Showing posts with label Garden. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Garden. Show all posts

13 February 2016

Raindrops and Snowdrops

 snowdrops images free use

We've had so much rain, I've been in doors all week.
What do you do when your at home and it rains everyday?

It seems like most of you clean the house from top to bottom.
Have you met Daphne she decided to wash all her blue and white
crockery that she has on display. I didn't want to do things like that,
although she did make it sound a pleasure, pop over and take a look at her blog.
Every week she shares a tasty recipe, along with the music she listens to while
cooking/baking and she can make a visit to the dentist into an interesting story.


Those of you know me well,
know I'd rather be doing things in the garden, than dusting.
I'm always looking forward to Spring.


In between the few times it stopped raining, I had a quick wander around
the garden, and made a note of some of the things that I need to do
as soon as we get some dry days. Looking at the weather forecast
it won't be until the middle if next week.

I did another search to see if I could the find any snowdrops in bloom
 this is the variety I planted 2 years ago.


I still only managed to find one in flower, which had been
battered by the heavy rain, so I brought it indoors.



 Daphne spotted this lonely snowdrop amongst the
tete a tete daffodils in a photo I shared on my Facebook page.



I had hopes of the garden being full of white clusters of snowdrops.
Just like this.

 snowdrops images free use

There are so many different species. all so dainty.
Maybe I should have chosen a more hardy type similar to these.

 snowdrops images free use

I'll have to ask my friends if I can dig up some of theirs after they have
 finished flowering, to plant for next spring. Which is called planting
 'in the green' or wait till next Autumn and plant some more bulbs.

No gardening has been done, so I did the next best thing.
As I'd left my watercolour paints and journals handy
I had a great time sketching & painting Snowdrops.







This was painted in a Stillman & Birn Beta journal.
using Winsor & Newton pan paints.
I really like this paper it's thick so you can paint on both sides.



The next sketch was done in a  10 cm x 15 cm  sketch book made for me
by Valerie Gardener who has a lovely Sketching blog,
called Colours in the Briezh at the moment she is sharing sketches
 from her clothes  designed in the 60's.
She lives in northern France and travels a lot with her husband. She records
all their trips with sketches in situé. Her posts vary from time to time,
 I look forward to seeing her next posts as she is travelling again.


This sketch I did in the lovely handmade sketch book she sent to me.
All the pages are different types of paper.



 It's still raining,
and  while I've been doing these sketches, no dusting has been done.
Who cares, I'm back into watercolour painting,
and if we do have any unexpected visitors,
I'm sure they'll have come
 to see Mr France and I
'Not the dust'

All snowdrops images
are from snowdrops images free use

Have you got lots of snow drops in your garden ?
if so take some photos, I'd love to see them.



à bientôt

Barbara Lilian



08 November 2015

Autumn in my part of France.

Just returned home, after celebrating my 75th Birthday in Denmark.
I'll tell you about that in my next post.

Before I left I did some tidying up in the garden 
so that it wasn't too much to do when I returned.
It had just rained and everywhere was looking fresh.
It was just turning to dusk and thought it was a good time 
to get my Panasonic aim & shoot pocket camera out,




Non of these champignons are edible.
but look lovely in the wild part of my garden.

These champignons have a lovely shiny sheen on them
 and the leaves with tiny droplets clinging on, looked sparkly in the scanty light.



I love these raindrops glistening on the leaves.
I raked off a lot of fallen leaves and found these primula in bloom.
Having such  warm weather for the time of year,
 some plants don't know which season it is.

We don;t usually see these in flower until early Spring.
I even saw some tips of the daffodils,
so I quickly covered them over with some compost.
Far too early.

I found this old metal watering can when we moved here many years ago
when we started the renovation. It was hidden in the overgrown garden.
It has a hole in it, but I use it for decoration. Sometimes I put
 a washed jam jar or a cut off water bottle inside, then
I can put wild flowers in it. Living in the country
it's so much nicer than a vase.
I love a bit of rustic.

How's your garden looking, 
are you continually raking up leaves ?

Do you still have plants in flower ? that are usually dormant by now.
Let me know.
 Several of my gardening friends, from different parts of the world
have told me how different their garden looks to previous years.
Hope it's a good sign !!



à bientôt
Barbara Lilian

28 August 2015

Some of my favourite things.


I'm sure those of you who are getting to know me
a bit more will know what most of my favourite things are.


 I'm unable to look after my garden at the moment as I've just spent 5 days in the
 clinic again, having treatment for my back problem and now I need to take things easy.

With flowers all around our home I couldn't wish to be resting in a better place.


I can't seem to get back into my painting, so I thought I'd browse through my photo albums and pick out some of my favourite things to cheer me up.
Would you like to see what I've chosen.
Get yourself a cup of coffee or what ever your favourite drink is,
and if you love flowers I'm sure you'll enjoy these photos.


I love the coffee Mr France makes for me mid morning.
better than any Starbucks, not that we have a Starbucks near where we live.
As you can see Mr France has drunk his coffee before I've even tasted mine.

During the past few days we've had some stormy weather
with lots of rain, which was badly needed, but has damaged a lot of the flowers. 
Fortunately Mr France had noticed that the early flowering pink rose
had a few new buds on it. so he cut this one for me.


and now I'm able to enjoy seeing it indoors.


Along with some more pink roses, which I have now hung to dry.



 The first photo selected has to be the Lavender from my own garden.



After my visit to La Provence region.


I had to have a Lavender bed of my own.


and also I had to paint what I'd seen.



A few of the hanging baskets we have every year.
These were from a few years ago when we won First prize in the floral competition.


This year we planted some pendulum  Begonias which have given us
a beautiful splash of colour all summer and it's still looking good.
A totally different basket to the previous one much daintier
flowers, which hangs at our holiday cottage where the guests stay.

Now for a selection of flowers cut from the garden.
With it being so hot and dry this summer, I haven't had many flowers to cut.



Our new Pierre de Mansard rose has certainly bloomed well for the first year. 


Pretty Spring flowers in a dainty cup.


Summer pinks & blues.


A lot of you seem to be wishing for Autumn. not me I hang on to every sunny day
hoping summer will last another month.
Our two eldest grandsons, are moving on in their education next week
 which means they will be leaving home.
So a family get together around our pool is planned for tomorrow.


This was one of many get together meals, during this summer
 when our son was here from Denmark with his family.
We just love having our home full of family and friends.


Boys at work.


Pool waiting for the family, teenage grandsons and girl friends.
What better way to end their summer vacation before College starts on Monday.



Next week I'll be taking a break. revisiting the Atlantic coast region. 


Mr France has rented a tiny fisherman's cottage.
It will be such different scenery for us. I'm really looking forward to it.
 hoping the good weather will hold out and we can just stroll along the beach, 
 enjoy a nice fish restaurant, nothing too energetic.


 and take lots of photos, 
Maybe it'll help to get me back in the right frame of mind to paint.


I hope to see you again soon
 as I'll certainly be sharing my short break away from the countryside.

à bientôt
Barbara Lilian

27 June 2015

Flowers from my garden.

This past week we have had very hot days.
The garden is looking colourful 
so I thought I'd cut some flowers .


A vintage pitcher full of poppy seed head stems from last summer.

A selection of flowers put in a jam jar then placed in a hessian bag.
I added some wild flowers picked from the edge of the lane 
along with a few blooms from my new climbing rose  'Pierre de Ronsard'




A corner of the terrace which I'm always changing.

I very rarely buy flowers,
However I couldn't resist these Rose buds found at a supermarket.
I bought some awhile ago and hung then in a walk in cupboard
and they've dried a lovely faded pink and kept their beautiful scent.


So I plan to do the same again.

are you picking flowers from your garden ?
if you are I'd love to see what how you display them.



à bientôt

Barbara Lilian