It's raining!

I did not think that I would ever be pleased to see rain. Today I did. The garden was getting very dry and although I have watered the plants there is nothing like steady rain to soak the earth through. I love the smell of the garden after a dry period, you can almost hear the plants soaking up the moisture.

We have had no rain for 21 days which is very unusual for this part of the country. In this area we normally get too much rain, it can be raining here and 10 miles away it is dry and sunny. Rain can get me down especially when it rains constantly for days and days like it did during January and February this year.

My new garden has clay soil which just turns the lawn into a sticky mud bath and then it dries like concrete with cracks going to middle England – oh how I miss the loamy soil I had in my previous garden, that is one thing I would like to have brought with me!

Flowers

My garden is fluourishing, I am still waiting to see what pops up, the previous owner of the house was a keen gardener so the garden is quite established.

Spanish Bluebell, this is one of my favourite flowers and I brought quite a few with me from my previous garden, I have left them in pots and will plant the bulbs in the autumn. It is related to the English Bluebell which are a protected species now, a woodland full of bluebells is a beautiful site.

Pulmonaria - which I brought with me, I only brought one pot as it spreads quite a lot.

This is a beautiful shrub - but I don't know the name! It had orange berries in the winter, if anyone can tell me what it is called I would be really pleased.

Visit to Kingston Lacey

Some friends and I visited Kingston Lacey at the weekend. It is near Wimborne in Dorset. The house and garden are set in 250 acres of wooded parkland. After eating our lunch in the sunshine,we went on one of the woodland walks which took us past the Japanese Garden, quarry garden and Cedar walk. The weather was sunny and warm, it was so enjoyable walking in the sunshine. In February there is a beautiful display of snowdrops, I would love to go back next year and see them.

The house is 17th century house designed by Sir Robert Pratt for Sir Ralph Bankes to replace his ruined family seat at Corfe Castle; it contains a collection of Old Master paintings with works by Van Dyck, Titian and Brueghel collected by William Bankes, there is also an exhibition of Egyptian artefacts from 3,000BC.

I hope you enjoy the photos.

Kingston Lacey House

This is the fernery, a few weeks ago this would
have been a beautiful drift of snowdrops.

Lady's Walk

Japanese Tea Garden was originally built during the
Edwardian era and has been recently rebuilt.

Part of the Woodland Walk

Camelias

Kingston Lacey house from the Cedar Walk

Ozzie

This is Ozzie, a border collie, he was found in Bristol and had been set on fire by thugs. He has a 50% chance of survival. How can anyone who calls themselves human being do this to a dog? I just cannot understand how people can be so cruel, what did this poor defenceless dog do to them? The pictures on TV showed a very friendly dog and even after this ordeal he was playing with a ball, he has not lost his trust in humans. Follow this link to read the news story.

(Photo BBC News)

Happy Easter

Forget-me-Not - One of my favourite flowers

100 year old photoblog

If you like looking at old photographs of the USA visit Shorpy the 100 year old photoblog
it's full of superb photographs from the past