A garden is a lovesome thing, God wot!

[MaudantWit]

Join us for ongoing gardening chat in the MN potting shed. Blow the cobwebs off a deckchair, help yourself to a glass of elderberry champagne and tell us about your garden.

Brickwork. Two entire sides of the house. So that I can grow climbing things on the walls without them having to be cut down every few years for the walls to be repainted. And also because the original Georgian brick is so much prettier than slightly bilious cream. The only trouble is, the stripping quote more than doubled after the contractor did a test patch, after the scaffolding had already gone up, so we sacked them and are having to do it ourselves. It works but it's messy, tedious and rather dangerous.

I will try to shut up about it now. I am aware it is immensely boring!

No, that's interesting. Our house is painted - many of our neighbours' aren't - and when our paintwork looked rather tatty we repainted because I didn't think that stripping paint from brickwork was a viable proposition.

I'm pleased you're chatting about houses because i'm thinking about painting our beams magnolia or white (which are atm stained a vile dark brown) because you all seem aesthetically switched on

Our ceilings are high, the rooms are not very light and there's no way of putting extra windows in the thick stone walls! I'm pulled 2 ways because it's traditional to have dark beams but a lot of people paint them now.It's also impossible to strip them without revolting strong chemicals or dust,dust dust . What would you all do ??

Maud it is viable but you have to be slightly deranged, or have pots of money to throw at it. After much experimentation, we have found that what works on our walls is firstly to spray off the top cream coat with a pressure washer. This comes off quite easily. Then we apply Peel Away paint stripper, which is basically caustic soda in a paste form, and leave for 24 hours (you get plasticky paper sheets to stick over it). Then scrape off as much solid/pastey stuff as possible before reverting to pressure washer to get the rest off. Rinse and repeat.

The worst bit is swabbing up the highly alkaline water/gunge that sluices off, with a sponge, to stop it flowing onto and poisoning the garden.

I don't recommend it. Dh has inadvertently given himself a facial chemical peel and has lost most of his fingerprints. And then there was the cat debacle. BUT, I do have to say, the bricks look really lovely and the windows and doors stand out better now which gives the house better proportions.. We've nearly finished the back; the jury is out on whether we can cope with doing the front as well.

Ppeat we also have your beam problem inside. Some have that dark treacly stain/paint on them, some are painted cream, some are boxed in. I am determined to strip them back to the original elm. But not ourselves! Once the exterior work has been done (we are also repointing the two non-painted house walls and replacing a load of window frames, fixing gutters etc) then we shall be bankrupt sit tight until we have found sufficient money to do the interior.

My peach harvest will be rivalling your plum harvest, Maud. What will we do with them all?

We spend time sitting lazing about in the garden. Oddly what didn't work was the chair hammock thingy which looked very attractive in the ethnic shop in Oxford but proved a) hard to fix reliably and b) impossible to get in and out of.
The adirondack rocking chair looks nice painted seagrass green but is....ahem.....too narrow for my ample figure. Oh well, the swing seat and lloyd loom will just have to do.....
rhubarb that paint stripping sounds dangerous adventurous. In my day everyone stripped pine and wooden floors and fireplace surrounds. It was quite the thing. Then everyone stripped brick. Then everyone repainted the brick.
I read the new Gardeners World magazine in the hair salon today. Sitting about resting really isn't my thing though. it is very boring.

Flipping heck Rhubarb, that sounds lethal . I can imagine it looks lovely though. Ppeat, we have beams in our garage thing which are an oak colour. I'd go for a more natural look and strip back if possible but if not, given the room is dark then I'd paint to blend on with the ceiling.

My plum harvest is even worse than yours Maudant and the birds ate every single cherry. Lots of June drop on one of the apple trees, the strawberries were planted too late for this year and the Rhubarb died. Still, there's always next year...

Sarah Raven catalogue and GW magazine have just arrived. Noticed that there is a 20% off code in GW for Sarah Raven at the moment. I might have bought a little palm tree whilst I was out.

Just catching up on the thread. Blimey Rhubarb dc's eating things they shouldn't, cats falling in paint stripper, paint stripping. Have some .

I'm not sure whether to get my house painted now, it's a victorian villa, with yellowy bricks and cement coloured decorative features which all the other houses have painted cream. We were going to follow suit. We need to decide and crack on though, as the wisteria is growing rapidly and I want to extend where it goes.

My favourite plant at the moment is Nigella, a friend gave me lots of seedlings and 'twas a lovely surprise to find them in 4 colours, which are white, light blue, dark blue and purple. Do you think they will seed true?

maudant when did you plant your plum tree? I have none but its only 1 year old. Enjoy the harvest

sugar thanks for the 20% tip from Sarah Raven. I got the catalogue today, I predict a big order !

That is a good offer.

While I was flipping through the Gardeners World magazine I noted a column on gender. Totally last century. Men are supposed to like sheds to retreat to from 'er indoors, and women like kneeling and weeding.

Huh.

Obviously they never heard of our potting shed.

There is a nice section on Autumn planting though with lots of echinacea and achillea and grasses and so forth.

FP I do like that magazine, but I'm still learning the ropes, I guess when you know what you are doing its a bit repetitive. Sarah raven are selling a bag to make leaf mould, can't remember how much but thought you might be interested. I did wonder if you could just use a hessian shopper instead.

Hm yes, true, have to gear up for falling leaves...

Not so pretty as hessian for leaf mould but on the advice of Daily Telegraph I cram leaves into black bins liners, poke in holes with a fork, tie and leave for a year or two. The hole poking is quite cathartic.

That's very true about GW magazine. Some of the articles do seem to come up on a yearly cycle. I think I subscribe out of inertia (it's on a standing order) and because I still get some of the free offers and discounts with other suppliers.

I can't remember how many years ago I bought the plum tree - about three, I think. It was not much more than a stick, from Lidl. It's a pity I got out of the habit of keeping a gardening diary, as that would have compensated for my unreliable memory!

Oh, and beams. I prefer oiled/natural wood to painted wood, so if it were possible to strip them back and then treat them to bring out the grain, that would probably be my preferred option.

well ive had a lovely weekend staying at my parents, my step-mum has asked for some planting ideas and advice so its been lovely thinking up ideas for a 'new' garden.
We popped to Hay on Wye for a couple of hours yesterday, did the obligatory trip to Booth's bookshop and picked up a copy of The Well-tempered garden by Christopher Lloyd.
Today has been spent sat under the shade of the parasol with a pot of tea and my new book

Oh and 2 of my dahlias are in flower, which is great because I had completely forgotten which ones I had got

That is a good buy at Hay , nightshade!

Today is a gardening day for me: I have to plant stuff and move stuff and pot on stuff. Otherwise I will fail the challenge DS set me in return for my challenge to him regarding his room.

One of the neighbours planted a new hydrangea earlier on in the summer: deep plum edged with maroon , possibly a variant of marveille sanguine or leuchtfeur, not sure, but it has grown and spread and looks stunning. I have hydrangea petiolaris climbing up against a shady fence and a pale pink lace cap hydrangea in the sunny border with very dark purple salvia growing though which is quite pretty but having seen this one, am seriously considering making room for it.

If ever we go back to Hay - haven't been for many years - I must look for classic gardening books!

I need to do some potting-on but will leave it until this evening. I also have some fuchsia cuttings in water that I think I will plant in compost instead.

This is my favourite thread! I luve you all! Thanks for the varying opinions on the beams; I think i'll follow the "paint them the same colour as the ceiling" advice and leave them showing their whorls IFYSWIM.

rhubarb if your house is Georgian it must be early because the later ones don't have beams do they? You're lucky with elm. Have you seen the ads in the Period house magazine that talk about stripping them with no mess or dust? Gawd knows what it costs though

For the first time I have aproper harvest of apribelles (i call them that because they are growing on the tree that I bought as apricot)! They are shaped like mirbelles but are dark red and sour . I'm going to make jam with them.

ppeatfruit maybe they are cherry plums, Prunus cerasifera. I bought some once at about this time of year, as 'wild plums', and they made the best jam evah.

They seem often to be confused with mirabelles but I believe are a different variety totally. The ones I got were yellow, but they come in red. They do ripen very early.

YesBearleigh but mine were sold to me as apricots! They do sound like cherry plums though ,gawd knows where they came from The tree only has a couple of branches with the original apricot leaves on them the rest are the same as the mirabelles a mystery

Those hydrangeas sound lovely funnyperson I also fancy the climber petiolaris.

I have just succumbed to the blandishments of GW magazine and ordered the freebies (48 butterfly-attracting plants). I know that they will be teeny and most of them will die. Will I never learn?

Set free a very unusual butterfly trapped in dd1s room today. I wonder if the warm weather is bringing in foreign ones!

at maudant I never got round to the lavender offer but have 20 munstead wood seedlings. I really need to improve the soil before I plant too much else. Still it's looking loads better than last year.

anyone watching the alan titchmarch gardening show?

My friend's son is convinced that he's seen a north American butterfly here in sarf London.

I was watching DH's choice of programme - an historical thing on the BBC - but have taken advantage of his momentary absence to switch over to dear Alan, who is planting lavender. He has just confirmed that it is a short-lived plant.

::surveys corpses on window sill::

Hello! Away for 3 days and came back to raspberries and blackberries!