Flaming June is my favourite of all of the months, especially when it is flaming, my small urban garden is not only growing but some of the plants, after all of the rain we've had lately, seem to be growing like triffids!  I also remember that I fed them with Baby Bio the last time I watered them before the rainy period came so I'm guessing that has something to do with it.  Even though I only put 1 small fuschia and a trailing tomato plant in each hanging basket, they're both about to explode over the sides and that makes Mandy a happy gardener.

I was worried this week that the slugs and snails had eaten away my contained potatoes but when I emptied out the container I found enough new potatoes to feed Looby and me for a couple of dinners!  What actually happened though was that the potatoes were so good that Looby ate about 3 portions after coming in from the stables.  We had one amazing dinner and I swear, they were the best potatoes I've ever eaten.

I've already had my first harvest of rocket and my second batch is just about ready to greedily gobble up in a big salad.  Is it just me or is there anything more satisfying than growing things you can actually eat.  Don't worry though, I love my flowers way too much to completely replace them.

As time goes on in the garden, I realise just how bad the planting previously was, the collection of plants which would be better in mansions or gardens much bigger than mine.  There's even a compost plant which was helpfully planted and I hate the blooming thing, it has zero points to it and though I have tried to pull it out, it just keeps coming back.  Don't even get me started on the Japanese anemone, it's so monstrous it would be better off in the Little Shop of Horrors, suffice to say, it's living on borrowed time and will be the first plant I remove when it dies back in autumn.

Now I'm definitely not claiming to be some kind of gardening guru but I think it's really important in a small garden not to buy, borrow or receive gifts of enormous garden swallowing plants.  each inch is precious after all so it has to be planted correctly.

The bane of my life, aka, the self-emptying water feature finally went to the great water feature heaven in the sky today to be replaced by an 80 litre half barrel style nature pond, I used the pump from the old one, I bought a pot which was £50 and I thought was going to cost £40 because Dobbies had 20% off for their club card holders and when it went through the till for 50p, the assistant and I nearly fell over, it turns out that they're selling off tons of stuff after taking over the local garden centre from Wyevale so go me, with a pond that cost 50p!

Now, I have to admit that I know very little about water gardening so I went the easy way and bought a marginal planted basket which was already prepared, I'm going to add a water lily next and it's probably big enough for fish but I think we're going to try and attract frogs and toads to the garden so I need to find some big rocks so that they can get in and out of the pond and also bask in the sunshine, assuming that's what frogs do, I haven't a clue!

I also managed to get a Bay tree which should have been £60 for just £12, again, get yourself to Dobbies if they've just taken over Wyevale as there are definite bargains to be found.  I really only wanted it because I needed something to stand behind the pond which would cover up some dead space, I recycled the bottom tub from the old water feature, cut a hole in the bottom for drainage and then covered it with a few pieces of slate, put in some new compost and repotted the Bay pyramid, I think it's going to be very happy where it is and I've recreated what looks like a natural environment for a pond.  All in all, I'm delighted with the progress, I just wish it would stop raining long enough to enjoy it, one thing is for certain, this summer doesn't seem at all like it's going to be the scorcher that we had last summer although I'm hopeful, I'm always hopeful.

Spring in the small urban garden

Today marks the start of a new semi regular feature which is all about gardening and what's going on in my garden, I say semi-regular as I still get bored writing about the same things over and over but right now it's such a big part of my life having seen it's complete transformation over the last few months.

I've always loved gardening, when I met Paul, it was me who was the keen gardener, I'm one of those plant nerds although I can say right now I do not know all of them or their botanical names.  I think I just have one of those brains where I can't remember what I did yesterday but I can remember what a plant is called.

It's been a couple of months of hard work and I've done it all by myself, although Looby occasionally helps with planting or putting something together for me but it's probably the first project I've taken on since being single and where my vision has actually related to the end result.

My biggest irk currently is the paving and the fact that I actually have no idea what to do to it or pretty much, how to actually achieve that, and that's with all of the research time I've spent on Pinterest looking at ideas.

Lighting in the garden is really important to me and I've spent next to no money on any of it, I really did have countless sets of fairy lights of all different types (solar, mains, battery) in my garden and home previously.  There are still areas that need more twinkly bits I feel but I think I've gotten to a point where if it was all completely finished I would have nothing to plan when I'm pottering around of an afternoon.

The big stuff, the heavy stuff, that's all done apart from the aforementioned paving and a Juniper tree which started as a bonsai, then stood in front of an ugly area and is now completely out of place and blocking out all of the light to a red camellia which I think would flourish if it were removed but whilst I still have the searing burning hot pains in my neck I don't think removing a 5 year old tree which I'm mostly allergic too is a great idea.

My garden has been done on a really low budget, I've used Facebook groups, I've begged, borrowed and stolen things from my house to be repurposed in the garden.  The string moon chairs are expensive everywhere apart from TJ Hughes where I randomly found them selling them singularly for £24.99 each, I wanted hot pink, Looby chose grey but it is her garden too.  The cheap water feature is made of solid plastic, also from TJ Hughes, it's weird and I wouldn't recommend it, it empties itself at random moments and i've no idea where the water goes to but until I can save a couple of hundred for the water feature I actually want, it's just nice to have the sound of running water as I sit in the arbour.

Rachel suggested at lunch yesterday that I get another arbour, not one to sit in but one half way up the path to grow fragrant climbers like Jasmin and honeysuckle and I have to agree, it's something I want to add in the future and then perhaps I could hang some pretty lanterns from it to shine in the nights.

As you can see from the last image, I still have plenty of room for new plants, although that is the shady side of the garden so it's getting plants to suit the conditions, we used to have a Gunnera in there near the Rhubarb (they're from the same family) until Petunia the husky came and thought it was tasty and so told Holly Bobbins she should eat it too, that was the end of Gertrude!

I really want a hardy palm too but so far I've only seen cheap ones in pairs and I definitely do not have room for 2 palm trees in my garden!

May in the garden marks the transition from spring to summer with the bedding plants finally able to go outside when the risk of frost has passed, I cannot wait to get some big blousy colours going on and I plan to spend every moment I'm not working pottering around and enjoying my garden.