Lambs, Pottery and Gardening!

This week was all about settling back down to normality with the return to work and school after our much needed holiday, happily though it was only a 4 day working week so smiles all round.

School is always a worrying time as Riley is not a fan, if he is interested in the current terms project then its not so bad, this term is greek gods! Thankfully this week has gone okay with no issues which always makes for a great week
Jack is in his first year of GCSEs and coping okay with them, I still don't think he realises how much more of a workload is coming his way!

For me personally this week I got to feed the local lambs after work each day which just makes my soul smile every time I see them. That's it for another year though so I look forward to next spring already.

I had another pottery session this week, I truly love it, totally for personal pleasure, if i'm honest I'm not happy with the pot I threw but I'm hoping the decoration hides that! It sadly has a week point but I did learn the bubble blowing technique so it wasn't all bad

This weekend the garden has had all of our attention, there is so much to do and to be honest we're still not sure exactly what we want to happen but we are making a start, lots of pruning, weeding and tarpaulin

Our garden is quite large (its not all in the photo) so we are trying to make a plan to design a family friendly garden, the trampoline for the boys, a seating area, lawned area, shrubs and growing our own veg!

We are slowly making progress and we're hoping to work so much more on it as the weather allows us too

Muddy Boots...

We've managed to transform our garden space by digging up an area that was neither here nor there and after lots of preparation adding some new lawn to it
A few weeks of watering has gone by and the lawn has took really well

So we set aside a whole day of doing as much as we could whilst the sun was shining
We had odd gravel areas which we've dug up and are going to plant herbs and lavender in as they will look a lot more inviting than a gravel bed

Whilst we busily worked away the moggies snoozed under the hydrangea grabbing some shade whilst they could

Our garden space is really quite huge! so we're working on it in sections, over time the amount of work we've done to try to make it into a more family useable garden is finally starting to show
Before -
We dug the border in the front you can see as they were mainly over run roses and weeds

 

 All of this middle border came out

by adding new lawn its made the garden feel so much bigger! the middle border that we dug out was just by the climbing frame! so you can see how much extra space its given us
you can see the two areas i've dug out as well (they were the gravel spots!) so they will be planted really soon

Alot done but still so much more to do, I have to say though its lovely looking out the window at all the space now

Our Garden Space - Welcome

The garden is HUGE, like totally huge, it can and will be a fantastic space for our family but at the moment its a bit here and a bit there!
We've removed a fair bit of 'rubbish' like falling down aviaries and the spikiest plants i've ever seen in my life! A ridiculous ivy growth which was suppose to be some sort of a walk through! it didnt work at all!

The easiest way Ive found to sort this space out is to section it off! They will more than likely not be done in order as it depends how much work each space needs!
I've drawn up a plan and everything! Lets see how it comes together over the next year!

This is a panoramic view of it from the back of our garage (sun was too bright)

So here it is again from the fish pond area!

The fish always bob along to say hello :)

We've made a start!

Buzzy Bees

This is the year our garden is going to come alive!
I saw this on facebook and just had to share, I'll certainly make sure we have some of these plants in our garden to encourage our humble bumble bee

Blooming Peony

I love Peonys and we have one in such an odd place in the garden! It was already here when we moved in
I've been watching it for a couple of weeks to see it bloom

and now - its gone! already - so short lived but oh so pretty!

Pots of Blooms

With the small amount of days of sunshine that we've had here, we've been able to get out in the garden, get some new plants in and start seeing how we want the garden to grow
I've got a few lavenders dotted about, this one is currently in a large pot

 The allium is new to the border, after seeing this one bloom I really want to get some more now

 The cauldron chive pot is quite literally blooming

Our garden is quite large so we need to attack it in stages, the house updating has come first though over the years but hopefully the garden will start to be attacked very soon

Buttercups

With thanks to Jane from Snapdragon for giving me the idea of putting them in a vase
I have a huge amount of buttercups in the garden, yes I know its a weed but to be honest I think its really pretty too

 May the sun continue to shine x

Garden Time

Sunday was a glorious day of sunshine so we went off to The Bell Plantation in Towcester and spent a couple of hours mooching around the plants, chickens and most marvellous
We came home and hit the garden whilst we could, I started on my herb area by digging out weeds and edging the lawn

 I moved my funky wooden toadstool to the rockery

 I totally adore this peony, its in the oddest place in the garden so i'm very protective of it

 I do believe we will be well laden with blackcurrants this year

 The lilac tree is finally in full bloom

The Garden Rockery

There was already a rockery in the garden when we moved in, it basically just needed a good clean up and some fresh new plants!
With the weekend just gone been a bank holiday, we of course did the must do garden centre visit, to one of our favourites at Poddington! Its a little drive out but really worth it as they have huge koi swimming around in a large pond outside

I bought these for some gaps in the rockery

Its taken a whole month to be able to plant them out as the weather has not been kind to us here! constant rain! but finally they are in their new home

Another critter found in the garden today, he was super huge

cheery bugs!

I've been quite ill this past week with a viral infection to the point I havent been able to work in my shop or attend our monthly market!
I've woke up this morning feeling a little itsy bit better, I went out to the garden first thing and saw this little beauty

It kind of made my day start with a smile
Happy Sunday everyone x

Cauldron of Chives!

When we moved here I found this cauldron pot in the garden and knew at some point I'd do something with it

My friend gave me a pot of chives recently and knew straight away where I wanted to plant them, what I wasnt expecting was a huge hole!

I worked around this by buying a hanging planet basket liner (cheap as chips from tesco for 87p)

I did the job so I could get filling with compost without losing any out of the bottom

Love it, cant wait for the chives to grow more and fill the pot :)

On another note, I've planted so many lettuce in one go I hope my friends want some too

unravelling

Amongst the disarray that our garden currently is, I keep dreaming of how it will be, whilst I continue to dream and dig the pretty fern is unravelling

and the hosta is unravelling too - i love hosta flowers there so pretty

I have lots of plans for the garden starting with someone edging it all for me and digging out my veg plot so I can just crack on with it, hows your garden growing x

Pretties

*Giveaway still open - see post below*

Ive planted some new pretties in my garden this week, I'm in love with adding little bits here and there, making it 'our' garden