border.

Rose Gloriana is far more prolific in this, its third year in the Rose Garden,

the faded blue entrance arch to which bears creamy Madame Alfred Carriere.

Altissimo stands sentinel at the corner of The Rose Garden and Elizabeth’s Bed,

where this sturdy fuchsia suspends its delicate pink flowers.

Cheerful erigeron cascades from the wall of the New Bed that contains

this pink-striped clematis,

as healthy as this, one of Jackie’s rescued spindly little twigs, mounting the front fence.

This evening we dined on pork medallions in barbecue sauce, with crunchy carrots, broccoli, and new potatoes. I drank Parra Alta Malbec 2016. Jackie had already imbibed her Hoegaarden on the patio beforehand.

Oh Yes – We Did Have An Easter Egg Hunt

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This morning Aaron began weeding the Brick Path.

Bees were feasting on the tiny blooms of tellimas which grow quite profusely.

Noticing Becky wandering around the garden gathering up Scooby’s poo bag contributions, Aaron quipped that she had missed Easter, so there was no Egg Hunt today.

This afternoon Jackie drove Becky and me to Elizabeth’s home at West End, where we enjoyed a roast lamb meal cooked by Adam, in honour of Danni, Thea, and Andy’s 10k run in aid of Cancer Research.

These are before and after photographs e-mailed to me by Danni.

As soon as I opened the front door it was apparent that such an event had taken place. a medal on the stairs and discarded trainers provided the evidence.

My great nephew Jasper earnestly concentrated on his father’s train set

details of which he explained to Becky and to Danni.

The constituents of Adam’s excellent meal, namely roast lamb, potatoes, parsnips and carrots; cauliflower cheese and red cabbage were laid out on the kitchen table from which we helped ourselves and repaired to the dining room. Of the drinks on offer, I chose red wine.

During the meal, Mum was prompted to relate a story of a particular Easter when I had gone to bed after eating too much chocolate and emerged later with the liquidised version all over me.

Afterwards, an Easter Egg Hunt was laid on for Elizabeth’s grandson. He was a little frustrated at first when he could not find any of the treasure,

but soon got into the swing of things.

The highlight of his afternoon was the final large package containing a train that had to be embarked upon immediately.

At this time of the year, it is best to avoid Lyndhurst on this journey, because you are likely to be held up by traffic jams. That is what we did. The donkeys at Beaulieu were determined to demonstrate that they were perfectly capable of providing a similar delay.

While the others grazed a bit, I needed no further sustenance this evening.

Far Too Busy To Chat

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Aaron, Jackie, and I continued tidying up the garden this morning.

Daffodils still glow all over;

the new generation of honesty crops up everywhere;

and the Anemone albas are spreading nicely in the Weeping Birch Bed.

Jackie has weeded around and cleaned the little cistern pond, thus revealing the frogs and Jattie’s sculpture.

The lamp glowing in the sunlight is one of the snake’s head fritillaries Jackie has added to those already shining in the Cryptomeria Bed.

A peacock butterfly tried in vain to look invisible on the gravel of the Heligan Path which joins

the south end of the Brick Path.

Bees continue to plunder the pulmonaria.

I had a fairly lengthy conversation with a young collared dove taking advantage of Aaron’s fencing.

Wood pigeons

and sparrows were far too busy gathering nesting material to chat.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s delicious lamb jalfrezi and special fried rice; followed by apple pie and custard.. She drank sparkling water and I drank Cimarosa limited edition Shiraz 2014.

The Magic Carpet

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Having spent much of the night watching the BBC’s presentation of the unfolding of the EU referendum, I wasn’t up to much this morning.

I did, however, post my day 5 offering on the Facebook nature series.

This was it. It appeared on my WordPress post Earthworks, of 29th September 2015.

I then occupied myself with dead-heading, and, after lunch, cut off more of the hedge along the back drive. Although there was very little rain, the sun made only fleeting visits, enough to encourage this

determined hoverfly to hitch a ride on the tempest-tossed magic carpet that was a single, clinging, poppy petal. As the insect rode the turbulent waves, not a slither did it make.

As so often, the evening was bright and sunny. We took an amble around the garden.

The rose Wedding Day, a prolific climber, is just coming into bloom on the Agriframes arch.

Also flowering is the rodgersia

that dominates the foreground of this view along the Cryptomeria Bed.

The Dragon Bed and the Head Gardener’s Walk are now both well established.

This evening we dined at Lymington’s Royal China where we received the usual efficient, friendly, service and excellent food, accompanied by Tsingtao beer.

We enjoyed some splendid sunsets overlooking Christchurch Bay on our return via Milford on Sea.

A Dust Bath

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This is the second of my 7 day nature series on Facebook.

It appeared originally in https://derrickjknight.com/2014/04/29/a-fascinating-collage/

When we paid for Country Girl last week, Jackie also bought one of her favoured wrought iron candle holders for use as a planter. It has a screw fitted to adjust the height.

Today, I moved it to the gravelled concrete at the southern end of the garden. This involved moving a pile of bricks from where it now stands, and raking gravel to cover that corner. I had to evict a large number of woodlice, slugs, and, one snail.

Jackie had moved a few of the bricks earlier. Feeling the heat she must have removed her jumper, and slung it over the nearest available hanger, thus providing the Country Girl, now dubbed Florence, with a purple hair extension

The white climber is now making its way up the Agriframes Arch straddling the Brick Path.

The clump of geranium palmatums halfway down that shot draws bees so large that they weigh down the petals to which they cling whilst plundering the nectar.

Those plants are at the corner of the Dead End Path, alongside which a large philadelphus is in bloom.

Other plants attracting bees include poppies (this one also has a beetle)

and linaria.

Bees have shaken off so much pollen in the poppy that much smaller insects avail themselves of the bowl for a dust bath.

What, now, is this nosey creature entering the foxglove?

It’s a mosquito making a bee seem comparatively harmless.

My afternoon tasks including gathering up The Head Gardener’s weeding and clippings, and dead-heading roses, mostly in the Rose Garden where a few clematises like this

Hagley’s Hybrid have been incorporated for variety.

For our dinner this evening Jackie produced a stupendous beef stew with new potatoes. So tasty was this that when offered a choice of more stew, sticky toffee pudding, or more stew and sticky toffee pudding, I opted for more stew. That way, I reasoned, I could eat more. Jackie drank Peroni, and I drank Patrick Chodot Fleurie 2014, except for the glassful I knocked over the table, which was a shame.

Before The Wedding

Before setting off to Lyndhurst for Danni and Andy’s wedding, we took a short tour round the garden.

Cynthia Jobin‘s question on yesterday’s post had alerted us to the similarities between cow parsley and hemlock. After extensive research The Head Gardener was able to pronounce that we did not have poison and could indeed make soup with our crop.

We have now discovered that the boy in the four seasons statuary represents summer.

Two clematis Montanas are now giving the dead Snake Bark maple a new lease of life.

We attended the aforementioned wedding, had lots of lovely food and a certain amount of beer and wine. I will report on it tomorrow.

Which Statues?

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Yesterday, Jackie bought two nicely weathered stone urns from an outlet in Molly’s Den, and positioned them either side of the brick path.

She accidentally let slip that there were four more available. Naturally we had to dash off this morning to procure them.

We also bought two garden statues which could not be resisted. Once more, it was two young ladies who helped us load these latter items onto a sack barrow, enabling us to transport them to the car. Because of the overall weight, three trips were required to take them home, unload them, and install them.

Linda, on our second journey through the antiques centre, was vacuuming the carpet in her section. Seeing Jackie pass with a couple of urns perched on the barrow, she switched off her Dyson, and engaged in a pleasant conversation in which she told us that they had once belonged to her. She had sold them to the dealers from whom we had made our purchase.

Later, we spoke again, and learned that our two items of statuary had also belonged to this cheerful woman who was downsizing.

Which two pieces from this corner site did we choose? All will be revealed tomorrow.

When finishing a heavy morning’s humping at Molly’s Den, there is only one thing to do.

We did it. We consumed the obligatory Molly’s Pantry brunch.

The rest of the urns are now distributed around the garden.

The statues will be unveiled tomorrow.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s excellent beef pie, glorious gravy; and crisp carrots, Brussels sprouts, runner beans and new potatoes. she drank Diet Coke, and I finished the malbec.

A Lost Shadow

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Ronan the Boilerman fitted a new thermostat to our hot water cylinder tank this morning. That means we no longer scald our hands and have to turn on the cold tap every time we want to wash them.

Jackie spent much of the day weeding and planting.

Once The Head Gardener had prepared it, I covered Elizabeth’s bed with compost. It took eight bags.

The gradual burgeoning throughout the garden can be seen, for example, along the Brick Path – and, yes, Jackie has smuggled in another owl since this was las displayed –

and along Margery’s Bed, in the foreground of which a geranium palmatum has pushed its way into the light.

We have varieties of tulip,

including tulipa saxatilis lilac wonder;

daffodil;

and aquilegia.

elegant leaves stretch their fingers out from this Japanese maple.

Pulmonaria crops up everywhere,

attracting equally hirsute bees clutching petals as they suck the nectar.

Butterflies, like this Small White flitting from honesty to honesty, are also back,

as are poppies, one of which, like Peter Pan, has lost its shadow.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s choice Ferndene Farm Shop chilli pork sausage casserole, mashed potato, carrots and Brussels sprouts, followed by chocolate eclairs. The Cook drank Hoegaarden, whilst I consumed more of the madiran.

Pops

Last night Becky forwarded us three photographs entitled Pops, taken by Tess. They are of Poppy sleeping on her Pop’s chest. On waking she seems quite contented. Remaining asleep, so does Mat.

These low resolution images had been e-mailed twice; from Tess to Becky, and from Becky to me. They were consequently heavily pixellated. I chose to de-noise the images at the expense of definition. Naturally, a 6″ x 4″ print of the last one was required to be made for Grannie’s handbag.

I then updated ‘My Branch Of The Family Tree’ with an amended version of Judith’s chart.

Jackie cut the grass today, and Aaron completed his refurbishment of The Brick Path.

Among the new blooms is a cluster of white gladioli.

This evening we dined on pizza and Becky’s pasta bake followed by lemon, and jam, tarts. My choice of beverage was Ringwood’s Boondoggle; Jackie’s was Hoegaarden.