Dorothy Clive Garden.

Posted on June 10, 2020June 10, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged 2018, Art, Day out, Dorothy Clive garden, Drawing, Fun, Gardening, Pictures, Plants, Sketching, Staffordshire, Stoke-on trent, VisitLeave a comment

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This was my drawing of the Dorothy Clive Garden on 6.5.18. It’s recently reopened but with a booking system so you have to book morning or afternoon slots to visit. There is a self service system at the cafe. I hope we can go one day next week if the weather improves, after a month or more of sunshine we have been having rain for the last few days. Good for all gardens including the Dorothy Clive.

It will be lovely to see different landscapes, beautiful flowers, and peaceful water features.

When you draw a place you are interpreting the world in a different way to simple photographs. That’s why I enjoy it. Trying to tame nature and describe it.

Flowers

Posted on May 28, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Blogging, Colours, Environment, Flowers, Gardening, Geology, Life, Photos, Plants, Random, Spring, WaterLeave a comment

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A few flowers from the garden today. The flowers are starting to develop, the big summer plants are a bit swamped with ivy and scrubby bushes and so we have cut back branches and peeled ivy off trees a bit today. Only what you can do with a pair of secateurs and a small pruning saw.

We need to lay some pathways, and where a spring has erupted in the garden we are going to put a few pebbles to simulate a stream flowing down under the hedge. We live on a hill which is a very old Volcanic plug. The water percolates out further up the hill and we think because that was built on a few years ago it might have got diverted down towards our house. I don’t know….

Steps holding the pear tree up.

Posted on May 27, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Blogging, Cherries, Crop, Garden, Gardening, Green, Life, Pears, PlantsLeave a comment

We have to put a piece of wood under one bough of the pear tree but in the strong winds last week we had to put step ladders under the other limb. Surprisingly there are lots of pears setting on it. It may be that it’s because it’s more horizontal and fruit does tend to set (develop) on horizontal branches. Thats why some fruit trees are tied onto walls. Is it called espalies?

The cherry tree behind it is also covered in fruit. Looks like it might be a bumper crop! The bush/tree cut in step shapes is an old evergreen we have had for years. It grows slowly and I practice topiary on it. The rest of the garden is very leafy. I’m going to have to get someone in in the autumn or winter, to cut things back slightly and let a bit more light in.

Russian vine

Posted on May 20, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Blogging, Gardening, Growing, Hard work, Humour, Mile a minute, Plant, Russian vine, Taking over, Tangled, Tired, VineLeave a comment

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I don’t have a photo, but this afternoon we removed what feels like miles of Russian vine from our hedge. I think it’s also called mile a minute. It’s also growing at the back of our garden, and bits of it have grown up the telephone wires and even into our shed!

It was hot outside, so we worked in the late afternoon as it started to cool down. The Russian vine is wraping itself round a couple of leylandii, up an old willow tree, into our walnut tree, and around the Holly tree. It’s tough stuff. We should dig out the roots, but it’s too entangled. So we are cutting through the largest vines, then you pull at it, and strands of vine twenty foot long come out of the hedge. Each vine splits into branching thinner pieces. The leaves are green and heart shaped. It looks like a nice plant when you get it. With small white bunches of flowers in the summer. The bees like it, but our privet hedge flowers and that is more pleasant than the vine.

Unless you have a massive garden don’t grow it!

Today’s challenge was ‘busy’

Posted on May 9, 2020 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged #uskstoke, Art, Bird, Blackbird, Drawing, Gardening, Life, Sketch, Sketching, Tidying, Usk Stoke-on-Trent, Working4 Comments

Today’s drawing session, these are for my Urban Sketchers Stoke-on-Trent daily challenge. I thought I would share them, I was planting up pots and trying to tidy up, plus attacking the ivy that’s taken over the garden. Finally had a beer with my hubby and then came round onto the back yard to listen to the blackbird singing on the chimney tops. That was wonderful. So melodious

Green spirals

Posted on May 8, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Flowers, Gardening, Green, House plants, Indoor plants, Photo, Plants, Spirals, TimeLeave a comment

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I want green, spirals, like pangolin scales. Cactus or succulent, indoor beauty. I wish I could get some more plants. One of ours on the upstairs window sill has sent out a flower spike. If it doesn’t get broken by the cats I will take a photo of it.

I have lots of baby money plants, and the one outside has survived the winter. But I’d like something more exciting.

I’m tending my orchids. One regularly flowers, the middle one got a flower spike on it for about three weeks, and the last one has tiny green leaves which were hiding under a couple of dead leaves.

Then my four amaryllis plants had only one flower this winter.

I love growing greenery inside and outside the house.

Finding a calm view

Posted on May 6, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Beauty, Cheshire, Dorothy Clive garden, Gardening, Gardens, Laburnum walk, Magnolias, Photo, Place to visit, Quarry garden, Shropshire, Staffordshire, Waterfall, World famous2 Comments

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Waterfall at the Dorothy Clive Garden.

This was taken about this time last year. We had driven out to visit the beautiful garden on the border of Staffordshire, Cheshire and Shropshire.

The garden is in a steep slope with colourful flower borders filling the air with scents of summer. But before the summer show I am drawn to the quarry garden at the top of the site. This is filled with flowering rhododendrons, under planted with spring flowers such as bluebells. At its centre is a little dell where a waterfall cascades down into a tranquil pool. You can follow paths up to the top of the waterfall where you will find a full sized bronze stag sculpture looking out magestically over the quarry garden.

Other pleasures include a magnolia walk at the back of the garden, this is behind the quarry at the top of the slope. Here you can see the surrounding countryside.

There is another dry garden, with a laburnum walk arching over the path.

When lockdown ends I think this will be one of the first places I visit.

Tulips

Posted on May 5, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Aqualegia, Bluebells, Exercise, Gardening, Layout app, Lesser celandine, Photo, Plants, Russian vine, Tulips, Wild garlicLeave a comment

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This image was something I did last year. We had some pure white tulips in the garden.

This year we have had less tulips. I think because our squirrel has taken to digging them up in the winter. We are going past the tulip season now. Instead we have Spanish and English bluebells, aqualegia starting to flower and wild garlic and lesser celandine adding splashes of colour to the garden.

Today we were pulling out hunks of ivy from the ground and from trees where its thick stems have scrambled up. We will fill our recycling bin completely over a couple of days. I was also pulling more pieces of Russian vine out of the trees at the front of the garden, it’s amazing how quickly it grows.

Tired and achy. But it’s good exercise.

The oak tree in the kitchen.

Posted on April 30, 2020April 30, 2020 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged #uskstoke, Art, Fun, Gardening, Greens, Kitchen, Oak tree, Plane, Sketching, Stoke-on-Trent Urban sketchers2 Comments

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The oak tree in the kitchen… Hubby planted an acorn in with a Christmas cactus plant on the kitchen windowsill. The cat in the drawing is a big doorstop that we have put on the window sill.. Must find somewhere to plant the tree before it gets too big…. I have a friend who owns some land in the countryside. When this is all over I’m going to give her this little sapling together with some baby walnut trees.

This was for day 12 of the Stoke-on-Trent Urban sketchers new challenge. Lots more to go!

A task I love

Posted on April 26, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged #uskstoke, Art, Drawing, Fun, Garden, Gardening, Hanging baskets, Love, Planting, Plants, Sketching, Staffordshire, Urban sketchers Stoke on trent2 Comments

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Urban sketchers Stoke-on-Trent new challenge, a task you love.

I am trying to plant up hanging baskets, but I only have a few plug plants, and a bit of compost to put them in.

Luckily some of my plants overwintered and are regrowing, so I have a few fushia plants, a lobelia, and some trailing plants with pale purple flowers that is in this basket. I’ve put a few begonias in the pot hanging below it.

I put one basket under another to get a tiered effect. Usually these are full of plants, now I’ve done two with tumbler tomatoes which you put in baskets and as they grow they hang down for picking.

Yes these are tasks I love. X

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Gardening