Nasturtiums and winter jasmine – surely not.

The garden is happy but perhaps confused. I wanted to bring in some flowers the other day and found this charming combination of nasturtiums and winter jasmine. I also found some late blooms on the centaurea and and yet the hydrangeas have their autumn seed heads.

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We still have cistus in bloom and below them autumn crocus are merrily flowering.DSCN6718DSCN6729

Then we have the winter iris stylosa – I usually start looking for a few flowers on this in mid-December and sometimes find blooms for the Christmas table and then throughout January and February. They are already blooming in three separate sites in the garden.

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And late blooms have appeared on the  summer-flowering non-clinging clematis Durandii.

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A few feet away a primrose is feeling the air, while between these two Rosa Papa Meilland is throwing up yet another bloom.

DSCN6726DSCN6688Raspberries are still fruiting – they are autumn raspberries, but they are usually long gone before November. DSCN6737 This is looking like autumn. DSCN6656DSCN6710…but what are the runner beans doing flowering at this time of year, and why can I hear the buzz of lawn mowers even as I write? And how come we had lunch in the garden in the UK on November 1st?

At least my general failure in the greenhouse has been redeemed by the late hot spell, and my magnificent sweet pepper is finally turning red. DSCN6751

greenhouse shame

This was going to be a boring post about TAX and ebooks, but I’ll save that until I have made a call to the US tax authorities.

In April I was putting up photos of my wonderful new greenhouse. Soon after this I started planting seeds like fury. I decided to try and use up all my old seeds (some very ancient indeed). After an anxious week or so a few little seedlings made an appearance in a couple of trays, but I didn’t really know when to take the lids of the propagators and one lot damped off. The others died on the very hot day we went into town forgetting to open the greenhouse ventilators. Absolutely nothing appeared in the other trays.

I tried again with fresher seed but had similar results. So my total greenhouse haul this year so far is four weeds, DSCN5900

the sweet pepper a friend gave me, DSCN5901

and behind that one of the two tomatoes I managed to grow, DSCN5899the other is in the vegetable patch. I did manage to grow a pot full of purple sprouting broccoli and that is in the veg bed along with some direct sown leeks, carrots etc, but still, it’s embarrassing.

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The good thing about gardens is that there is always another season and something else to admire. I rather like this last glimpse of the sun. DSCN6034 - Version 2The lilies are trying to make up for other failures,

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and the giant host is flowering madly.

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Thrilling post about tax coming in the next few days.