My garden in June

The lupins which did so gloriously in May are finished, and have been found by the whole neighbourhood’s snail community - it’s obvious to see how much they enjoyed them! Thankfully though the plants were able to set seed before their demise, so hopefully next year I’ll be able to grow more lupins from those.

This month it’s been about roses, with much dead heading and some new roses too. At the start of the month it was this peachy-yellowy beauty that took centre stage; positioned just outside the gate, every time we came in or out there seemed to be another head of flowers, which was perfectly fine by me.

The never ending weeding of the gravel continued, but it did throw up a surprise with this tiny poppy flower. There’s been a few others since, but none have made quite the impact that this first one did.

When I said it was a month of roses, there were also new roses. This Gertrude Jekyll arrived for my birthday, a present from MOH - isn’t it gorgeous? As you know we had one of these in our previous garden and had to leave it there, that one he’d bought me as a wedding anniversary present and so it was a lovely surprise to receive this one unexpectedly.

The weather was good enough to start some proper gardening and as well as the rose to pot up - I’m not sure where I want it yet - there were some plants to plant out. The hellebore which we brought from my FIL’s garden was ripe for potting out, it wasn’t until I got it out of the pot that I realised just how much. It hadn’t done much this winter, and the amount of roots to soil might have contributed to that. It’s not just along from the pale green hellebore in our border which had done so well, let’s hope this one takes the hint.

Only two of my sunflowers survived on their own while we were away in May, but they have gone from strength to strength and to help them further I decided to pot those out too. Usually you wait until they’re about 30cm high, and these were still a bit off that, but thankfully they’ve done well and there’s still the two of them. And they are so much bigger, almost reaching the top of the boundary wall to date, and I’m sure they’ve more to grow yet.

I’ve also had my first peony flower. I potted two of our peonies to bring with us, and they have managed well - they haven’t quite thrived but each of them have produced a single bloom, which is way more than I expected. They are likely to have a little longer in their pot, as our new garden plans are starting to form but will take a while longer to implement.

Among the other plants I’ve finally planted out are these wallflowers - these are the Chelsea Jacket type and have multicoloured pastel flowers. The planter is one we brought with us, and which had edged our greenhouse in the old garden. I was pleased though to discover it’s made for this spot on the corner of the garage, nestling in among the oak upright and just along from the garden tap.

The rosemary bush which suffered last summer and then recovered again is still alive and well still alive is probably as good a description for it. It’s a fighter that’s for sure, and to reward its effort this is another plant that’s been potted out, this one’s in our external borders in a much more sheltered spot. So if it was the wind it objected too, it should do ok where it is now.

Ah yes, then another rose arrived.

I’d spotted this new rose in a magazine, it’s named after the National Trust’s Mottisfont in Hampshire which is famous for its roses. It’s a great place to visit too - we’ve only been a couple of times, but I love it there.

So then there were two new roses.

MOH could hardly say no don’t get this lovely magenta Mottisfont rose as I’ve ordered one for your birthday, could he? But what a happy result - though I did have to scramble around a bit to find two pots large enough for each of these. Thankfully the obliging ox eye daisies made way and were happy enough to take up life in a new pot, so happy in fact they’re still flowering.

Our pink jasmine, which also travelled from our previous garden also flowered. It’s not in its most favourable spot, and I know that, but I am appreciating it doing its best.

As well as roses, there’s been the lavender. And that has been glorious.

We have at least six large bushes which took many hours to prune at the end of last summer, but in the sun they are so worth it, and I know in a month of two I’ll be changing my mind again! Though it’s a great way marker to say to people ‘our house is the one with the lavender’ as it’s quite obvious which it is!

We have a lot of dark leafed and purple plants - some that were here, and others which we brought with us - one of the most striking is this hebe, which again really enjoys the sunshine (but then again don’t we all).

I brought some hardy succulents back from Gardeners’ World Live this year - the first time we’ve brought plants at the show, and I couldn’t resist some of the redder leaved varieties as well as the bright, fresh greens. I’m hoping that these are as promiscuous as my aloe vera plants…

On a trip to the garden centre for lunch, I left with two small tomato plants. They’ve a while to go yet, but hopefully we’ll be eating our own home grown tomatoes this summer - it seems so strange that I haven’t grown anything for a good couple of years, mostly because we’ve been moving house.

The Mottisfont rose flowered, and it’s another beauty…

At the other end of the garden the little crab apple tree continues to do its thing - it’s plumped out so much these last few months with each of the branches looking laden with fruits again. This year I will make use of them, whether it’s jam or jelly, or even a wreath. Well, that’s the plan anyway!

Post Comment Love 12 - 14 July

Hello there, and welcome back to this week’s #PoCoLo - a friendly linky which I co-host with Suzanne, where you can link any blog post published in the last week. We know you’ll find some great posts to read, and maybe some new-to-you blogs too, so do pop over and visit some of the posts linked, comment and share some of that love.

Please don’t link up posts which are older as they will be removed from the linky, and if older posts are linked then please don’t feel that it’s necessary to comment on those. If you were here last week it was great to have you along, if you’re new here this week we’re pleased you’ve joined us.

I can’t let this week’s PoCoLo go past without mentioning the England team at Euro 2024 - it’s been a rollercoaster of a ride following their games, but as it’s been said football is a results game, and boy have they got the results. There’s been goals in the last few minutes, a penalty shoot out and a semi-final win taking them into Sunday’s final.

We’d already booked to go wine tasting, and so unusually weren’t able to watch the game live - and kept up to date (albeit a little behind) with updates on my phone. While we’re glad it was a positive result in normal time, it was one game we’d almost hoped would go on for longer so we’d be able to catch the end in a local pub. Also unusually though, that wasn’t to be, so we had to wait (not so) patiently for the highlights, and what a game to miss!

Here’s hoping that on Sunday evening there’s as much good news for England fans everywhere - C’mon England!

And yes, my phone lock screen is that pink! It’s a recoloured version of a Norfolk beach which I though looked better with a pink hue - and it’s kinda stuck around for the last few phone upgrades too. It’s something noone else has, that’s for sure!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Finishing my new hexi sewing machine mat

It’s been a while since I shared how I’d fallen for some of Tula Pink’s bright designs, but since then there’s been a fair bit of activity and I’ve even finished both of my intended makes; one fully, and the other the sewing element is complete, but I’ve still to find the right kind of day to get my paintbrush out.

Today I’m sharing the fully completed project, which wasn’t even a twinkle in my eye back at the start. I enjoyed the whole English Paper Piecing process so much that once I’d finished the top for my sewing box, I wanted to carry on.

And so I did, and the result is a gorgeously bright mat to go under my sewing machine. Not that I really need a mat, but it will prevent any marking on the surface and I’ve got used to having my sewing machine on a mat. I’d been using an old and worn out cutting mat, and that helps me move the sewing machine back and forth on the desk when it’s not in use.

But it wasn’t very pretty. The finished mat is way prettier, and I’m really pleased with how it turned out.

An organic plan

I didn’t have an exact plan when I started, other than to create a mat for my sewing machine. I knew I wanted it roughly the same size as the old and worn cutting mat I’d been using, but I hadn’t really worked out - at the start anyway - how I was going to finish it, if I was going to quilt it (or how), and what the backing would be.

I knew I probably had some batting somewhere, so that was covered and I knew I wasn’t keen on having the hexagonal shapes on the edges, so I was always going to square those off somehow.

But when I started, finishing this mostly hand sewn project seemed a long way off.

Yes mostly hand sewn.

All of the piecing and quilting on the colourful front is done by hand. The binding was added with two rows of machine stitching on the front, and attached to the back by hand sewing slip stitches all the way round.

The back though is mostly machine sewn, the strips pieced by machine and also quilted by machine. And you know what, that’s perfectly ok.

Starting out

Back in January I needed to crack on with assembling enough hexies, and deciding on a layout - and the layout was probably the hardest part!

In my head I thought I’d create a colour graduating design, which would look both slick and chic. But try as I might, it didn’t feel right - and so I abandoned the layout above, and adopted a more random placement design. Switching individual pieces around to get a layout that I was happy with - don’t get me wrong, there was lots of switching, trying to get the different patterns evenly spaced.

Once I’d decided on my layout - and taking a picture so I didn’t forget it, I did the clever design trick of looking at the photo in grayscale to ensure that the lights and darks were also relatively evenly spaced.

And then I numbered every single hexi with its row and position so that sewing them together could be relatively mindless. With rows for each stack dotted around my craft room, at times it felt like I’d never reach the end.

Front assembled, now for the back

But gradually the individual hexagons were attached into rows, and the rows sewn together in order to create the front of my mat. I decided to fill in the gaps on the top and the bottom, but to leave the smaller gaps on the sides.

And I settled on the backing fabric too. I wanted something equally colourful, but something that would come together much more quickly, and nor did it need to be quite so labour intensive.

In the end I settled on some of the less Christmassy fabrics that I’d picked up at the Newark Quilt Show at the start of the year. All of the fabrics were part of a ‘grab bag’ and a lucky dip. Part of their attraction for me was their selvedges, so I was keen to keep these on show.

I’d slightly misjudged the size making it longer than it needed to be, but not as wide - so with my organic plan and solutions brain mode, I added part of what I’d cut off the bottom onto the side - which you can see on the left above - and that makes me smile.

Hand quilting the front

With the back complete - sewn together, and machine quilted - I could no longer procrastinate about how to finish off the front. At one local sewing group evening one of the ladies asked me if I was going to hand quilt my piece - I laughingly said no, I’m not a glutton for punishment.

However, it turned out that I am - as it needed some kind of quilting, and I thought machine quilting this side would lose some of its charm. I started out with a plan to chain stitch individual hexies to form an oblong shape, and I completed the inner oblong. But realistically, it took way longer than I wanted it to take and it didn’t look as good as I thought it would. I wasn’t unpicking it though.

So instead I changed tack, and added a small running stitch around the remaining hexies using the same embroidery thread.

Adding the binding and elastic

As I neared the end of the hand quilting I was thinking of how to finish this project - by chance I saw a haberdashery company online showcasing their widest bias bindings, and I was hooked. I did a rough calculation of how much I’d need, then added a bit more for good measure and waited for it to arrive.

I hadn’t thought about thread, but thought I’d probably have something. Turned out that I did, and in exactly the same colour - what are the chances? I’d picked up a bag of part-used overlocker threads in a recent WI sale in Newark - attracted by some of the colours, thinking I’d use them at some point without knowing that would be quite soon!

By now both the back and front were pinned together and so I pinned and re-pinned the binding to the front of my mat, mitring the corners as neatly as I could, adding extra pins to keep them in place before I slowly (at times) whizzed round with a couple of rounds of machine stitching.

With a stroke of luck the mitred corners behaved and stayed in place on both the front and the back. For the back I added some glitzy pink elastic (left over from mask making during the pandemic) across the corners and then pinned the back in place before slip stitching it and completing my mat. The elastic means I can slip the corners of the old and worn out cutting mat through these and get the benefit of its solidity, but the prettiness of my new mat. Not something I originally planned for, but a useful addition.

Definitely a project to take on the go

For now my English Paper Piecing (EPP) projects have come to an end, but it’s something I’ve really enjoyed - and it’s something that is easily portable. The mini oblong pouch below - which is no more than 15cm long - carried everything I needed easily, that includes needle and thread, small scissors, a thimble, a thread catcher and approximately four rows of my hexi top. That’s where the row and positional numbering came in handy too - that’s definitely a top tip, write these on the back of the cardboard - mine took the format 6.1, 6.2 etc for row 6 position 1, position 2 and so on. Absolutely invaluable, unless of course you are creating a truly random design.

So my new sewing mat looks good, is functional and is in place in my craft room. Now I need a day to paint my sewing box charcoal - I have the paint already. I need a day that’s not too hot, not too cold and one where I haven’t already committed to other things! Then I’ll share the other half of my EPP Tula Pink creation - don’t hold your breath!!