welsh hills again

It was looking as if it might be tricky to find something which would count for the project today.  Cold and cough continue.  Continue to look like something the cat dragged in.  And today we are off to Manchester to pick up grandchild number 4 from nursery and look after him overnight to give his hardworking parents a tiny break.  I contemplated not going and letting Ian do it by himself but that just seemed too sad.   So I was very aware of limited time and limited energy.  Fortunately Ian had staking the amelanchier on his list and I decided that holding the post would obviously count as it was a vital part of the job!  This is because we have adopted the practice of staking diagonally rather than vertically and diagonal stakes need someone to hold them at an angle in order to start them off right! We moved this amelanchier last year.  There have been three planted up here by the shepherd's hut for five or six years, maybe seven.  I...

Suddenly the garden is full of spring.  Life has been so full of driving and journeying and worrying about both my father and my father in law, both failing in different ways at different ends of the country, that I don't seem to have looked at the garden for a few weeks.  Last time I looked the beds were empty and covered with sticks and old leaves, a mute reproach, not mulched or weeded or showing signs of having had any loving attention.  Wandering around in the sunshine a couple of days ago I found that all sorts of things had emerged and filled out and burst into flower, quite without assistance from me or anyone else. Erythronium Pagoda is flowering with a graceful beauty that makes me feel I need to wash the whole side garden with it.  It took a long time to decide that it was happy here and for two or three years my three plants sat quietly, throwing out the odd flower spike but certainly not colonising or establishing in a way that looked permanent. ...