New paintings and regular art updates.
We had a few yellow flowers last year. Now they are mounds! I think it’s lesser celandine. Apparently they are grown from little bulbules? They can get on your shoes and get transferred around the garden. I used to be on a natural history website where you recorded the date when the flowers come out. It’s clear that spring is getting earlier each year even though it is only changing slowly. Anyway I like these plants. Our garden is quite wild and it’s good to add different wild flowers.
We were going out yesterday when a car pulled up outside the house. Is that your garden? The driver asked us. Yes we said. Oh great. Can we buy it? No, I said. It’s not for sale! The man looked disappointed. Why do you want it my hubby asked. We are thinking of buying the old pub across the road to turn into apartments. We would use it as a car park. A car park alongside our house? No way. People coming and going at all times of the day and night. Destroying our wildlife garden. Also we would need a large fence to keep people out who could just walk onto the carpark…? NO! I was polite but said no.
Yellow and orange. Large flower heds. In front of the house. Cheerful and bright. They delight me when I come home. Signs of spring are showing everywhere now. The trees are starting to blossom, buds are swelling on the branches in my garden. I’ve seen blossom on the trees along the canal. But it’s been dry and sunny, it’s been exceptionally warm for this time in March. I worry because the temperatures are due to fall next week and frost might nip at the buds. But if it stays dry they might be OK. What we need now is rain to swell the buds and start the growth process. Cells expand when they absorb water, the become turgid and then, they start to photosynthesise. We are at the turn of the year.
I know it’s almost spring because the grape hyacinths come out in the pots at the front of the house. We are the only house with plants growing on the pavement. When I come home it cheers me up. They really do look like little bunches of grapes, don’t they? The blue colour reminds me of bluebells but they don’t emerge until April or May. X
In one of the hothouses in the walled kitchen garden at Rode Hall. Yes I have gone on about it but it was an interesting visit. Vegetables were displayed as if they were in a competition. Onions balanced on flower pots, old gourds piled up and drying. Bulbs were sprouting. It must be spring soon!
Sweet treats without sugar
Neatly packaged
Sour until ripe
Peel and see
What’s inside
Flesh and juice
Bite into it
Taste
Today’s #bandofsketchers prompt was factory. This is the view from our window across the road to the factory. They have trees and plants in front of it to screen it a bit. The tree is covered by ivy at the moment but the buds are already showing ready for spring.
A new orchid as a present from my hubby. I now have four. Three of them have already flowered and I’m hoping in the summer I might get some more blooms. The old ones have masses of arial roots. I think I need to re-pot them soon. They need clear pots to allow light to get to their roots and the orcid compost has to be quite loose not packed in to allow the roots to breathe. I repotted them a couple of years ago so I think it will be OK to do it again. I need to check the details but I know they are happy in this window.
I made him at Etruria artists a couple of years ago. I textured the surface and it is bisque fired. I didn’t get it glazed so I used a pale metallic blue acrylic paint to colour it. It used to sit on the shelf with my orchids but hubby bought me a new orchid plant so it’s now on the kitchen windowledge.
After watering these for a few weeks they are blooming. Christmas Cactii that I have on the kitchen windowledge. They don’t all flower at the same time. There has been a progression that started with a dark pink one before Christmas, then a pale white/pink coming up to new year and now these two. I’m not sure whether the light levels affect the flowering. I know I have one that won’t flower till sometime around Easter (if it’s an early Easter). I realise some people don’t like plants in the house, but to me it’s more about adding greenery to your life. The Cactii cheer me up. X
Mallaband-Brown