WORK TO BE DONE!

June 15, 2017 | gaiainaction

Hosta

Yes work to be done, and that in our front garden. The back garden is taking care of itself for the moment, quite wild, but all the same some vegetables are growing and fruit is being harvested already.

But the front garden has hardly been touched for the past six years. For years I could not do anything much as I had a bad flare up of fibromyalgia. For the moment that is under control. And so the work has been waiting and it is a pleasure to do it now. Trouble is that I have several ‘projects’ on the go at once. All maintenance has to be done otherwise in this damp climate everything rots, wood especially. And so, apart from power washing the patio, there are the pillars to paint, the woodwork of the fence to be sanded and treated with Sadolin or something like that, and the hedges need cutting also. And I have been and still want to introduce more container plants, especially the Hosta which I adore.

Wellingtons waiting! And as can be seen there is much work, especially the red brick I want to get really clean as it looks lovely when they are done. All the same I am very aware of not wasting water!!! But what else can one do, I decided to concentrate on the red bricks. And to remove the moss, if I could achieve that I would be happy enough.

DSCF2196 As can be seen….lots of moss and dirty bricks!

This is the end result more or less after several hours of work and too much water wasted (where is it all going? Underneath the house? I have all these questions and in a way I am happy that I am only doing this job every so many years.

These Verbena I potted up the other day, l love the colours and they give a cheerful face to the front garden. The Buddleia is also almost flowering, that will bring many butterflies! The Rose pot which used to be in the back garden I am now enjoying when I look out the kitchen window while cooking, it is a joy!

In Gozo, last winter I did see lots of lovely and well kept front gardens, the plants were mainly succulents, often in containers, beautiful. I started then to fantasize about putting more containers with flowers in our own front garden to brighten it up.

While I am wrecked tonight, it has been well worth the effort today.

I think that I deserve another visit to the Garden Centre tomorrow!

THANK YOU FOR THE ROSES

June 9, 2016 | gaiainaction

Yes, thank you for the roses, the beautiful sweet scented wild Irish roses that have been planted along the road, the link road in Skibbereen. What a foresight the town-planners had when they decided on what to plant along this road, the shrubs too are interesting and lovely, but most of all I love this time of the year because of the luxurious roses, what a delight for the eye and much nourishment for the mind and soul. I went for a walk today along this road and back through North street, I found more roses along a stretch there too. Could not resist illustrating this blog entry with full sized photos (phone pics) just to feast our eyes on these roses. Please enjoy this blessing.

“And the shower of roses spun around me, inviting me to take part in their ever-present waltz.”
Gina Marinello-Sweeney

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HOPEFUL LIGHT

December 3, 2015December 3, 2015 | gaiainaction

A golden sun was setting soon after four thirty this evening, it had been a dark day but, as often happens, around sunset the sun came out and like a wizard transformed everything with a golden glow. The roses which are still flowering abundantly took on a magical luminosity, that’s the only way I can describe what I saw, it was magical, I was so happy that I happen to glance out through the window and saw what was going on. This made my evening and banished for a while the sad thoughts going through my head with what is happening in the larger world right now, how whole families and little children are now looking at these same skies scared of what is to come, scared of, not a beautiful sunset, but of what destruction and death may be coming their way. I’m learning to find peace deep inside me so that I can be strong in sharing out peaceful thoughts in the hope that it will help bring about peace on a larger scale. Is this possible? I am not sure, but ‘peace’ does start with each one of us, in our immediate circle, in ourselves.
Let there be only peace!

LIVE IN SILENCE

November 23, 2015November 23, 2015 | gaiainaction

“Be empty of worrying. Think of who created thought! Why do you stay in prison when the door is so wide open? Move outside the tangle of fear-thinking. Live in silence. Flow down and down in always widening rings of being.”
Rumi, The Essential Rumi

MY SISTER JOSEFINE’S TOWN GARDEN

July 2, 2015July 3, 2015 | gaiainaction

Lier is a small but beautiful town in Belgium. Most of my immediate ancestors come from there though my mum and dad were born in Brasschaat and in Diest respectively. Goyvaerts is not a common name in Belgium, but in Lier you see quite a few signs with this name on it. I feel at home there, it’s a lovely typical Flemish town with a huge car free ‘grote markt’ and a beautiful cathedral, its bells and Carillion chiming out over the typical town houses. A most interesting beguinage dating from the 13th century, a fine library, a large school of music, the Zimmer tower with it’s astronomical clock, on it’s façade it gives the times from all around the world. And many more special cultural and scenic corners.

Anyway, my eldest sister still lives there and she has a small town garden in which I went to take some photos recently. It’s a neat garden, she has one raised bed where she already had a crop of herbs last summer, but trouble with cats is making her hold back this year, so we discussed how to make it so the cats cannot use it as toilet. But there are many beautiful shrubs and flowers in her garden. Since the soil is quite sandy and of course Belgium gets quite hot in the summer, her lavender is doing extremely well, so we did harvest a lovely bunch of these flowers to dry and use later for making sachets to use as presents. There is Turkish sage – Phlomis russeliana, growing in her garden, growing tall and showing bright yellow flowers, much loved by the bees! Along the verge of one of the flower beds it is full of ripe wild strawberries, very sweet and tasty. An arch made of willow twigs lets you enter the rear end of the garden, a woodbine trails along it and is also in flower. Some beautifully scented roses together with the privet hedge in flower make this garden full of wonderful scents, a garden that anyone would love to sit in on a summers day.