Long Mizzle Garden

 Hello m' Chateau escapees, What's wrong with a glitter-ball-skeletal-lampshade topped with a Giant Flying Tuna, as a Christmas decoration, I ask you ???  When the kids mocked me and asked for a 'proper Christmas Tree', I started to worry. I mean, what is up with these kids today?  Next they'll be asking to go to Disneyland, not content mud sliding on tea trays down one of the local spoil tips.    Then I thought, 'right, you little blighters, you want 'Christmassy', I'll give you 'Christmassy'... with a dark Winter Solstice twist '.   Inspired by Beate , and channeling my own inner 'Escape to the Chateau',  I donned my red beret, grabbed my secateurs, pulled on my wellies, and went out into the garden to forage for foliage. Returning indoors, I kept on my red beret, just for effect really (our 1970s house is centrally heated).  The gathered foliage:  Phontinia, Bay, Camellia and Rhododendron (the later two with flower buds). Our y...

 Hello m' fiery crusts, With each growing season, it is fun to try something different at Long Mizzle. This year I thought I'd have a dabble with dry flowers. Technically all flowers can be dried, but some fare better than others. If hung upside down, nicely spaced in a warm, dimly lit place, they are more likely to retain their colour and shape.  As I am yet to erect a proper drying rack (or slung twig more like), some have started to festoon the living room druid tree - turned skeletor lamp shade.  Above: Statice (Limonium sinuatum) The Statice was very easy to grow, with lovely sturdy fluted stems and indigo flowers. The mutant molluscs seemed to leave it alone. I wish the same could be said of the Strawflowers - many young plants succumbed to the munching marauders. Aren't the papery flowers wonderful though !? Above: Strawflowers (Limonium sinuatum) In addition to the Cornflowers (Centaurea cyanus) and Love-in-a-mist (Nigella damascena), which self seed freely here, ...

Alreet m' glossy dahlias,   Well I've been eagerly waiting for them to all pop out so I can give you a proper update on this year's Dahlia patch....Do you have your preferred tipple ready??? The sun is shining and I've started early on a classy Buck's Piss, with plenty of ice cubes to crunch when no one's looking. Back in March, the idea was to plant a small cut flower patch inspired by the Mexican artist Frida Kahlo (original post here -  Flowers for Frida ).   Frida vase (a birthday pressie from Ol' Glass Eyed Mumrah) The small rooted cuttings that arrived in the post (from Halls of Heddon) all grew strongly and I just had to then battle with the slugs and snails. Twice they were completely gnawed down to the ground. I persisted and luckily they re-sprouted.     Yet again, my overwintered tubers were not a complete success. A couple of tubers didn't sprout at all and ended up rotting. Sadly, this meant loosing my favourite  'Totally Tangerine'....

 Hello m' handsome hollies, Today I'll be sharing a few of the more wintry drawings in the found Watling bag of sketch books. But before that, it is with great joy that I can announce... HOUSTON WE HAVE LIFT OFF!!! One of the hyacinth bulbs that mam and I started off in her cold October garage, has this week started to flower. After weeks of roots expansion, and a slowly emerging shoot, the flower rocketed quite quickly and suddenly, at precisely 32 minutes past the hour.   It still yet has to extend its full flower. We think some of the others will not be long behind -   And what of our red-onion-that-escaped-the-soup-pot ? It is looking very Chrismassy on the window ledge in our Snub (home office) back at Long Mizzle -    In my last post here , I wrote about finding sketchbooks by an unknown artist called 'Mr LJ Watling'. Last week I shared the summery landscapes, this week, here are some of the wintry ones - [ Saltsjöbaden (Sweden) January 2nd, 1982] ...