Frozen Images

Oh the weather outside is frightful and the fire is so delightful...and here are some images from Holly Grove this frozen December day...MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Snowy Shropshire

Thought I'd post a few photos from our garden and the lanes around our home this snowy, frosty December...keep warm everyone!

Home Renovations and Cooking

I'm afraid that there is not much change going on in the garden at the moment as we are focusing on some home improvements and preserving the late autumn harvest - pop over to Holly Grove kitchen to see what we're up to...

Goodbye Unwelcome Visitors

In a previous post earlier this year I mentioned that we had spotted wasps building a nest on our little blue garden house...well that was early June. Sometime around the end of July I noticed less activity around the nest and on closer (and careful) inspection I saw a number of dead wasps under the entrance to the nest. 

We watched the nest throughout August and came to the conclusion that the nest was no longer in use.  But just in case we left it in place and continued to give it a wide berth, until last week when we noticed that the nest was beginning to fall apart.

Beginning to decay

So today was the day to dislodge the nest and inspect the inside.  A wasps' nest is not an attractive structure from the outside, but quite fascinating inside.

2 parts to the nest

Subtle colours on the nest shell

Wasp honeycomb and eggs

The nest was amazingly light in weight, the nest formed in two parts: the shell of the nest resembling thin, paper like bandages in soft grey, white and lilac, added in layers and the honeycomb centre filled with eggs, some of which were cracked open, others with a baby wasp partly formed and more complete eggs - amazing!

The question outstanding is: what happened to the wasps that they died or abandoned the nest?  If there are any entomologists out there it would be great to hear an explanation of what might have happened to the colony.

Renovation and Reroofing

The title of this post doesn't sound as though it has much to do with gardening but the Handyman's largest project to date will have a significant influence on the look of our surroundings and on how we use the garden.

When we first moved here over three years ago there was a selection of outbuildings opposite the back of the house, christened 'the shantie town' by the Handyman. It was a real jumble of corregated iron and wood shacks together with the original outhouse and a concrete block building that had been built to house goats kept by a previous owner of Holly Grove.

Over the time we've been here the Handyman has removed some of these shacks and has plans to renovate the original outhouse. The old Goat House is the largest and most substantial of the buildings and has been used by us as a workshop, this was to become the biggest and most complex of the Handyman's projects to date.

The work began last August when we designed the party patio and incorporated the proposed pitched roof of the Goat House renovation into the patio design. The photos below show the two beams that will support the end of the pitched roof, the end of Goat House can be seen that will support the outside fire and chimney.










On completion of the party patio the focus shifted through the winter months to creating a workshop for the Handyman in a small barn on the other side of the garden. When the building was ready it took several weeks to relocate all the tools etc.

So as Spring arrived it was time to start work on the pitched roof. Roofing is not a job that the Handyman has tackled before, but he likes a challenge! So with some advice from his brother C, the Handyman set off. Unfortunately due to an accident and some broken bones the project was put on hold for 8 weeks or so...

Following confirmation that his bones were healing well, the project continued...below are a couple of photos of the beginnings of the handcut roof, each piece cut and put in place by the Handyman. there was much deliberation over the angle of pitch and the inclusion of hips on each end of the building - we find ourselves looking at the shapes and sizes of local roofs and deliberating on the aesthetics of each.











The next stages were to apply the felt and then the battens for the tiling. I spent a lot of time feeling very anxious as I watched the Handyman climbing up the scaffolding and across the roof - all this just 16 weeks after breaking two bones in his leg!

We then spent more time looking at a range of tiles - colour, shape and size - and eventually the Handyman sourced some reclaimed tiles which should allow the building to blend into the garden and surrounding architecture. Then last Saturday the tiling began, with the help and knowledge of a friend P, who shared some of the secrets of roof tiling with the Handyman.

When the tiling is complete the rest of the project to turn the Goat House into a garden studio will be mothballed until next Spring whilst we start work on a couple of major projects in the house. I'll update this blog with the progress of the Goat House as things are added.

I've ventured up onto the scaffolding at various stages, though I found the experience somewhat daunting (I don't do heights very well).

The views across the garden and surrounding countryside were amazing - wonder if the Handyman could incorporate a viewing platform in the roof design? Hmm!

Tooty Fruity!

Quick update on the soft fruit front...raspberries and blackcurrants in abundance light up the fruit cage. So far we've had 3lbs 2ozs of raspberries and about 4lbs of blackcurrants. Much use has been made of these in the Holly Grove kitchen.

There are more raspberries ripening each day and more blackcurrants. The redcurrants are beginning to colour and there is the prospect of a bumper crop of blackberries later in the summer. Delicious!

Freshest of Veg

Well, harvesting time has arrived as seeds sown in April and May start to produce lovely fresh vegetables for the kitchen. We've been eating sugarsnap peas, lettuce, baby carrots and the odd kohl rabi for ten days or so and yesterday we had the first of our soft fruit in the shape of raspberries and blackcurrants.


Today I've got a basket of vegetables to roast for our tea. In the trug are some of the usual suspects: beetroot, carrots, baby courgettes, with some first time arrivals at Holly Grove: florence fennel and kohl rabi. The kohl rabi is becoming a favourite with us. A more sophisticated version of turnip, it is tender and sweet when any size between golf ball and tennis ball. It peels easily and this variety 'Green Delicacy' has lovely white flesh. I've just sown another row which should be ready around the end of August.

I haven't grown Florence fennel before so I'm looking forward to tasting it. So far it has proven easy to germinate and grow, though I think it could do with a bit more frequent watering to swell the edible stem base and two or three more weeks in the ground should produce better sized bulbs. However I just couldn't wait any longer to have a taste, so have taken one immature bulb to try.

There really is nothing quite like fruit and veg from your own plot!

Border Bouquet

Just a quick note as I have a busy day ahead both in the garden and the kitchen. Look out for a new post on Holly Grove Kitchen coming soon...

Whilst deadheading the roses yesterday I also cut back a few stray stems of border perennials. Rather than consigning them to the compost bin I put them in a vase and before you know it a border bouquet had emerged. Okay, so it wouldn't win any flower arranging prizes but it really gives a flavour of the borders at Holly Grove.

In the mix are shasta daisies, various penstemons, scabious, valerian, campanula and the odd frond of fern - a real cottage garden fusion!

On Display

We are expecting visitors this weekend, my cousin and her husband are staying overnight with us on their way to Spain for the summer. So the garden has had its hands and face washed - this takes the form of a bit of furniture painting, cushion washing, patio sweeping, grass cutting and border edging. The end result is a very tidy plot, hopefully showing off Holly Grove at its best.

Fingers crossed for fine weather on Saturday so that we can sit in the garden and enjoy all the hard work.

Gardener Turned Painter?

We have lots of places to sit at Holly Grove - not that we spend much time using them! But they are an important part of the garden; the metal table and chairs outside the sunroom door make a lovely spot to sit for breakfast and the companion seat at the top of the circle lawns is perfect for an afternoon cuppa, then the swingseat in the evening sun...

To these the Handyman is adding a small gazebo in the shade by Valentine's gate. This was a structure he made for our previous garden and it has been sitting dismantled in the 'builder's yard' since we moved here three years ago, so as you may imagine it is in need of a coat of garden paint/preservative...my job.

Not quite the transition between gardener and painter that Monet evoked in his Giverny garden but then he probably had 'staff' to paint the Chinois bridge. The painting of the gazebo will take me several days to complete as I intend to attack it a bit at a time. At the same time I'm repainting the metal table and chairs, a glutton for punishment you may say, but the reward will be in having one new place to linger and another refreshed.

As an antidote to all this painting I spent a couple of hours in the kitchen garden removing the gone-to-seed rocket and radish (I always sow more than we can eat) to the compost bin and sowing two more rows of carrots and one row of Little Gem lettuce in their place. The cut and come again lettuce sown in the half barrel earlier this year has been a great success and is still flourishing and we had the first thinnings of our carrots last night for tea with the first of the sugar snap peas - delicious! I don't have a photo of these as they went straight from plot to plate in minutes.










In the greenhouse the first courgettes are ready and small green tomatoes are appearing on all the varieties. The first two tiny cucumbers have also materialised -- how exciting! Oh, and I glimpsed the first ripe raspberry as I was sowing the carrots; must go out and harvest it for my breakfast...
Yummee! Hoping for more in the coming days.