A rummaging we will go

How on earth do you link this disparate group of pictures? No idea so shan’t even try. You can see that I’m flagging; but this is the last. After this I shall be orderly and timely and not leave pictures such as these dangling.

The herb garden is my most established flower bed. By established I mean you can’t step into it without treading on a plant. And behind the herbs are the roses. New Dawn ones this time. Oddly unscented but at least fetching.

And when they have done their duty as background plants, they are plucked off the wall and tossed into a basket for drying and potential pot pourri. (That is a later project for when I work out just how to turn them into a christmas treat.)

The other blooming marvel of the spring season just over was the Deutsia shrub. Yes, it’s too big now to be called a shrub. And it’s the dullest plant in the scent department. But here it is in its glory. With luck and a cracking of the whip, Nicolas may have given it a mighty pruning when I get back.

It’s possible you have seen this before. But just the effort of scrolling back through the month of posts is too much. I have blogger’s thumb. So apologies for the repetition.

And here are some yet more random flowers. The rogersia flowered well in the cutting garden. But has since become so parched that it badly needs re-positioning. Will I wait until autumn? Perhaps not. It may be dead from too much heat before then. It is only now that I can actually see what is a shaded garden and what has gaps in the chestnut tree canopy above and is blasting the plants to oblivion below.

And then there is the little flower bed at the end of the lawn. I vacillate between calling it the grasses garden or the rock garden. Either will suffice, but both sound dull. And right now the nepeta is flowering and competing prettily with verbena bonariensis. More of that please.

But no. More flowers would make this a thematically neat posting. Instead I have to lob some last pictures of vegetables to ruin the look. I have three pictures left before I can log out, chill out and stir fry lots of these veg for dinner.  I didn’t bring back any new potatoes on the Eurostar to London this week. Coals to Newcastle comes to mind. But here they are in situ.

Love that dry brown earth look to the potager. That won’t last.

And up at the top potager I keep mentioning the asparagus, but consistently fail to show you what they look like at this time of year. They are staked, (well, that’s boasting, they are corralled between bits of string) and they are tall.  And with a bit if luck next year we might get a spear or two from the entire bed. Patience, it has its virtues. So I am told.

Last but not least. The missing white currants from the list of the post below. White currants. Pink currants, hours of toil to strip off the stalks and leaves. I have stuffed them into tupperware boxes and shoved them in the freezer. Who knows, come high summer I will pull them out and lovingly turn them into a pretty tart. One can always dream.