I started blogging in 2007. What a different world, a different life. I was fifty three, still working in a demanding job which took me away from our beautiful ancient house, high on a Welsh hillside. I had one two year old grandson. I loved my job but my life felt very fragmented, split between London and Wales, between professional me and personal me. Both my parents were alive. My active, funny brother had yet to have the stroke which for twelve years until his death confined him to a wheelchair and robbed him of much of his dry, witty personality. And now? Now I am seventy and have been retired for years. My mother died in 2013, my father in law in 2014, my father in 2015 and my brother last year. We now have ten grandchildren, ranging in age from six to eighteen. There have been departures and arrivals. In the intervening years we have bought a building plot, sold our old house and built a new one w...
I enjoyed your slide show and adore the views you have.
ReplyDeleteThanks for participating again this month
Wonderful! Impressive too - I'm beginning to feel daunted by the idea of a large garden, when I see how much work must go into yours!
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ReplyDeleteIs your garden always as tidy looking as this year or did the photography deadline cause you to work extra hard?
It is, of course, possible, that you have hidden the messy bits.
I thoroughly enjoyed your slide show. I looked through it a couple of times and good a very good idea of what your gardens look like. They are a pleasure to see. You must be very proud of yourself. I would be. I bet you can't wait until next spring when you will be full of new ideas. What a wonderful place. Thanks for showing it.
ReplyDeleteThanks Helen. I am so glad I found this end of month view on your blog. I really like the insight it gives you. You always think you will remember but I at least never do!
ReplyDeleteRachel - It's not at all impressive. There is a lot of weed or wildlife garden as we call it.
Friko - see above! It looks much tidier in the photos than it does in real life. I suspect it is taking the long view. In fact the best garden photos combine a long view (where you can't see the mess) and some lovely close ups (where you ignore the mess alongside and focus in on the plant of the moment).
What a great idea Elizabeth. I loved the slideshow.
ReplyDeleteI am just amazed. Not only can you garden but you can technologise for Wales, too! Now if you took a photo every week and speeded the presentation it would be like having a film and you could add in bits of weather, clouds hurrying across the sky, snow coming and going, peacocks drifting languidly across the lawn - but don't film the rain for rain always overacts, have you noticed?
ReplyDeleteNo seriously - your blog is both lovely and instructional. Wonderful.
You clever thing, you! I am so far behind the technology that I may have to take some time off just to learn.
ReplyDeleteYour garden is quite lovely - the views, the kitchen garden, the orchard - everything. Thank you for sharing it with us!
Beautiful!I know its not perfect (neither is mine) but whhen you put it all together with the views its lovely. I'm learning not to be so critical of my garden, and I'm enjoying it more because of that.
ReplyDeleteLovely!
ReplyDeleteI love the slideshow. It brings out things I would not otherwise have noticed, like how the wall in your side garden virtually disappears once spring takes hold!
ReplyDeleteYour slide show is wonderful, Elizabeth. Thank you. It has brought back happy memories of our holiday in your lovely cottage last summer.
ReplyDeleteOh how lucky we are to live in a country with such variety.
ReplyDeleteDid my parcel arrive? After my son returned from holiday he confirmed that they do indeed drive through your village on the way to their holiday cottage. He could have dropped it off.
Nora - now that is a lovely thing to say but I am not all proud of myself! I tend to feel that the true beauty is the beauty of the place and that my efforts are just a fraction of the dream I have in my head!
ReplyDeleteCait - thank you! I have to admit it took some time to get my head round how to do it but now I like it too!
Fennie - funnily enough rain has been overacting here this evening. All that sheets and stair rods and wild swirling stuff - just over the top altogether.
That's a great idea - I loved getting a better sense of how your plot fits together, and seeing the changes over the months all together like that. My favourite area is the veg plot, and how you have built your raised beds into the slope to beautifully.
ReplyDeleteThat wonderful vista that opens up to the right . . .
ReplyDeleteI just changed the blog picture of my house in October, as opposed to May, and was startled by how different it all looks. Blogging encourages such an interesting variety of journaling, don't you think. Like photography itself, it forces/encourages me to look at things properly. BTW, I absolutely loved your previous post.
The slide show is great. What a good way to reference your plants.
ReplyDeleteI love the October photo the best/
yvonne
I really enjoyed visiting your garden through the various seasons and stages, what a lot of work, but lovely to look over the months and see the different phases of growth.
ReplyDeleteWhat a good idea - I've enjoyed your end of month posts very much too.
ReplyDeleteYou've achieved a lot this year, well done.
Pondside - thank you. I bet you would crack the technology pretty quickly and I would love to see more of Pondside!
ReplyDeleteLinda - you are right. I have had to become much more forgiving of nettles and weeds and untended parts of my garden since taking this one on. Two acres is too much to keep tidy to that degree and anyway that amount of tidiness would not look right here and would not encourage the bees and butterflies which I love.
Frith - thank you!
H - it is fascinating to me to see the changing shape of the garden on a larger scale rather than looking at specific plants. As you say the wall is dominant in winter (when I always notice that it needs repair) and disappears in summer. There are so many other instances too.
Helen - how lovely to hear from you! Now you know what it looks like at other times you should come and visit in spring or autumn!
Weaver - I have emailed you. Your parcel did arrive thank you and the plants are in the ground and some of the seeds sown too. Thank you so much. I shall include pictures next year of your plants too!
What a great slideshow! And the garden, of course, the garden is just beautiful. Lovely to see this!
ReplyDeleteSweeeeeeeeet!
ReplyDeleteThat is one impressive garden; I am so envious of the vegetable patch
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