For years we've been planning on making our garden prettier and it's looking like this year may just be the one where we actually do it! I love sitting and dining outside, but right now there's nowhere really to sit, everything looks dirty, in dire need of a repaint and a lot of TLC.
This weekend we started with a project of Alfie's that he's been desperate to do for ages, putting in a little pond. As we have a tiny courtyard, it's a bit of a blank canvas, but also lacking in space. We opted for a space saving pond in a half whisky barrel. We already randomly had a water feature from the previous owners that we couldn't use, but does have a decent pump and filter we can use in the new pond. So for starters, we picked up the half barrel on a whim at the new BM store that opened in Lincoln, tested it for any leaks and made space in one corner for it to live.
Right now, the pond is filled, filtering and all ready for some plants to get the water ready for a couple of goldfish. Alf is over the moon and I'm so happy he has this project to work on with us. We worked on cleaning up the garden this weekend and even found some giant spiders, plenty of snails which have been re homed elsewhere, two juicy caterpillars and a few visiting bees.
The beds around the pond and garden just need filling with shrubs, so over the next couple of months we'll be building our new garden, adding new patio furniture and making it somewhere clean and attractive to sit while we enjoy our BBQs and long evenings. We've already made a start on the small space at the front of our terraced house too, it's not really a garden, but is a walled area and there's no reason this can't be planted up and looking good too. So far, we have a larger and two baby Acer trees as well as a cherry tree that's just had a little bit of blossom on - this made me smile, a lot. I also rescued a tiny rose plant from a skip that has just spread like mad in our back garden and is now budding, so hopefully we'll have a little colour out there next to our other rescued plant - a buddleia that decide to start growing out our brickwork, but now stands about 4 foot high in our flower bed! We also have lots of stunning clematis going down our fence and spreading over our shed roof, so we are finally getting a colourful garden, one that the bees are already visiting!
Having Alfie so enthusiastic about the garden and pond too really gives us the motivation we need to get it going, so watch this space for more updates on our pond and garden for summer.
How are you getting your garden ready for summer?
