Hurray for Hellebores!

This weekend was the fabulous Hellebore day at Bosvigo Gardens in Truro, it's the third year that I have been and, as ever, it didn't disappoint.

Check out previous visits here and here.

It is truly the most inspirational and uplifting early spring garden, it restores your faith in the new season and galvanising you into enthusiastic action for the new year.

Truly gorgeous Hellebores...

...but also Hamamelis, Snowdrops and Eranthis

Single Hellebores...

...with drifts of Pushkinia and Snowdrops underplanting them.

Doubles...

...speckled...

...darkest of dark...

and splotched.

Hellebores even made it into the refreshment tent!

And my purchases...

...a beautiful creamy yellow single with bright green leaves...

and a glorious white speckled double.

I'm very pleased pleased with my haul which adds to my collection that has grown year on year, but that doesn't stop me planning the list for next year.

A double green and a very dark purple maybe?

Valentines Day

The perfect Valentines Day afternoon, a cup of tea, a roaring fire, a box of (somewhat hastily purchased, but thank you Mr B) chocolates and a huge pile of seed and plant catalogues. I've been saving them up and now is the moment!

I already have a bit of a list.

Vegetable garden:

 Broad Beans, Peas, Runner Beans, French Beans, Beetroot and Garlic, and I really fancy one of these...

A Patio Raspberry requiring no pruning or support, which fruits madly in a pot! 

(Hmmmmm...I will reserve judgement and try it out but that sounds to good to be true!)

And for the flower garden:

Isotoma, Marigolds, Daucus (wild carrot), Asters, Aconitum and Phlox.

When and if I get these various plants underway I will give some more detail, but first I have to choose varieties and whether to have seeds or plants

Now pass me the pen I've some chocolates to eat and some decisions to make!

What are you planning for your garden this year?

Ooops I did it again!

In the words of Britney, Oooops, I did it again! Bearly a month ago I was rambling on about committing myself to some thing manageable this year instead of resolutions, and I've failed already. Regular readers (those that have survived the disappointment of my ineffectual bleating) will recall that I came up with a new year non-resolution which involved shopping.  Easy, you would think, even for me. But the horrible realisation that it was suddenly February (how did that happen?) has crushed my dreams and sent me into non-resolution failure despair. Which, it turns out, is even more depressing than the standard resolution failure as it means I haven't even got round to shopping!

THIS IS VERY SORRY STATE OF AFFAIRS!

So I thought I better remedy it as soon as possible by doing this...

Cyclamen Coum

Snowdrops 

(mine are taking far to long to flower, see last post, and anyway you can never have too many)

So, back on track now - that was a very close call but I think I got away with it, nobody noticed did they?

 Right, onward and upwards and I must remember that February is a short month. I don't want a re-occurance of the sad shopping free January!