Here we are at the start of another week – the last week in January already! As usual I am linking up with Cathy at Rambling In The Garden to join in with her lovely challenge to find something from the garden to bring into the house every Monday.
This weeks find was unexpected – the blossom on my purple leaved plum tree (called I believe prunus cerasifera) is always the first to appear, but I do not remember seeing it as early as January before. Looking at the tree from my kitchen there is no sign of any blossom, but the far side of the tree, which is facing south, is already covered in fat buds and quite a few flowers. Yesterdays walk around the garden with the dogs found me chopping off a few branches to bring indoors and many of those fat buds have opened in the warmth of the house to give a real feeling of spring to my dining room.
I took these photos early this morning in the kitchen, which is where I always find the best light in the winter and spring mornings. As the day wears on the light becomes too harsh and in the summer, when the sun is already high in the sky by breakfast, I have to find another window to photograph by in the morning as this one will always result in very harsh shadows.
I have used my macro lens today, as this captures the delicate beauty of these tiny flowers perfectly.
I nearly always set my camera to Aperture priority when shooting flowers and I choose a low f stop to allow the maximum light into my camera. This gives me a good focal point with a lovely blurry background. If you have a camera which allows you to choose your focal point pick one of the flowers towards the front of your arrangement and always think about how the light is shining on the petals.
I keep my editing fairly simple as I am not yet comfortable with Photoshop. As I use a Mac I load my photos into iPhoto and do a little cropping, lightening and reducing of shadows. The same effects can be achieved in PICASA – a free downloadable photo editing software which is surprisingly powerful and easy to use.
Having had a taste of blossom this week I am now feeling more impatient for spring to arrive and fill the garden with all the lovely delicate colours and textures. The light is already lasting much later into the day and I can once again squeeze an hour or two of weeding into the afternoons on a dry day.
Having let the Forget-Me-Nots self seed into my spring borders I am slightly horrified to see just how many plants are now growing in this area – these combined with some violets that have grown rampantly since last year and ever increasing numbers of muscari bulbs are squeezing out everything else including my primroses, cyclamen and delicate iris reticulata. I now have a big job on to try and restore order in these beds before the spring bulbs start to flower!
I am also throwing the last of the tulip bulbs into the ground in the hope that they are not too late! I rarely finish planting my tulips before Christmas, but am particularly behind this year. I really need to get the last of the bulbs in and the autumn sown hardy annuals cleared out of the greenhouse and into the cold frames asap, so that I can start sowing seed in February. This endless wet weather is holding me up though – I am keeping my fingers crossed for some drier days soon!
Whilst my gardening time is limited by the weather I am making the most of my extra free hours to get out and about. Last week I saw the film ‘The Danish Girl ‘and today ‘Room’. I have been to a concert of Duke Ellington music, the ballet Sleeping Beauty, have a piano recital to go to and am hoping to visit the winter gardens at Anglesey Abbey and the Cambridge Botanical Gardens in February. Added to that there is time to catch up on reading and my own piano practice – as I am relatively new to the piano I am finding it very difficult to learn to both read the music and find the right keys, so this is Slow Learning at its best!
A particularly exciting note is that I have a wedding to grow for in July! I do love a wedding and my bride would like a church and reception filled with english country garden flowers in shades of pink and apricot with lots of fresh greens – it sounds like a heavenly mix! In February I will be making my first sowing of hardy and half hardy annuals and I will repeat these sowings a second and possibly third time in early and late March to try and ensure there is plenty of lovely material to pick from in July. I will of course keep you posted on my progress.
I also have a personal success to share with you – has anyone received the new 2016 Agriframes catalogue yet? If you have take a close look at the front cover – the photograph is one of mine taken in my garden!! I also have 2 or 3 more scattered throughout the catalogue so I am feeling very proud of myself right now!!
I hope that you enjoyed walking around the beautiful Glemham Hall gardens with me yesterday – you can find the post here if you missed it. It is the time to get sowing with your sweet peas, so I will be back later this week with my annual Guide to Growing Sweet Peas.
Is the weather good enough to garden where you are right now or are you finding other ways to keep yourself amused?
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It has been a perfect gardening day today. Hope you had time in the garden too. Thank you for your photography tips and also for the reminder to weed out forget-me not seedlings. I have a bed at the cottage filled with these and thinning them out is on my list to do. It is good to get out and about. I enjoyed reading ‘Room’ so much (because it was so different and I loved the use of language) that I don’t think I’ll see the film but I’m looking forward to seeing “Carol” tomorrow and we have several theatre visits and exhibition viewings planned too. How exciting to have a wedding to plan flowers for and I will be following your sweet pea tips assiduously this year.
Thank you for your lovely comment Sarah – I hope you enjoyed ‘Carol’ – I missed that one so will have to catch it on Netflix. Room was good but not as good as the book so I think you have made the right decision. Happy weeding!
Beautiful pictures of the cherry blossom Julie.
I remember Fergus Garrett saying you do not need very many fore-get-me-nots , individual ones can reach the size of dinner plates.
They do look good with tulips though.
Thank you Brian – they do look lovely with the tulips so I have to forgive their prolific nature!
Fabulous branches showing spring already! Lovely in a vase so natural. And a wedding. Can’t wait to see the arrangements you create.
Thank you Donna – I am planning to share my growing experiences for this weeding as well as the final arrangements – I just hope the summer is kind this year!
I have had a lovely afternoon today pulling weeds in my woodland garden.
I am finding plenty to keep myself amused! My husband, knowing how much I like to look at your beautiful photographs, bought me a camera for Christmas so I can take some photos of my own garden.
Inspired by you I also have the pleasure of my bulbs coming into flower in the greenhouse and of those I have brought into the house. My current favourites are the Iris ‘Pauline’.
I too have a wedding to grow for. My daughter is getting married in September and her colour scheme is coral, cream/white and lime. I would particularly like some coral zinnias but have only been able to find them in mixed seed packs at the moment!
Thank you Sandra – your lovely comment made me smile! I am so happy to have inspired you to grow bulbs in your greenhouse and how lovely that you have a new camera to photograph them with as well. Have you looked at the Seeds of Distinction site? They have a good variety of zinnias – Mango Cordial and Lime Cordial might fit your colour scheme. September is a lovely time for flowers – all the half hardy annuals and dahlias will be at their best. Do email me if you would like to chat about your seed choices.
Wild! A glorious dance of branches and blooms.
Thank you Sandra – they have lasted surprisingly well in the house this week.
How lovely to find this blossom and what fabulous photos you have taken of it, Julie – you clearly demonstrate the benefit of a decent camera and some knowledge of how to use it. Isn’t the extra light wonderful – and have you noticed a hint of warmth in the sun yet? We mustn’t get complacent about that though 😉 Good luck with clearing the forget me not and violets!
Thank you Cathy – I am finally catching up on comment answering! It does feel much lighter already and one day last week really was like spring. It looks like we are back to wet and windy again for a while though – I think I will be getting on with seed sowing this week.
Lovely post Julie. We are far from seeing any blossom in our garden, however the snow has retreated a little and I discovered one of my hellebores in bud and a double lilac primrose.
I do hope you have some hellebores soon and you have reminded me to go and uncover my double lilac primroses – they are my favourites but currently buried under weeds and leaves.
Gorgeous images and quite simply beautiful.
Thank you so much Sue.
A gift from the garden to you…and your photographs from you to us. The blossom really is pretty, and so nice to bring indoors.
Thank you Noelle!!
Great photos and awesome vase, Julie!
Thank you Anca!!
I have the same Prunus also coming into flower about a month earlier than usual. I made some delicious jam last year with the tiny fruits.
I have never seen any fruit on mine Angela – I have a problem with birds so perhaps that is why – I will watch the tree closely this year.
Dear Julie, the photos of your plum tree branches are sooo… beautiful, it is really touching! It comes as a total surprise to me that a plum tree would bloom by the end of January in England.
How exciting that you will be growing the flowers for a wedding! That is so wonderful, but I also think a huge responsibility. I really wish you good luck with your adventure.
Here in Southern California, where I garden, it is a very busy gardening time for me. All my roses are deleaved, just finished the last one today, yay! We have to deleave the roses here by hand, since the weather is not getting cold enough to make them drop their leaves in the winter. I would say 2/3 of the roses are pruned, but there there are still quite a few that need a date with the secateurs and then, then I have to fertilize them all. But since getting the roses ready for spring is such a big job and not all the time a fun one, I take some time out to just tinker around. For example today I planted some leucojum aestivum bulbs that I didn’t get into the ground earlier. I hope they will still come up and it is not too late for them.
Warm regards,
Christina
Thank you Christina – you must have a beautiful garden with all those roses! I have just started pruning mine as well – of course I do not have to de leaf them as nature does that for me here. I also have to prune my apple and pear trees this month – these are jobs that I have to force myself to do – I would much rather be playing in the greenhouse at this time of year!
Your plum branches are the promise of spring.
There is so much blossom out this week Susie that it really looks like spring has arrived – we are in the middle of wind and rain storms though and the temperatures could well still drop substantially so I am quite concerned about how the garden will progress over the next few months.
What beautiful blossoms, Julie. I am glad I was not the last person to get my tulips into the ground last weekend. Looking forward very much to seeing your wedding flowers, I did enjoy your previous posts about the wedding flowers you grew last year.
Thank you Joanna – it is always nice to know you are not the only one running late isn’t it!! I am planning to try and write a regular post about the progress of the flowers I am growing for the wedding – I have just started to sow some seeds which is always exciting.