A blog of 2 halves!

Excellent blog Gee great to see u again

Good to read and see all your goings on Gee! Bargains - a bit of an understatement! They are superb. Especially the old ones and you are right a wonderful story.
Like the shelf on your bench, I may pinch that idea ;)

My goodness what a lot you've been up to! Your collection of Heucheras are fantastic, and as for the wonderful cake, all I can say is 'please may I have a slice?'

Lovely blog Gee ... I was wondering if you'd fallen into one of those wheelie bins as it's been a while since you posted a blog! I love the view from your front door now, especially the three wise monkeys on the bottom shelf. Good to see Millie approves of your new rug ... it's lovely. Aren't terracotta pots lovely? I managed to obtain some via Freecycle recently. Love your plant stands too ... and good to see your Heuchera collection amassing! :o)

Fantastic bargains!!!!!!. Great story that went with some of them also. Maybe u could hang pots on the side of the seat arch??? Or at least one each side.
Enjoy your family dinners!

Nice to see you back, you have been so busy, and so many pots and bargains, you are going to be busy again filling them all up........your cakes look delicious, made me feel peckish (well for cake, that is)
loved the blog and your photos, obviously Millie likes the new rug too!!

You have a good excuse for being AWOL Gee. You have had a very busy summer and a productive one. Your Heuchera collection is grand and I do much prefer clay pots, so tactile. I like your new floor and rug every bit as much as Molly. She does seem to be keeping a doting motherly eye on Stanley.

Hi Gee Lovely blog what a busy time you have had and what super bargains you have found.....loving the story of the buried pots, Millie and Stanley's photo is so cute and as for your cakes well - scrumptious doesn't do them justice! :o)

Its so interesting ot see everybody geting enthusiastic about terracotta pots. it seems such a short time since plastic ones were welcomes as they don't need wtering as often - but the old ones do look better

Lovely blog Gee, you have some great pots at great prices, I'm envious. Your family sound like stars :)
Nice to see you around.

Hi Gee pleased to see you around again, what a lot of projects you have been busy with, I can see you use your Abour the same as I do, its full of cuttings Plant pots and seed trays lol What great collecion of pots you have amassed and lovely to see your Heuchera collection thriving and growing, great to see Milly and your lodger Stanley too, just dont disappear on us again ;0)

I think you must be the queen of bargains and the queen of delicious looking cakes and jams!

Wonderful to see evidence of so much happy activity.

Thank you
x

Well...I am glad that this blog of yours made it! What happy, fun reading it makes and the photos are brilliant to, as are your captions. Careful with Stanley who might not want to leave for home after he's taken over everything at yours! Poor Milly :) And mind that seating of yours with the shelf you have added above it...save those plants from being flung over the fence! lol :)

Hi Gee good to have you back, you have had a busy time, pleased you got sorted with the bins, I thought you'd be ok once you were able to manouvre them and also not have to have them ruining your outlook, very nice selection of plants to admire instead, its always good when the housemates approve of the changes as well which Millie does as shown in the photo, Stanley also very energetic and feeling very much at home, lol..
You are still going to be busy filling all your new pots and will probably need another bargain find to display them all.....

Thank you, all, for your welcome back and kind comments.

Shirley, I did nearly end up in one of the wheelies when I tried to retrieve something that ended up in the wrong one. I couldn't reach it so just covered it up with something else!!

In spite of the wind, it has been quite sunny here today so I have spent some time in the greenhouse planting up some of those pots :)

Gee, that conjures up a great image in my mind ... mind you I did have to tip out the contents of the paper/cans/plastic one once when an item had ben thrown in by mistake ... good job I rinse containers out before re-cycling them! I bet you enjoyed some time in the greenhouse ... it's so mild for the end of October :o)

Really enjoyed your blog Gee, all looking lovely, especially love how your new heuchera caramel looks in its pot. Best of all the dogs and tortoise:-))

Gosh Gee you have been so busy I like the changes in your home and garden the brick edging looks superb and what great bargains with the terracotta pots I've been lucky in that direction myself as a neighbour is clearing his stuff out to move and has passed loads of his terracotta pots on to us ! I love to see Milly and Stanley together they are such good friends ,Those cakes look so yummy , BTW you know I couldn't have done that last fairy photo without your expert help :o))

Great blog. I enjoyed reading it.

Nice to see you back Gee... great blog, you really have been busy.... love your new rug... glad you solved problems with your bins... :))

Have just been reading this again and sorry I missed the sink first time around. It is looking lovely and healthy. Stera I like the clay pots because I can bury them in a plunge bed, boxes in the green house, and never worry about watering as i just water the sand mix on the outside of the pots.

Good point Scotsgran.

Good to see you blog again Gee; pleased to read that you are at peace with your wheelies via the new arrangements. So good to have a helpful family to see you through this sort of problem. It has brought a benficial change for you. All your new arrangements look well done. The raging winds tore through the garden 3 hours ago. I prepared yesterday by thinning with the high lopper and stashing things away. Hope you got all your stuff safely stashed. Kent always seems to be in the path of something snowy or very windy and wet. My OH was in hospital on Friday all day on a routine admission plus the removal of a tiny portion of his anatomy. So far so good but could have done without the visitation this morning. Lotsa tidying up to do in the garden if I can manage it today.

It's good to be back again and to hear from you all. Sorry to hear that your OH is in hospital, Dorjac, hope he is making a good recovery and will soon be home.

The storm hit hard and my poor garden looks like a battlefield - a 20 foot branch, from one of the trees by the pond (council), is lying across the width of the garden and it has knocked a table over, smashing a number of my lovely terracotta pots and breaking my lovely white camellia. I may be able to salvage some of the plants knocked out of the pots but difficult to tell at the moment.
Millie is my main worry at the moment as she is suffering from repeated perianal abscesses in spite of three lots of antibiotics. Another visit to the vet on Wednesday to see what the next step is :(

Take care all :)

I hope you get Millie sorted out. Sorry to hear about your pots and the Camellia. You all seem to be having an awful time this year.

Oh Gee, that's not good news, especially about the broken terracotta pots which you have only just acquired ... I hope Millie is fighting fit soon ... :o)

So sorry to hear you were in the storm's path and your garden so sadly disrupted too and Millie not well, with her abscesses. Trees and household pets can cause us a lot of problems. We have been planning to get our trees thinned out and topped off a bit, even if it costs quite a lot. October is a dodgy month for gales and floods. The wind was horrendous as I severed a huge lump of tarpaulin flapping madly off the shed roof. Good job the garden scissors went through it like a knife through butter......phew. It sounded as loud as a big jet taking off.......very scary.

Sunshine here today although a little bit breezy too. Millie and I have walked through the wood, lots of broken branches but nothing major although I didn't go through to the more exposed part. That's for another day :) Millie seemed to enjoy her walk in spite of her rather sore looking rear end. She is such a poppet.

My grandson came round with a saw yesterday evening and cut through the fallen branch in the garden and then lobbed the pieces back over the fence!! I have picked up the broken pieces of camellia and stuck them in the ground - a bit optimistic maybe? I think about 8 pots were broken - mostly smaller ones but I think I have managed to salvage most of the little plants (all heuchera cuttings).

You're very brave going out to tackle the shed roof in the wind, Dorjac. I cowered indoors! The cattery that the family are looking after was badly hit, one complete cat house blowing on to its side. Five cats were very upset to find their shelter suddenly gone but my grandson managed to catch 3 kittens almost immediately and then the fourth one a little later. One cat disappeared into the fields nearby but was caught in a cat trap this morning. So all is well. They are all cats awaiting new homes. The smallest kitten is now named Storm :)

Oh Dear Gee it's all bad news from you , I hope your garden will recover from the damage , didn't you have a branch fall in your garden sometime ago on a shed ? Poor Millie fingers crossed she will soon be much better and that the kittens soon find new warm homes :o)

You've a good memory, Amy, yes, my greenhouse was damaged last time. It has happened about 6 times in the 15 years I've lived here but the council won't do anything about the trees because 'it doesn't do them any good to be topped'!! They are very, very tall. Never mind, I have just arranged to pick up some more terracotta pots from the same place as last time :) Millie is better is herself this evening - I just hope the vet can sort something out for her.

Glad Millie was able to enjoy a walk in this lovely mildish sunny end too October. Such a deceitful month. I had to go out. My brothers shed roof covering did the same in a fierce northern gale some years ago. Over the roofs of houses at the back. Landed in a busy main road and stopped traffic! So I had to do something in a hurry. Poor cats, they must have been terrified. Our garden cat Spooky retreated deep into the shrubbery. He only came out when all was quiet, strolled through the house, to go next door and get his breakfast. I tidied up the garden Tuesday. Now I have aches and pains to show for it. Hope the vet can help Millie this time.

Lovely day again today and Millie and I plus a couple of friends (humans!) had a lovely walk in the woods.

Just returned from the Vets and she seemed very happy with Millie and has prescribed another week of antibiotics and a revisit next Wednesday. Hopefully that will solve the problem. I feel happier about it but will have to wait and see if anything else develops.

As it was a lovely day Gee, OH surprised me by wanting a trip out to North weald airfield for lunch. So we went the 20 miles and had a lovely sunny trip out and a visit to a GC on the way back. Dull and wet this thursday morn, such a variable month. I think this storm cut a narrow swathe through Kent, London and Essex. A sandbag wall in the doorway of the NAAFI was dislodged by one gust measuring 72 miles per hour in the conning tower, and the top of a shed blown off. Friends a were free at Cromer from assault by storm. No planes were turned over, as they were all well lashed down. A really old plane, flown by a commercial pilot, in his day job, flew in for dinner. A Queen Bee, the only one in existence. He talked to us while he ate and walked alongside the old plane on the runway before he hopped in and taxied off....very eccentric!

I have just returned from the Cotswalds Gee. A friend has a lovely healthy looking Camellia which is full of nice plump buds. She grew it from a leaf of a plant she has in the garden. She just stuck the leaves around the edge of a pot and this is one of the successes. She could not remember if it was two or three years ago that she did it. I know cuttings rooted outside can take a year longer than ones in a pot in a cold frame. I think you might well be successful with your cuttings.

I have never heard of a 'Queen Bee' Dorjac but googled it and saw some lovely pics :) I suspect your pilot was in the photos too.

Thanks, Scotsgran, that's encouraging. I did a bit of tidying up this morning and found another two smaller pieces so have popped them in a pot. My daughter took me back to the ebayer who has all the old pots and I bought some more so I have plenty now :)

Very good. I have just been cutting the stems of the Nicandra physolodes to save the seeds. I should have posted a photo to show you how well it grew. I gave lots away to very grateful recipients. Thank you for sending me those seeds.

brilliant blog as usual. wow, you have been busy ...

Thanks, Fran, I enjoy being busy especially in the garden but I hate housework :)

snap! I'd rather knock myself out gardening than lift a duster!

Now you are speaking my language!