A BIT OF A TIDY

After watching Gardeners World last night I decided to do a bit of trimming and tidying in the perennial border today. The rain these past few nights has been torrential but the sun came out in a it's glory along with my secateurs and I chopped and tidied away.

Before I started it looked like this 

That's to the left

This is the middle

and this is the right

I made some more notes of plants which need moving next spring and also which need supports and how big. 

A good  bit of time spent me thinks. 

IT'S STILL GOING

My perennial side of the garden that is. Unbelievable plants and growth this year obviously because of the wonderful weather we have had and also because the growing medium was new and chocker full of goodness. Next spring will see me putting goodness back in and hoping for a show of plants and flowers to equal 2014. 

I was given a couple of pea plants and they look like this today

All of 2 pods! May need rather a lot of imagination to make a meal from those!

I may have mentioned that I love Verbena but that mine grew way above the 36" stated on the plant label. They are magnificent 

They have flowered and flowered and flowered and kept both bees and butterflies occupied in their search for food.

Osprey Penstemon, Belles of Ireland and Scabious together.

This Penstemon is Amelia Jane.

My biggest surprise was this - my tiny Jasmine 'Inverleigth' had flowered and I missed it because it was hidden by other plants. They will be moved next Spring.

Cyclamen are flowering again under the big trees.

I'll update again before our holiday next month.

INSPIRED BY

I saw an amazing canvas the other day created by Astrid McLean 

She makes the most eye catching art and I have loved most of her wonders. 

Trying definitely not to recreate her canvas I came up with this

Neutral with a hint of colour I am thrilled with the outcome because making decent 'stuff' doesn't always come easy to me. 

CC3 #8 - FADED LAYERS

Page 58 of Tim's Compendium of Curiosities has details of how to create Faded Layers and all the details for this challenge can be found HERE. There are prizes to be won too. Tim and Mario have provided an enormous pile of prizes for the Curiosity Crew to give out and this week the Funkie Junkie Boutique are sponsoring the overall winner. To say I had a little bit of trouble with this technique I'm really happy with the end result - a lovely little card for my stash box ready for sending to a pal for their birthday. I'm a bit of a Tim fan and have rather a lot of his products including ALL the alcohol inks. I use them for all kinds of things but really love the effect of Faded Layers because how ever you begin and whatever you use you will never ever get the same background. It's so exciting.

I decided to use some greens, yellow and caramel for my base. Unfortunately that's all I can tell you. Have a look at page 58 and you will see how to create yours.

Plastic packaging makes lovely flowers, leaves, butterflies etc and that is just what I used for the flowers on this, coloured with alcohol inks of course. The centres are little piles of Beadazzles which I always end up chasing around my craft room!! The rub ons are from Tim's Botanical Remnant Rubs, another simple embellishment but one that adds just the right touch. I had fun today completing my card so why not give it a go yourself??

12 TAGS OF 2014 - AUGUST

This month Tim asked us to 'do our own thing' and use techniques, embellishments etc that were personal favourites. I've struggled with the old mojo for a few weeks and time is running out for me to 'play' as I need to get sorted for going away next month plus, by the time I get back the summer will be over and other things take priority. I've had this tag sitting on a little shelf in my craft room for a while and when I looked at it, it really is made up of lots of the crafty things I love. With that in mind I've decided to use it as my August tag.

I swooshed my tag through just 3 colours of Distress Stain and then went over the whole tag with Distress Ink. Love doing that. I then roughed up the edges and used just a little ink around them to hide the cream of the tag. The Frameworks dies are my favourites so much so that I bought them all!! I glued some of Tim's papers to grunge and ran it over the Lattice die through my Vagabond. I also ran it through using plain grunge and some mirror card. I made a rose using the Tattered Florals die and some Vintage Shabby paper and cut some leaves from Distress Core'dinations with the Spring Greenery strip die. I already had the little swirl in my stash. The bit of lace at the bottom is cut from card using my Vintage Lace strip die. Obviously the saying is also a Tim stamp. I did enjoy making this tag challenging myself by using only 3 colours. The whole experience was led by a dear lady who now has a little challenge group and every so often we 'play', another bit of fun......

PANEL PLANNING

I kind of planned my perennial garden in panels ie 4 fence panels. Also there needed to be space for my whirly gig - clothes line - and enough path space to move the bins to the front.  

Also I wanted to be able to sit in the sun and if it ever got warm enough to have a parasol up and if it was cool to have the chiminnea going. I reckon all these points have been achieved.

The glorious summer has made it even more of a happy garden and I have 'HAD A BALL'.

Plans are in my head causing much 'ado' for next year. So as my garden colour begins to fade, I am sharing it's last moments with you

 

CHANGE ROUND AGAIN

Just popped on for a minute to show my display shelves again. I've found space for all these canvases I've been making so they are safely packed away at last. 

The shelves look like this just now

The empty stand is to hold something I can't share til next month but it's a piece I had fun making.

I spent all day yesterday having great fun with my SD die cutting some gorgeous papers of hers ready for her garden folder.

I can't wait to see it finished because I reckon there is a new paper crafter in the making here!