What did you do in your garden today?

[Sean Regan]

Too wet again. There's a lot of leaves that need collecting, have to find time tomorrow if it doesn't rain.

 

[Sheal]

A couple of hours raking leaves but I didn't get to finish as neighbours stopped by for a chat.

 

[Sean Regan]

Quite a lot today as it was quite dry and reasonably warm with some sun.

The wisteria leaves have "turned."

So as I always do at this time of the year, I've pruned thm off. They'll get a proper prune between Christmas and New Year.

The little acer is still hanging on.

There's still the ones on the pergola on the side of the garage and the two on the pergola on the back of the house to be done, but that will have to wait until next week as the green bin is full.


Last of the colour in the garden.

A couple of fuchsias hiding behind the rhodos

I've since got the blower out and moved all the fallen leaves to the back of the border to rot down. As it slopes towards the front, any released nutrients will work their way down to the plants at the front.

I find my Flymo with its big "pick up fan" is ideal for removing fallen leaves off the lawn. There's a lot more to come from next door's trees.

 

[Sean Regan]

This is what I hope to tackle this afternoon if it stays dry, now I've stripped the dying leaves and can see "what's what."
Far too many long side shoots to be supported by several thin stems.
I'll prune a lot of them back and try to get a more balanced distribution of branches. As they are all thin and whippy, it won't be difficult.

The leaves on the pergola on the back of the house can wait until next week.

 

[Sean Regan]

All done.

It doesn't look much different, but I've taken yards of unwanted side shoots off.

I've also sorted out some of the main stems where they were crossing and re-tied them to the pergola.

I also gave the ends of the cross beams a coat of clear Cuprinol. I may give them another coat of paint a bit later in the month.

The weather's been like this all day. Clear blue skies and quite warm.

 

[DirtMechanic]

Literally got hit in the head by a big acorn at terminal velocity. Glad I had a bill cap on my head. It hit my shoulder and I thought to myself that as small as that was and as unpleasant as that was how very little extra would be needed to hurt a person. Of course they call it FALL for a reason.

Also I decided to buy the equipment that drags behind my mower for the lawn. We have to reset every year after the heatwave devastates the shad grasses at a minimum.

 

[Sean Regan]

Far too wet again, just watched the leaves piling up.

My gardening services have been offered to my wife's best friend. She is only partially sighted and her husband is disabled. They have a wisteria down the side of the party fence and their neighbour keeps hacking bits off it. So on Thursday I'm going over to their house to tackle it. From what I've heard it's a bit out of control. so may need some drastic pruning and untying. Fortunately at this time of the year a lot of the younger growth can be "manipulated" in fact you can double some bits over and they still won't break. I'll make sure that it's all on her side of the fence.

Ours on the side fence is under complete control (as much as it can be), as it is only attached to horizontal wires which run at intervals between eyes screwed to the concrete posts. Theoretically, the fence panels can be changed without disturbing it. Can't say the same for what our neighbour has got growing up their side of the fence. It's an ivy of sorts and it's "eating" the panels.

 

[Sean Regan]

Nothing today as it's chucking it down. But I got a lot done yesterday.

Pruned off the foliage of the last wisterias. There's actually three. The main one which grows up the right-hand post, a branch from the one on the garage pergola that travels around 25ft from the one on the garage pergola (you can see the branch over the door in the fence in the second photo) and a younger pink one that is in the small bed next to the kitchen window.
These "hang on" the longest as they get full sun and are sheltered being on the back of the house. They also benefit from the hot gas from the combi in the corner of the kitchen. The vent is immediately under the pergola.

So we went from this.

To this.

This isn't the final prune, they'll get another between Christmas and the New Year. I did thin out the one on the right, above the top of the post, to stop it "bunching" there and put more energy into itself further along the pergola.

I was able to inspect the main beams and cross beams of the pergola for any rot once I'd removed the leaves and found none. But it'll get a coat of paint if we ever have a dry couple of days in the next few weeks.



My Chinese pot movers from e-Bay have arrived. Not over-keen on the colour, but it was all that were available. The alternatives were wire ones. I've a couple of these but they tend to bend with the weight of a 16" ceramic pot and its contents.


So I'll use the green ones on the new flagged area and these on the main patio, for the new David Austin roses. They are quite wide and have larger better four castors, rather than those on the green one which are smaller and have only three. I need to drill a small hole through the middle of each so any water that passes through the pots can drain away. At £4.62 each with free postage, they represent great value for money.

 

[Sean Regan]

Someone on another board suggestted I painted these new pot movers to match the others. I wasn't going to bother, but for the amount of effort it took it seemed like a good idea. I bought a can of green paint from the village hardware/DIY shop and sprayed them this morning. There was just enough paint to do all six, though I didn't bother with the centres as these will be covered by the pots. It's not a bad green as it was the only choice. I'll let them dry in the garage overnight and put them on the patio tomorrow.

Four of them are on the bench in my garage.

Earlier this year my wife talked me into buying a new sideboard, I didn't resist as I immediately had in mind a use for the old one.

 

[DirtMechanic]

They look good. I like your stylish bench. Here in the States Chinaware cabinets are worthless as the new generations seem to value wax paper for meals. There is a lot of nice furniture that can be repurposed.

 

[Sean Regan]

They look good. I like your stylish bench. Here in the States Chinaware cabinets are worthless as the new generations seem to value wax paper for meals. There is a lot of nice furniture that can be repurposed.

This is so true.

Here in the UK, new builds are quite small and you can't get in a lot of furniture.

We'd had that sideboard for a number of years. We'd bought this coffee table from Dwell, three or four years ago. The two tops slide away from each other to reveal some storage space.

As we liked their stuff we bought the new sideboard from them.

This is from their catalogue. But I see it's gone up by £100 since we bought it.

We bought this leather sofa at the same time, photo from their on-line catalogue

On the day they were going to deliver it, I checked on line and it had been reduced by £400. So I rang them and they gave me a refund for the difference without any quibble.

The sofa replaced an M&S we'd had for fifteen years, which had "hardly been sat on" as we have two Ekornes Stressless recliners in that room.

There was nothing wrong with it, but it was too heavy for my wife to drag out and vacuum behind it, but I didn't fancy dragging it through the house. So I took it out through the French windows. As it wouldn't go through the door in the fence between the garage and the house,It was a new fence since we bought the sofa, I couldn't even give it to charity, so I chopped it up and took it down the tip. The new one has chrome bars as feet so it's easy to slide out.

This unit we have in the front room we've had since the mid-seventies. It's been in and out of fashion ever since, (I think it's in at the moment). It's real teak veneer, made in Denmark and came in four pieces. It'd cost a fortune if you wanted one like it today.

This cupboard was intended for a TV set, but I keep my audio stuff in it.

My wife keeps a lot of her card stuff in what's supposed to be a cocktail cabinet.

Every drawer and cupboard is full of stuff, (most of it mine).

 

[Sean Regan]

Nothing in our garden today, but I went round to my wife's best friend's to sort out her wisteria. Couldn't get round there until mid afternoon as there was shopping and stuff to do first.

If left to it's own devices, wisteria is just like a weed. There was a main plant and two others that had layered themselves part way along her side fence. So it needed some drastic pruning. She was concerned as the guy next door attacked the top along her six foot fence with a chain saw. I can understand his frustration a bit, but that was a bit drastic. I found lots of places where it had forced it's way through fence panels half way up. Many of these were an inch thick, so he might have quite a bit of growth his side, which will now of course die off as I've cut them right back to the root. I've reduced it to a few main branches from the three main trunks running the length of the fence that I'll finish off tying to the fence just below the top. It'll need some eyes screwing in the concrete fence posts and some strong wire streched between them and some ties to connect it to give it stability. She has several big rhodos in that border which were getting strangled by the wisteria. No point in having any wisteria growth below about 5ft as it won't be seen over the planting in front.

But that'll have to wait for another day as it got dark.

Yesterday, I bought some fairy lights for the eaves of the teahouse. We've some very old multi-strand ones on there which are very dim by comparison of which one strand doesn't work. They come on with one of the four switches in the lounge are used that control all the lights and the fountain in the garden, so aren't often used. The new set is mult-coloured and there's 100 of them. Five quid in Wilcos. I've put them on a timer as are the red berry ones on the pergola next to the garage. o we look a bit more seasonal, though the red berry ones are on every evening.

As one or two houses in our road heve got their Christmas lights, I dug ours out and put them up.

We only have them round the front door. That's the extent of our Christmas decorations, we never bother with a tree, but there will be a lot of Christmas cards to be put up later.

This is the "tradional" way of having lights around the front door as all the houses in our road, have the same shaped front door. I'm not sure but I think I started it, a few other neighbours copied our style of front door.

It's hard to get a balance with one string of lights and a lot of plastic suckers.

Many houses have a narrow porch with a second front door. But we got rid of the inner door to extend the hall slightly.

They look better without the table lamp on. The mat under the plant is for visitors shoes.

 

[DirtMechanic]

It is always interesting to hear your tips on wisteria @Sean Regan as it grows so well here.

I recently put up some lights outside. I will suggest a smart plug to power them, as it allows me to have 3 separately named circuits or 1 combined name (gazebo) for control by smart phone or the speakers inside the house.

We have yet to put up Christmas lights but since you brought it up this coming week is as good as any. Ours are on these metal forms which hang from eves. I wish they were LED, as I know many will be out.

Did a French Architect design your door? I rarely see the round shape.

 

[Sean Regan]

It is always interesting to hear your tips on wisteria @Sean Regan as it grows so well here.

I recently put up some lights outside. I will suggest a smart plug to power them, as it allows me to have 3 separately named circuits or 1 combined name (gazebo) for control by smart phone or the speakers inside the house.

We have yet to put up Christmas lights but since you brought it up this coming week is as good as any. Ours are on these metal forms which hang from eves. I wish they were LED, as I know many will be out.

Did a French Architect design your door? I rarely see the round shape.

Thanks for the kind words.

All the houses were built in the sixties by a local builder, to the one design. They were extremely well built and expensive at the time.
They all had the arch at the front with a wooden door frame, a door with a curved top and two side windows. This door opened outwards to reveal a narrow tiled porch but it had exposed brick sides, (we called it the "air lock") and there was a second door in a square frame opening inwards with side windows in reeded glass. Over the years some owners had the outer door and frame removed, probably because the wood started to rot and had the inner door and frame changed to double glazed. Some had both done. We bought the house in tthe early seventies. About 20 years ago we decided to get rid of both sets of wooden doors and just have an inward opening door in the arch and have the walls plastered. There's no evidence now thst there ever was a porch.

 

[Sean Regan]

We've been struggling for a week with a very slow drain below the kitchen window. The sink, dishwasher and washing machine, plus rain from the back of the house and the baisin in the garage all empty into this. So it was overflowing every now and again. I suspected some wisteria leaves and moss of the roof had got down there. No amounts of buckets of water chucked down it and neither a whole carton of drain cleaner improved the flow. There was no plunger available for that size of drain. It's a pot one with a diameter of six inches. Most key terrain pipe work is now 4". So I decided to make a plunger out of some plywood and some duct tape wrapped round it to improve the seal. I was pretty sure there was no earth or anything that could get further compacted in the pipe, so I gave it a go today. As it had a very good seal, filling up the drain and ramming this down forcing about a gallon of water down the pipe every time, cleared it after a few goes.

It would have cost about £100 to get someone in to do it, so I was quite pleased with myself.

Our five quid lights from Wilko look quite good.