Home Sweet Home

I've finally sold my old house. Eighteen months ago I tried to sell, gave up and rented it, then had to kick the tenants out because they wrecked it and then I re-marketed. Now some 14 weeks after I accepted an offer I finally have the money in the bank and the paperwork all completed. Not a moment too soon. The estate agent was no help at all, and considering the huge fee I had to pay them, I still did all the chasing-up myself.

This week we have a gardener starting on the back at last. this was to be WH's project over a month ago but falling off the roof gave him a good excuse not to! Now, weeks of glorious weather wasted we have finally found a chap who can dig, put in fence-posts and lay a block wall. If it keeps reasonably dry I might have some plantable ground by November.

Who knows by next spring, after owning this house for two whole years, I may even have a garden to call my own!

Summer is on it's way

The last couple of weeks we could almost be excused for thinking it was summer already. Long days of sunshine and the clearest of blue skies have sent the temperature here on the patio cum building site soaring. It's been too lovely to resist doing a bit of plant pottering, re-arranging my many tubs and pots and potting up a few summer bulbs. All this despite the fact I still have no actual garden to plant anything into.

The icing on the cake has been the arrival of the swallows and martins which wheel over the village all day and long into the evening. The resident blackbirds have been busy to making a nest just over the fence in a shrub in our neighbours garden. the male singing in the eucalyptus tree morning and night, a lovely sound I never had in the previous garden. How nice to have 'our own' blackbird. The goldfinches too have finally found the niger feeders and look like miniature parrots as they swing round 4 to a feeder busily pecking away.

Today though it's raining heavily, much needed water for the gardens. I wish there was more in mine than weeds to reap the benefits but without some decent topsoil I just have to wait.

A chink of light

Two years ago this week my Mother died, the end of 15 hard years of worry and aggravation when I knew that she would rather have had my sister as her main carer than have to make do with me, whom she always regarded as second best. As sister lives on another continent it wasn't to be. After the death came the relief and the calm of a certain knowledge that I was no longer on permanent call-out, albeit 140 miles away, and the luxury of being able to spend whole weeks at home without having to check my messages every 20 minutes and worrying that if I went out anywhere I would have to leave again in a hurry.

The effects, over the final seven to eight years of having to drive to her home in the middle of the night at short notice, go rushing up on a Monday morning because she needed a loaf of bread and she refused to ask anyone else, living in a 'guest room' for 4 weeks whilst hospital visiting a patient who complained the whole time and having almost daily phone calls from carers who were denied entrance, carers who had been shouted at, carers who had been accused of stealing and a doctor who thought I was a waste of space (after all I was ill with Lyme Disease too) can scarcely be over estimated. They took a toll on me that I had hardly noticed until the weight lifted. I took time to recover. I also spent the best part of the following 12 months sorting out her affairs, will, probate etc as I was the only person able to do it. I remember attending a probate interview at court being hardly able to walk. My step-daughter had dropped me off outside as there was no public parking but I then had to wait for her return outside the opposite side of the road in freezing temperatures, barely able to stand. Daughter was stuck in the midday traffic and the whole interview had taken less than 10 minutes and not the 30 I had envisioned.

I didn't expect much relief that first twelve months but I did get a little more than I bargained for. We decided to buy this house and that decision more than anything else has coloured the last twelve months along with WH being diagnosed with depression, the awful result of his appearance as a prosecution witness at a murder trail, a particularly nasty and vindictive customer and his general sadness at the effects of aging.

Today the house project is on its way to being finished. We had planned to have it finished 9 months ago but the downturn in the building trade coupled with the fact that every single outside contractor we have employed has let us down at some stage or other, lead us to decide that outside 'paying' work would come first, WH being in the enviable position, even now, of having so much work offered to him that he can pick and choose at whim. He may as well earn whilst there is still work there to earn from. Other local tradesmen without exception are not so lucky.

This weekend I unpacked the last of the 60-odd boxes which had been stored for up to 2 years in the garage at the other house, a truly momentous occasion. Now all we have remaining in there is stuff that should be in a garage and which can be brought here when this one reverts to it's proper use and stops being the builder's workshop and tool store. We now have just the two bathrooms, a cloakroom and the gardens still to do. The gardens are my job anyway and will occupy me over the summer whilst we are still here.

If we had been able to take our original course (which was get the keys in April 07, build in May to Oct 07 and move-in in Nov 07) we would have had tenants in by now. Instead we didn't get the keys until July 07, started building in November 07, due to planning delays, then lost most of the winter to rain and floods and a bricklayer who only worked 2 days a week at most so we didn't move in until July 08, the time we had planned to be moving out to somewhere warmer than here. Which brings me neatly round to my little chink of light at the end of the tunnel. Greek light, that is.

Last week I booked to go to our beloved Kalamos for the fourth time, this time for almost 3 weeks in May. It will give us a chance to look around again and make some decisions regarding our eventual move. By then the garden here should be well under way and the majority of the inside work completed. WH is seeing a new consultant soon so his depression should be getting some proper treatment too. My project managing duties are now almost over and I have time to spend on other pursuits; at present I am literally getting my office in order, unpacking and sorting the mountain of paperwork brought in haste from the old house. I now have time to read for pleasure again, I had almost stopped for those 2 years as I concentrated on planning applications, orders, insurances and probate. I get time to go off with friends window shopping, garden visiting or even better plant buying. Recently I've been trawing the web for apartments to rent and places to go and visit.

I can finally see that little chink of light and it's getting brighter by the second.

All planted out

Not my new garden unfortunately, for we are still awaiting the arrival of the ground-workers who have been coming 'next week' since August and even set definite dates and times three times but have variously been rained off or prevented from coming here by having to do remedial work for flash flood emergencies. So yesterday I gave up thinking my garden will ever have top soil and rushed out and bought even more big blue tubs and thus today it was that I planted 200 assorted bulbs into said tubs. Next year I will have flowers in my garden, they just wont be in the ground but in 30-odd varieties of blue frost free planters which are lining up along the patio like rows of little blue soldiers.

The other side of the (half built, brickies were rained off too)steps are serried ranks of herbaceous perennials looking very straggly and died down but which are actually humungous plants which will easily split into 2 or three pieces when they are finally released. These were scooped from my local National Trust garden the last couple of weeks.

I went on the Saturday to go to their annual Craft Fair and made a detour on the way out to check the sale area of the garden shop. Oh my! What delights awaited there. All these perennials, some quite unusual which had been marked down to 50p or £1 from a previous price of between £6 and £8. I hastily grabbed a dozen of the most obvious things to jump up at me and hastened home. I returned the following week with my Best Friend and bought another 16. Total outlay for 28 plants, £22. Result. Amongst these were a small tree, Eucryphia Lucida 'Pink Cloud' £1, a False Lily of the Valley, Maianthemum canadense 50p and a Lobster Claw, Clianthus puniceus 50p. If even one of these grows I'll have had my money's worth. Two hostas £1 each were bigger than some of the ones I have had in pots for 12 months pending this move. The jewel in the crown must be however, this one ,Anemone riparia, a North American native also known as the Tall Anemone.

If she survives, all this garden aggro will have been worth it. Now I just need that top soil to plant her in.

Meet the gang 'cos the boys are here........

We haven't seen many birds in this garden yet. Several reasons 1) it still looks like a building site and at any given time there is likely to be someone out there making a noise of some description 2) the bird feeding station WH had for his birthday was really put in the wrong place, in the centre of an open space backed by a neighbour's eucalyptus tree 3) the resident cats are still staking out their new territory and patrolling fences to repel any potential invaders and 4) there are not nearly so many big trees. Despite the fact we are only 150m as the crow (or any bird for that matter) flies from the old place it really is quite a different habitat to get used to.

Yesterday, however, I took advantage of the good weather to remove the timber mountain from the future lawn, move all my pots of stuff awaiting transplant and had a general tidy up. I had to leave the cement mixer as it is needed later this week but 7 builder's dustbins were moved to the yard along with bags of sand and enough tools to stock a shop. I also moved the feeding station adjacent to the apple trees, with a neighbour's buddleia and a laurustinus nearby for extra cover.

This morning large as life I had a small flock of about 15 long tailed tits casing the joint and sampling the menu. They hung around for about half an hour until a neighbour's cat (thankfully not one of mine) appeared over the fence and looked menacingly at them. I took that as my cue to frighten him off and so the birds went too although half a dozen were back again in less than 5 minutes joined by a couple of great tits and a coal tit. I'm hoping this will be the shape of things to come and that they liked the new restaurant and will bring their mates. I now just need to attract the flock of goldfinches which fly past several times a day but as yet have not seen the niger waiting for them and it will finally seem like home.

On the last minute

As per usual everything is a mad rush again. My tenants finally move in on Wednesday and WH has just decided to a) change the immersion heater, b) empty out the loft and c) fix the smoke alarms which have been sitting in the kitchen for 5 weeks. Just when I need help to sort out the garden.

Last week I employed the services of a student to help me do my bit, but torrential rain the first 3 days ensured we achieved nothing. WH took the lad to work with him. On Thursday we finally got going and three hours after starting some serious work the lad decided he had a bad back and couldn't do any more digging. I sent him off on his own to cut the lawn and tidy up. Fifteen minutes later he arrived back said all was done and and tidied and he duly went home. Later I discover the lawn looks like it has been cut with a knife and fork, or maybe a goat has had random bites out of it, the few grass cuttings are still in the mower box in the garage and in any case the only bit that has been touched is in the centre. If anything it looks worse than before he started. So today after 2 nights of even more heavy rain I have to set to and get it looking pristine.

Meanwhile all is not well with the letting agent. This is my third agent and the beginning of the relationship looked promising. The manager certainly talked the talk, the adverts went out quickly and tenants were found on the first serious viewing. This was all 6 weeks ago. The paperwork was all to follow. Three weeks ago the terms and conditions arrived and we decided that as we are so close to the house we would manage the property ourselves. We awaited the contract. Two weeks ago I called the office and asked where it was, "Don't worry all the paperwork is coming together, loads of time yet." Last Monday I called again. No-one in the office at all this time so I left a voice-mail. No-one called back. I rang again on Thursday. "Oh it must have got lost in the post." Why did no-one return my (numerous) calls? " It's the school holidays, lots of people are on holiday and several were sick. No problem it can all be done today, I'll drop it off tonight." She didn't. The contract finally arrived on my doormat on Friday morning to the sound of a hastily driven off car. Several key points were wrong, names and address of the Landlord for a starters. A call to the office revealed the Manager was out, again. The secretary said she would sort it and I would be hand-delivered a new agreement on Friday night. I am still waiting.

Why is it that these firms are all very ready to talk up their service and to take your money but when it comes to actually doing anything they fall at the first hurdle? Their attention to detail is absolutely zero. All these systems are in place for instant messaging, voice-mails and good old fashioned secretaries still take messages but no one ever replies. The offices are run by brightly dressed 20-somethings who talk a lot and do bugger all else. No-one checks anything.

I just hope that on Tuesday the Lettings Manager will actually turn up to do the inventory and condition report but at £100 plus an hour I expect she will. Whether it will get typed correctly and delivered to me in time remains to be seen.

At least I am not still with the second agent I had. WH has been working in a property managed by them. They were given carte blanche in terms of the time scale, no one was due to move in for at least a month. Some of the job was tiling, so days were left for stuff to dry and other jobs fitted in between which ultimately gives a better end result and a smarter finish for the customer. By Friday there were a couple more days left to do and then the refurbishment was finished. The painter, returning the key to the letting office at the end of the week, casually asked if a tenant had been found yet. "Oh yes, we always had one, he moves in on Tuesday." We received a frantic phone call from the already stressed painter. Cue much swearing from WH who is now working over the Bank Holiday in order to complete by 8.30 on Tuesday morning.

And they call this property management?

What a difference a week makes

The weather is warmer, possibly heatwave stuff here, meaning I can almost be too hot when I have so much to do. Not a thing I'm used to saying.

Anyway, I now have a sink and some worktops. The main kitchen is still a work in progress but I can cook a reasonable meal now and it even looks half like a kitchen! I've also ordered a dishwasher as my hands have lost the battle between me and the all invading plaster dust, gloves don't help as it's everywhere, not just when you get wet, so after half a century on this planet, I get to enjoy what other people take for granted: my own dishwasher. I can't wait until Tuesday when it comes.

The rest of the house looks almost respectable except for the bathrooms. One is currently a store room and the other a disabled shower room but it's usable and with my super homemade temporary net curtains (amazing what you can do with 4 nails, a stapler and a length of net) and a few hooks screwed into odd holes in the wall it's quite functional too.

The depressed painter rang to see what progress had been made in the hall and was told not a lot. "Oh, still waiting for the plasterer are we?" Well no, actually we didn't even get that far, we still have no hall ceiling and WH is being somewhat tardy getting it put up. Maybe it was something to do with the garage fire door, he started that on Sunday night, abandoned it having lost his temper because the brickwork wasn't true and hasn't looked at it since, feeling an urgent need to do jobs for everyone else every evening so far this week. So no change there then.

The other bit of good news is that I finally have a tenant. The old house has been spring cleaned, the kitchen and one bedroom re-painted, new blinds and lights fitted, smoke detectors purchased and the garden manicured to perfection. Result 4 viewings in 3 days and one successful applicant. They move in next month and my bank account will be looking slightly healthier.

Tonight I can't move, 3 long evenings this week of gardening in the wilderness we call the back garden has given me aches in places I didn't know I had. We can see the whole garden now and the cats love it. I have a huge pile of cut down shrubs and stuff and it's been so hot it might be dry enough to burn over the weekend, otherwise I'll have to load it into the jalopy and take it to the local tip. Hand-weeding most of the original borders has unearthed some gems, seedling broom bushes, 2 Rosa glauca bushes, an Acanthus, which one I don't know, and a load of other stuff. Next week I can start making some flower beds.

As the painter said when he surveyed a large hole I had dug in the kitchen floor where an old pillar had to be removed, insulated and cemented over, "You couldn't have done this twelve months ago." No I couldn't, but now it seems the more I do the more I can. Great isn't it?

Feels like summer

Yesterday we went to the Marie Curie Garden Fair at Kentisbeare house. What a fabulous day we had. The weather was perfect, cloudless skies, hot sun and a just a little light breeze. Over 50 stalls had set up selling mostly plants and garden related things but a lovely food tent as well. As usual the Wallaces' burgers were to die for. Die, I probably will too when I step on the scales later today having eaten 2 burgers with onion relish for lunch and then having pizza for tea, it being too hot and me being too tired to think of anything else to fill up a very hungry WH.

I bought loads of plants for the new garden and found a lovely little nursey not far from here which I will be visiting later in the week. The patio at the new house is so hot I intend to do lots of pots of salvias which I have hitherto had little success with in the present NE facing garden.

One I bought yesterday was Salvia patens which must be my most favourite colour ever and the colour of a perfect Mediterannean sky. I'm hoping that it will echo the skies to come here too.

Grounded

Got a date with a sugeon and his knife again in a couple of days so it's busy, busy, busy here as I strive to do in 2 days everything I want to do in the next 4-6 weeks, the length of time I must take it very easy. This time around I'm going to be good, or even more of a pain as far as Worst Half is concerned, no cooking, cleaning or lifting anything heavier than a mug of water, and no driving for at least 3 weeks. I set out to do this last time but things didn't always work out and I just did what I had to. Now I'm having the resulting damage repaired so I've decided that as I don't want to go through this a third time, I might as well be over cautious instead.

Meanwhile, my lovely cleaner Mrs T is having one of those 'special' birthdays so I must be up early tomorrow before her visit to arrange her present. Seeing as she did enough ironing to last half a lifetime last week and I have another mountain again already the gift had better be good. Actually I really can't live without her now and I do feel a bit sorry landing her with all this but I've been sorting out my holiday stuff in advance and also digging out a load of really old favourites which now suddenly fit again, after 6 or so years in the 'just in case box' so of course it all had to be washed and pressed. I am the living proof that saving stuff 'for when I lose weight' does actually sometimes pay off. Now over 2 stones lighter, I have just discovered a long forgotten interest in clothes shopping, trouble is, I don't want to buy too much as at the rate at which I am going none of this will fit again in 3 months time, it will all be too big. Then I really will chuck it out and save Mrs T any more grief.

Shopping however is off the agenda for the next few weeks, even when I can travel there's no dampner like a bored male to stop you looking at anything interesting, as I will have to have a chauffeur for a few weeks more. I'll be living vicariously through those members of the family who can get out and of course there's always the internet. After all, I do have a holiday in a months' time to plan for. Accordingly I have ordered a few little goodies to arrive next week to give me something to look at although I expect I'll be sending WH to the post office to return most of it, especially if he catches sight of the invoices.

Tomorrow I'll be potting up the rest of my herbaceous cuttings ready for the move to the new house. Someone donated about 50 ten inch plant pots so I'm busy filling them with stuff which will grow up over the next few months and then be transplanted in the autumn to create an instant 'mature' herbaceous border. It also means I get to take most of my collection of hardy geraniums which I would hate to lose. We did move a few bits from the new house down to WH's garden prior to us totally devastating the back garden and it's amazing what has come up. Today I spotted a mouse plant and a tiny cyclamen amongst a jasmine we have saved. It breaks my heart that the garden was so overgrown and such a mess that we had no real option but to cut it all back. During our visits this time last year we barely saw much more than weeds and grass and now all these little gems are appearing. In what remains of the garden itself I search every day for seedlings and signs of unusual things. Earlier we discovered at least 20 varieties of daffodils and narcissi, some very old varieties when I looked them up and a row 2 metres in length of what I think must be colchicums but of course we won't know until they flower in the autumn.

Meanwhile I'll be looking at flowers of a different nature later this week, on the TV, and making mental plans of the garden I'm going to make when I've recovered.

See ya!

Bird Fest

I don't usually see a Siskin in my garden until January, this year there are already several competing with the Blue Tits for the best bits of my feeders.

The mornings now are a regular squawking session. Today I counted Blue Tits, Coal Tits, Great Tits, Siskins, a Chaffinch, Goldfinches, Greenfinches, a Robin, Starlings, a Wren, a Blackbird and House Sparrows all jockeying for position. Only the Golfinches like the Niger seed however and then only one of the two feeders seeing as these are indentical I'm baffled as to what the difference is.

A big hit has been the string of feedstuffs I bought in the local dicsount supermarket consisting of alternate fat balls and peanut feeders along an 800mm length of plastic netting. I hung this from my red maple and it's cute to see a chain of diminutive Blue Tits all busily pecking away.

I'm hoping this mildish weather continues as I'ts a great sight to watch so many little visitors.

PS. For some spectacular photos of owls go and look at Graham Catley's site. As always superb pictures of some rare and some not so rare birds.

Work in Progress

After weeks and weeks of destruction, things are starting to take shape. We are actually building, hence my being away from the internet and having to get out and do stuff. OK, OK, it's only delivering breakfasts, keeping the tea stocked up and fetching sundry parts and supplies but it's all in a good cause.

The top pic is of the rear extension and the other one is the living room, now without the kitchen sticking out and with the fab new glass doors which will eventually open onto the dining area and to another set of glass doors leading to the wonderful south facing rear garden. Already I just LOVE it. Not least for the sun which streams on the back of the house even on a cold November morning.

The best news of all? My fig tree is surviving and has loads of figs developing for next year. Roll on Summer.

I don't want to go to Chelsea

That used to be one of my favourite songs, by Elvis Costello for those too young to remember.

This weekend however, I am going to Chelsea Flower Show and yes I really, really want to go. WH's business very very ocasionally has it's good side. This is one of them. One of his suppliers is sponsoring a show garden and we got tickets to go on not one but two whole days.

It's a bit of a marathon from here so we're staying up in town, not often I can write that I tell you, not least because the price of the hotel is only twice what the parking would cost! I'm planning a lovely weekend of gardening, bit of sightseeing and maybe some shopping too. Oh and WH gets to come along with his credit card too.

Just hope that daughter No 2, who is days away from giving birth, doesn't choose this weekend to get going. After I've been to the show she is allowed, but fingers crossed, not before, please.

Not much to say

...other than it has been an extremely busy week so far:

The Painter is in residence sorting out the bathroom
I have spent HOURS on the phone to solicitors, estate agents and the like.
Mr Hippy Chic has been to visit and to collect his post.
WH's No 1 Assistant is coming back from India and bringing his wife to visit too. Yay!
I dug up a huge bush in the back garden.
I'm sunburnt badly from the effects of gardening, so....
I am now sporting a big hat, cotton gloves and fetching zinc white sunblock.
The holiday confirmation arrived.
I have been packing for the move.

I am still feeling so much better. ......

In my garden this week

One of the biggest clumps making an impact is Euphorbia characias ssp wulfeni which looks stately and imposing when viewed from the patio. This particular bush wasn't planted by me in this place, I had an older bush probably 10 years ago which succumbed to the inevitable winter wet and was no more. Suddenly last year up came a seedling in an entirely different place and it grew to it's full 3 feet in less than 12 months. I see now that there is yet another seedling close by. One for the transplant list, to be taken to the new abode later in the summer.

My other bloom this week is the perennially lovely Granny Bonnet or Columbine, properly known as Aquilegia vulgaris, the European Columbine.

My strains mostly came from seed obtained from Joan Loraines's garden, Greencombe at Porlock a good few years ago. the really blue blues seem to having all disappeared due to their promiscuous nature. They most likely interbred with some of the others I had too, so now all I have left is a mish-mash of hybrids. They're early this year too and somehow better because they stand out more because of it.

Hopefully this will be the first of a weekly(ish) series through the summer, like last year. As the house we are moving too has it's own lovely garden they'll be some reports from there later on. I just wish I could show you the beautiful Wisteria sinesis which is already adorning the pergola.

What I've been doing this last week

A whole week's gone by and it has flown. I'm knackered. Anyway here's a brief resume of my activities:

1. Dug a whole huge patch of my back garden and removed oodles of Three Cornered Leek which had taken over. It was only AFTER I planted it I read a quote from Alan Titchmarsh which said it was a 'pernicious weed' and never to plant it in a small garden.

2. I have redone the stone border around 90% of my back garden. It's so unusual to be able to garden so early in the year, the weather was fabulous last week and the ground so dry it was almost a pleasure.

3. Spent 3 hours shopping at Cribbs Causeway on Sunday, bought a few gems and joy of joys Anne Harvey has reopened her shop so that was cause for more expense. ( Yes I know it's part of Alexon and NOT an exclusive designer shop but I like their stuff and it FITS)

4. Got sunburned, in April!

5. Emptied the whole of Mother's flat, disposed of the rubbish and cleaned it all out. That feels so good.

6. Saw middle step- daughter and bump last night, not long to go now. She was working, so we just called in briefly on our way past.

7. I have been playing Hayseed Dixie's fab new album. As usual I prefer the original material but they just bring a smile to my face and a bop to my step.

8. Reorganised my entire garage contents ahead of our imminent move; if we're keeping it, it's in a plastic storage box, colour coded and labelled in order of importance. Following this activity I had a trip to our local tip with a whole car load. Spring is for cleaning. Right?

Do you notice anything different reading all this??

I am feeling a lot better and I have the energy (and a little weight loss) to prove it. A trip to Dr Wonderful on Monday will hopefully confirm we are on the right track. It has only taken 15 years.