Six on Saturday - 24th May 2025

Six on Saturday - it's been a while!

Goodness, my last #SixOnSaturday was way back in September 2023. A lot of life has happened since then, including a big life decision - to retire; another big life deicision - to press ahead with a major build at our house to give us a better view of the garden, a new kitchen and an all important utility/boot room along with the future proofed added benefit of completely flat access from the street to living space, a not inconsiderable challenge on this hill. Then, an encounter with a young lad in a hire car in a massive hurry nearly put paid to all of the above. As we were crossing our road near our house he sped down and pulled out of a side street into our path, swerved to avoid my husband, hit me and flung me in the air.  I'm recovered. I'm "retired". I have a lovely new kitchen/dining/living space with a wonderful view of the garden. But it has been a year and some! The garden itself is recovering from major excavation, all the rain we had last year, the builders hut, and, well, the builders! Recovering to the extent that I managed to open it last weekend as par of our lovely local Telegraph Hill Open Gardens 2025 weekend. I take so many photos of the garden with the intention of posting a Six, and then I get sidetracked into gardening. This time I'm determined to break that silence. 

One: The King's Rose

Well, get me being bang on trend with a first edition rose! The first edition bit is the librarian in me equating the first selling of a new rose, now out of "print" (aka supply). It is the new David Austin King's Rose, as seen at the Chelsea Flower show. I ordered it there and then. It arrived two days ago and was planted the same day. It flowered immediately. Even the two tiny buds that got knocked off when I planted it have flowered in a little vase in the kitchen. 

Two: Wisteria, flowering at last

We've been in this house since the early 1980s but I've only really been gardening in the last ten years. This wisteria has been in the ground all that time. Until a number of years ago, it was completely untrained and had shot up through an ash tree - itself a seedling - and occasionally threw off the odd bloom. I've "rescued" it from the ash tree and gave it a jolly good prune. It spend a good few years sulking. I've been giving it the 7/2 treatment that I first heard about from Adam Frost on Gardener's World. It has repaid me by finally flowering. I'm hoping we'll get along together from now on. 

Three: water, harvesting thereof

The new build, a wraparound extension to the side/back of the house meant that I had to relocate what were a couple of daisy-chained utilitarian water butts from the side of the house that were filled from the roof via a rain diverter. The only place for replacements was on the new back facade of the house - no room for daisy chained butts, or anthing unsightly. So I went posh and big and got two huge (380l) butts with inbuilt planters. Hands down, "where did you get those?" was the most frequently asked question at last weekends Telegraph Open Gardens event. The answer is here. I went for the muted sandstone to blend with the london bricks. You can also choose from some joyfully coloured ones. I've kept their predecessors and those are now connected to the roof of the summer house and the shed. Even so, with the recent dearth of rain, all were practically run dry until the very welcome downpours here in SE London over the last few days. 

Whilst sill on the water theme, we have a pond, and a few bird baths. This one sits just through an arch which leads from what looks like "the garden", to a whole other secret set of garden spaces beyond. It is regularly used by our local magpies for softening carbs, usually bread or rice, all of which are added within minutes of me refreshing the water. Last weekend, I refreshed the water just as the first garden visitors were due to arrive, only to find a deposit of a new carb - Tagliatelle!  

Four: Geranium psilostemon - Armenium Cranesbill

The great thing about our local gardening club are the ideas and the swapsies. This one was doing very well indeed in Becky's garden, and had seeded itself liberally. We dug up a clump a week ago, I trugged it up the hill and popped it towards the back of one of my borders and, after looking a bit sad for a couple of days, it has really perked up and seems happy in its new home. 

Five: grass recovery

The 2023 Christmas holiday break was spent digging up as many plants as I could from the area that was going to be affected by the building works. Including all the palnts in the patio boarder which were, in the new scheme, going to be covered by the new extended building. So the bottom part of the garden turned into pot city, with all the things that I hoped would survive to be re-planted once the work was done. Then the builder's hut was errected on what would, after the build, still be a lawn area. As you can see, it looked very sad after the hut was removed. I've gone for re-seeding rather than re-turfing, not least because my lawn is not just grass and anything that was just grass would look way out of place. I reckon I mow as many daisies as I do grass blades. If I look closely I can still see the recent history of the lawn (where the hut was, where they stacked the stone for the new steps for weeks and weeks, where the rhododendron spent the summer in a big builder's bag on the lawn). But it is recovering. The daisies are back.

The reason why we want a lawn in the first place is that it is lovely to sit on the patio for breakfast or lunch, and to watch the birds feeding. The feeder has been relocated further up the lawn and right now, is being visited dozens of times an hour by Mrs Woodpecker. We've worked out where she is nesting and look forward to when the young get introduced to the feeder. Learner woodpeckers trying to feed for the first time is rather amusing. 

Six: OMG - I'm going to finish this one and publish it. My first six since 2023. 

The first strawberry. Harvested about an hour ago and eaten within minutes. We shared it atop a couple of strawberry infused white chocolates which arrived to help us celebrate our recent 39th Wedding anniversary. It was exquisite.  

That's all for this week. This is my latest in the #SixOnSaturday, a series inspired by The Propagator and currently being championed over at Garden Ruminations. Check out the participant guide here. I aspire to be as disciplined, creative and inspiring as them but for now, I'll remain pleased if I can just limp on with a post every now and again.