Come into the garden with Maud - all obsessive and wannabe gardeners welcome

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Whether you've got rolling acres or a tiny courtyard, whether you're a novice or a gardening die-hard, whether you're aiming for a garden of Sissinghurst loveliness or self-sufficiency à la Felicity Kendal in The Good Life, this is the place to be. Take a seat on the tastefully-painted Lutyens bench and chat with fellow enthusiasts. There may even be a bottle of gin in the potting shed.

Yes, Lidl had some nice-looking raspberry canes, but nowhere near as good a bargain as LaurieFairyCake's 30 for £20! DD was very taken with the children's tools but they were too young for her and we couldn't think of anyone to buy them for.

Ooh now someone told me about the 'special aisle' in Lidll. I've never been in Lidll but apparently you can all sorts of stuff like chain saws, work boots or whatever they have in that week. Its a sort of institution for Lidl afficianados.

Is that true?

Hello everyone. I have missed you all. Glad to hear you are all gardening happily.

I have been so bloody ill I have done nothing, but am starting to feel a little better so am hoping for some action this weekend.

Garden is looking great thanks to DH's hard work.

Yes, MoreBeta, it's all true. Have you really never been to Lidl? Its gardening sales are fabulous.

Good to see you, Humphrey. I was worried we had lost you between threads. I hope you continue to feel better. Can you sit in a deckchair and direct operations while your DH does the manual labour?

Hello Humphrey - thought you'd gone a bit quiet there. Hope the rest of your pregnancy gets easier. Your DH sounds like he's doing a good job though - I wish mine were a little more proactive!

Humph we missed you! Glad you're back.Thought all the booze talk might have been off-putting...

Sold some veg seedlings this afternoon at work and will possibly sell the lot by Thurs. must remember to actually keep a few for myself!! They're going for 50p and are about a month old.

Unlikely to get much done outside until Friday now, but might plant seeds inside tomorrow night.

Truly pleased to have got something right!
I have been through a bad gardening moment today. The newly turfed lawn was doing really well and looking green swardish so I ....mowed it....and now it looks rather woebegone and I was thinking maybe the frost will kill it off and the frost will kill all the fruit saplings and all the rose shoots and all the magnolia buds and ...and.....and ....it was a bad moment, but now I am over it and will not touch the lawn for a whole month I promise. I am probably not a lawn person.

Hi can I join? Just been preparing for my summer of hit and miss gardening.

I too mowed my lawn on Saturday and now it looks dry and patchy :( plus lots of little dandelions sprouting which are too small for my weeding tool to get. Boo.

I have been and bought nasturtium and sweet pea yesterday from little garden centre up the road as I feel like something different this year, but I have never grown a climbing plant before so will see how that fares! Is nasturtium ok in pots or would it need bedding?

Some lovely young camellias at garden centre as well, oly2.99 but they won't flower this yer, might consult my gardening book and see if I have a space suitable. I have a smallish east facing garden so only one side is in full sun all day.

Hello, I've found you!

Signing in, but have only managed to rotavate the veg patch this year, have been busy with work so haven't managed to start any seeds off. I'm hoping to get spuds in the ground this week and possibly first batch of onions.

I'm also going to have a think about flowers this year and try and have some pretty borders.

Haven't read the whole thread but will go back through when I have time. Did I see has Gardener's World started again? Does anyone know the day and time so I can set the planner.

I bought some soft fruit in Aldi a couple of years ago - I got 5 rasberry canes and two blackcurrants and a gooseberry in one and 5 autumn rasberry canes, a black currant and a white currant and a tayberry in the other - for £4 if I remember correctly. Had to clear a 'rockery' with large evergreen growing in it and put them in there (so a hard work weekend) but had lots of good fruit from them last year and they're growing now.

Had frosts for the last 3 nights.

Lawn still pretty damp - but definitely needs a cut - really need to find someone that can do that for me. DH promised to get someone last summer...

Hello, can I play? This is my second year having a garden. When we moved in we had to deforest the whole garden so started from scratch really. I am excited though because all the perennials I spent ages planting last year are now coming back, as is the jasmine and clematis we have climbing over some trellis. The lawn still looks patchy but the daffs are out so it's starting to look like somewhere you'd want to spend some time.

Can I ask for some inspiration? We are having a patio put in over Easter and I'd quite like to border it with something. I was thinking a mix of lavender and verbena bonariensis but does anyone have any, more original suggestions?

I've just been out on my patio admiring really frilly pink daffodils opening up in the herb bed.They look like multi-layered petticoats.My youngest dd has fallen in love with them [she is into all things girly].I will plant some more but i have absolutely no idea where i bought them or what the're called.Incidentally all the bulbs i planted really late have flowers on them, even the ones i planted in febuary amazingly.I've just bought a really lovely rusty[weathered] tripod for the sweet peas and a clematis only for my Mum to say "Why did you buy that rusty old thing?,it needs red-leading "-my mums obviously not in fashion as everything is rusty this year!I've also bought some beautiful Pasque flowers in purple and white for the rockery but could only afford 2 of each .I really would have loved to buy lots but they were so expensive.This is an expenditure and gardening diary all in one today.I am still wondering whether it is ok to plant the Dahlias corms today.Will they survive any future frosts?.

Welcome, lovely newbies! Pull up an upturned flowerpot comfortable deckchair and have a cup of tea/gin/fruit brandy as you choose!

QueenKong - That border would be lovely, but would work best in a sunny position (will it be sunny?) It would also have quite a short season - could you underplant with spring and autumn bulbs to extend it? If you want to stick with the purple theme, you could use crocus, muscari (latifolium is a good shade of purple), iris reticulata. And this is far from original, but I would put some lilies either in the border or in pots on the edge of the patio, so that you can enjoy the scent as you sit out there.

Teta - I wouldn't put out dahlias just yet. Can you start them off in pots in a coldframe?

Worzelswife - Have found my GW magazine. As far as my myopia permits, I think the photos are

p88: One of the lumpy outdoor cucumbers, multicoloured chilli and parsley (probably moss-curled).

p89 bottom: Cabbage. Flowers are calendula (pot marigold - possibly Art Shades) and the pink thing is, I think, an osteospermum (cape daisy). White antirrhinum (snapdragon) in the background. One lonely pelargonium (geranium) shoot poking through.

p90 (5): cabbage, black basil, nasturtiums, onion foliage, chive foliage, carrot foliage.

p90 (7): swiss chard (probably Bright Lights), red flower with dark leaves is perennial lobelia (possibly Queen Victoria), blue fluffy flower is ageratum.

Disclaimer: All identifications are provisional.

Alicia, GW is at 20.30 on Fridays on BBC2. Later in the spring I think it goes to one hour episodes (particularly when they go to the Malvern Show, e.g.) and it always gets bumped for sport. But if you're using a sky+ type thing I guess it works out those variations for you?

I am not going to mow the lawn this year until it has flowered. I only laid it from seed last April, and I included in it some primula veris and cornflowers so I need to wait until they have come up. I have some spring dressing treatment to put on it (Lawn Sand) and I need to re-seed the damp shaded edge where rain runs off the deck. In fact it could be interesting to do something else entirely here - it's difficult to mow the edges neatly because of the overall shape of the lawn so I may do some wildflower mix or other low growing grass-competitor around all the edges.

QueenKong A good mid-level summer bloom for your VB and Lavender combo would be Iris reticulata, as Maud says. How about crocosmia too - clashing colours possibly, but nearly the same height as the VB, more foliage, interesting structures between each other. The VB will not be there in the winter so you might think about Hypericum and/or dogwood for autumn/winter interest and structure. Does this sit against a fence or wall? Would winter scented honeysuckle/jasmine work? Sarcococca?

Lexi - I too am trying to think of something other than grass for the bits of lawn where grass fails miserably. Camomile I hear is quite fussy. What else is there?

Well it may be time for me to go and crowdsource that question on Twitter! Or I could email GQT. That would make me feel quite old though.

OH MY GOD MAUD, I think I love you. THANK YOU!!!

(gets completely over-excited and has to go and have a lie down)

Lexi, so glad you sold some seedlings. That's great. I must admit my costs are mounting and I'm looking forward to getting some out the front of the house. I'm away next week so will start the week after.

For where grass fails miserable - would clover grow? My LL tried growing camomile as she wanted a camomile lawn. It's a little scrubby patch; has never taken off.

Thanks Lexi and Maud - love the idea of some spring & autumn underplanting. I love irises so will get some of them. I quite like a bit of a clash too, so will look at the crocosmia.

It will just be a little border against the decked patio, so nothing to climb up. Although we are having a handrail so could get something to trail along that. I was thinking of hanging some window boxes of mixed wild flowers off the rail - for the bees and butterflies but not sure if they'll work or will look a bit crap.

Oh and we get the sun there until about 1ish.

Err, you're welcome, WorzelsWife.

::Feeling slightly overwhelmed but basking in the love, all the same::

my dp hacked the 20 foot sprawling bay tree down to 2 ft!!! its made a massive difference to our garden - suddenly looks much wider- we were going to dig the whole thing out but now I think we'll keep it to a more manageable bush (although that's what we planned originally...)

also sowed some squash seeds yesterday - bon bon -my absolute favourite wonderful taste and look really cute like cottage loaves, and autumn butternut. Only realised at sowing that I'd run out of the little onion squash (utichi kiri?) so had to re order. we grew those for the first time last year and they were lovely - sweet and just the right size for a couple of meals. my radish are up but a cat had crapped right in the middle of my salad bed despite old freezer baskets protecting the bloody thing, snarl

I bought some 1/2 price hellebores the other day And a load of small plants to grow on for my pots - ivy leaf geranium and heliochrysum. Our porch is quite good for little plants - like a mini greenhouse.

In more interesting (for anyone with a cat poo problem) news, the pepper didn't work at all - there was a huge turd right near the front door. But as well as buying plants, I got some Bayer Cat-a-Pult and we have had two poo-free mornings

They seem to have stopped making Root Out crystals. I have got some mega strong glyphosate to spray on but you're not supposed to put it down drains which is a bit difficult when the sodding passiflora is growing in a drain. If I chop the stems and split them down the middle a bit (to increase the surface area) and then paint it on, do you reckon that would work?

and just picked a bunch of rhubarb and my first purple sprouting which will be eaten tonight with pasta , cream and blue cheese

It was heaven getting home today

The star magnolias are out, the weeping willow on the edge of the garden is out, the pear tree leaves are appearing, the tai haku is bursting into blossom, the damsons in the orchard are just starting to bloom. The tulips in the front garden are starting to look amazing and I could hear the curlews.

And I have not been sick all day

Congratulations, Humphrey, especially on the not vomiting bit!

I did lots of seed-sowing today. Drat. Just remembered the coldframe is open.

::Searches for torch::