Ground Farce

I have been quite the handyman recently. Went over to see my sister, her boyfriend Tony aka the Boneman and my awesome nephew Joseph last Sunday. It was an emotional visit as our dear friend and bed humper extraordinaire Benson had died on Tuesday. He was a hell of a dog, my best four legged friend - bursting with personality, barks and a way of letting you know all was not bad in the world. I miss him.

As a new start I tidied up (some) of the garden. Worked my way from the top, removing weeds from under the palm tree then attacking the cooch grass. Damn stuff never wants to come up easily. The soil was a wonderful brick red colour and well drained, making me jealous. It kept raining so my job wasn't made any easier, but I ploughed on and was quite pleased by the results when it came to sundown. This is but the first phase of my job. I love doing it.

The energy I got from it was phenomenal and for the next two days I worked our garden hard, we're talking epic de-weeding, hover-mowering the grass, demarcating then cutting up turf for a border...and relax. Only I couldn't. Whenever I had a spare second I was doing a bit of weeding or piggin' and a diggin'.

This week has been the same. Just today I added a wicker border to the bottom of the garden. As ever it was an extreme bodge job. Playing close attention to the golden mean, using a spirit level and securing the border with plenty of soil was absolutely a brilliant idea for someone else to take up. I whacked it all in with a rubber mallet and to hell with it! When the grass grows back it will look mintball deluxe.

After that I tidied up the great little patch between the ivy bush and the buddleia, to better reveal the emerging poppies, the geraniums and the forget me nots. Then I planted some lillies in the freshly tilled and utterly weed free soil (snigger). I moved the mystery plants which I got from the Hardy Plant Society, see:http://parsleyandoregano.blogspot.com/2011/04/allotment-afternoons-allot-of-fun.html to the freshly created shady border. In with the hellebore seeds next to the fern at the far end. May have to wait a long long time to see anything happen with these bad boys. Man oh man there's so much happening in this garden!