Sunshine, always lovely to see and a welcome sight at this time of the year when we're already at the latter part of winter and spring is just around the corner. Spring is almost here, almost if you simply base it on the amount of sunshine we've been having for the past few days (except for Saturday) but the moment you step outside you are also reminded not to let your guard down especially today when it was just two degrees Celsius outside at ten in the morning. Nevermind, wrapped up warm with a hot cup of tea at hand and basking under the sun that spring feeling instantly returns.And it helps when you see some of the spring flowers in the garden, like this Iris that I spotted in bloom just today.
Iris histrioides 'Katharine Hodgkin'
Iris histrioides 'Katharine Hodgkin'
Or this Aloe spiralling away and seemingly smiling back.
Aloe polyphylla
On the weekdays that have just past it's been mild and very sunny so you can't help but feel that spring is just around the corner. And it puts you in the mood to garden too, except for the fact that weekdays means we have to go to work and hence cannot garden. Nevermind, at least there's the weekend. But the weather has been a bit of a tease and come Saturday all that sun disappeared, shaded by heavy clouds with lots of rain and it felt nippy again. Oh well, from spring like to autumnal in twenty four hours. And it just has to be on the weekend too, when we actually had time to garden!Anyway, we still did loads including a group visit to see the lovely pond and Koi collection of one of the members of our local Koi Club. We all had a fantastic time despite the weather, it was nice to see everyone as well as Tim's pond and stunning Koi in the flesh, not to mention the tea and cakes that were served, yum!
Photo from www.kangeikoiclub.com
Sunday was much better, although still nippy at least it was dry and very sunny so we were able to do a bit more in the garden. We did a mixture of things which included some plant tidy up, filling up the third raised bed with more soil, digging a trench for the foundations of a small retaining wall, and preparing the recycled scaffold boards to be used as decking in our new garden.
And then there were the Dahlias which are now potted up and stored indoors to warm them up and encourage them to sprout.
It's almost spring...almost but not quite so best to keep our guard up just in case. But at least it's not long to wait now, and there's a 'sunshiny' feeling at the very thought of it.
Mark :-)
