Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May: Alternative potting shed thread

[funnyperson]

On the grounds that potting sheds should admit those of all cultures here is an alternative potting shed thread. Probably makeshift and not as posh as the other one. Definitely subversive and open to gardeners of all capabilities.

Welcome back Rhubarb hope you feel better soon. Who needs brugmansia to feel spaced out, eh?

Is it worth letting NT know you're interested, as someone might want to do a job share now or in the future?

What a gorgeous morning! Just noticed a lovely plant combination near work - brown/bronze cotinus, with delicate flower stems, with a classic white rose climbing through it. It had big flowers - hybrid tea type, which I don't normally like but the strength of them was just perfect with the airy cotinus flower stems.

That does sound gorgeous, Bearleigh. I pruned my cotinus quite hard this year, in the hope of getting newer, fresher growth.

Rhubarb - will it help if you do more work locally, fitting around school hours, so that you get on the NT people's radar, so to speak?

There's another nice planting near work I've been meaning to mention - in one narrow front garden border a mixture of various red-berried and red-leaved shrubs (only a few red-leaved) - looks fab.

rhubarb - that's a shame about the job! You'd be brilliant. Is there any chance you could job share with someone else? Hope you feel better soon.

Job share would work. But it's finding someone. I think at the moment it all just has to be put in the 'too difficult' box and revisited in a couple of years. In the meantime, as Maud suggests, I just need to build up my local work.

Love the sound of that Cotinus/rose combo.

Sorry I meant to say thank you for all your nice comments!

Phenomenally, the lidl £! plum stick bought 2 years ago, having been pruned to a blobby shape, in the shade of the Anabelle hydrangea, is blossoming!

Just needed to share!

The garden furniture has been divested of piles of unironed but folded clean clothing and firmly put out in anticipation of summer!

Jugs of exotic minty lemony drinks have been prepared and refridgerated. Lets hope the heat wave lasts at least a week!

Hope you are feeling better soon rhubarb

Lovely sounding combos bearleigh

Valarian is everywhere in my area, it looked nice today growing from the top of a tall wall with Echium Pininana peeping above the wall. As I have no walls it's not something I can try. I have pinched a bit of Valarian with root though

Dd1 is away and as from today so is Dh, after school I suggested to dd1 we do something, she wanted to go to the local garden centre, because it sells tat Oh go on then! I rummaged in the seeds and came away with pink fairy Lupin, Excelsior foxgloves and Siberian wallflowers. The wall flowers are orange and are to go with for-get-me-not. I'm so pleased with my foxgloves at the moment I don't want to trust them to self seed.

I must log in on the desktop version to see all your lovely photos. No photos on the app

I must take some of my own over the weekend. This is such a lovely time of year. The new rose and lavender border I put in last year is coming on really well. I have lots of little lavender plants as they self seed all over the gravel. I'm going to have to find a new place to put them....

I have a space where my summer-flowering clematis succumbed to clematis wilt last year. Is it safe to put a new clematis in or would I risk the same thing happening again?

Do you have a recipe for your minty lemony drinks, funnyperson? They sound just the ticket.

Here are a couple of pictures of my now finished shady bed - it's part of the terrace level outside the kitchen (garden on 2 levels). It has a few different ferns, some hostas i grew from a poundland packet, sweet woodruff, solomons seal and Hugo the Pervy Statue. From certain angles it looks as though he is, ahem, interfering with himself

And a bonus pic of my naughty cats :)

That's very lovely, even including naughty Hugo. I love sculpture in gardens and would like more, but already have too many other naff objects artworks fighting for attention.

Naughty Hugo is funny! We have Venus de milo painted Chartwell Green, a stork, a fairy sitting with a water bowl, a tiny gnome, and a young Roman boy in a decent toga made of black plastic but he looks like old bronze. He is happy under the ceanothus, but having acquired a very large and stately cobra plant (arisema ciliatum) we might replace him with a real bronze Krishna playing a flute and avoid rude comments about Julius Caesar!

Minty lemonade

juice of 2 lemons and a lime
half a mug fresh washed mint leaves
6 heaped teaspoons soft brown cane sugar

optional
level teaspoon cumin powder
level teaspoon tamarind paste ( barts, from waitrose)
50 p piece fresh ginger peeled and washed

blend above in a blender

add to 500 ml clear or sparkling water
adjust sugar or more water to taste. If sugar free is desired add salt and pepper to taste instead

chill in large jug

before serving add fresh mint sprig and lemon slices to garnish and pour into glasses over ice.

if family don't like the brownish colour, omit the tamarind and use fine white sugar

Mmmm, that sounds lovely FP, thanks for posting that. I woke up to rain earlier but it has stopped now.

Love the shady border and naughty Hugo! Looks a lot better than my shady border, although I guess it needs time to grow a bit then review it.

We have a topiary cat, tiny little hedgehog, some ceramic mushrooms plus jug things that I inherited plus my Grandad's milk churn.

How bizarre - we made minty lemon drinks yesterday and put some in the fridge for today. I just slice lemons, limes, and oranges [2-3 slices of each] and chop off a large bunch of mint and pour water over, then add a spoon to crush it all together in the jug.

No rain today yet - and lets hope it stays away today as we have a group coming to re felt our community hut roof.

Haha at Naughty Hugo and your border looks lovely. The only culture-like object we have is a topiary squirrel. We gave DS a wire frame plus tiny box cutting plus cheapo secateurs a couple of Xmases ago and he's been lovingly clipping it ever since. This year for the first time it looks like a squirrel.

There is a lovely Sculpture Garden near Dorking (Hannah Peschar Gallery). Mind-boggling prices, and I very rarely see any marked sold ( suspect it's a rich woman's play thing) but the garden itself is beautiful - full of water -on a stream, with lots of trees, and very thoughtfully done. The sculptures are usually well chosen, and beautiful too and do enhance it.

P.S. the lemony minty drinks sound delicious.

I will be buying the ingredients tonight to attempt funnyperson's delicious drink.

I want to go to the Yorkshire sculpture park and to the Henry Moore collection, but as Dorking is closest perhaps I should go there first, whenever we next go to Polesden Lacey.

Arf at Pervy statue. Border looks good too.

bear I'd love to see a squirrel picture.

No sculptures here, just a stone birdbath. I would like some though.

So trying the minty lemonade, it's cooler here today but meant to be a nice weekend. I'm torn between a charity flower show in a local private manor or the beach which is what the dc's will want to do. Dd2 is back tonight hurrah!

we used to do the minty lemon crush thing, but haven't done for years - thanks for the reminder. i quite often have freshly picked mint tea which is lovely

(it wasn't quite the same drink - i think we used caster sugar, but the soft brown sugar sounds delicious). having said that i am off sugar at the moment, so maybe for dp only!

Love the minty lemon recipes. Rhubarb sorry the job isn't going to work out for you, sounds lovely.
Here is a pic of my alley this morning. Lavender is almost out! Out of shot there is a sweet pea wigwam and a bay tree

I'm go to give that lemonade a go!

Picture of the last daffodil in my garden - still out! (It's a late variety, but even so - this is how far behind a north-facing garden in the north can be!)