Ravendale House

Today I decided to check on the leek seeds that I sowed on the 7th. The packet said if sown outside they would need 14 – 21 days, but I hoped on top of the central heating boiler they might be a bit quicker, and guess what? They were.

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Last Spring we took a trip to our local garden centre. A large sprawling place that sells everything you could possibly want for your garden and more, at prices that could make your eyes water if you thought about it too hard. They do however have the odd bargain, and that’s why we continue to go.

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In the past a large part of what is now our garden was used commercially to grow flowers and vegetables. In the early days we used to have artichokes (not globe) popping up everywhere and to this day we still have a lovely show of daffodils all along the far side which were left behind after the whole area was ploughed up and grassed ready for sale as a domestic garden.

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I’m no great reader, and as a child the only book I remember reading and enjoying was Enid Blyton’s the Castle of Adventure, a story which surrounds 4 children who have an adventure in a castle during the school holidays.

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Well here it is, the first Friday the 13th of 2009. Did you know the fear of Friday the 13th is called ‘paraskavedekatriaphobia’, well maybe you did, but I bet you didn’t know that my dad was born on Friday July 13th in 1917, he’s approaching his 92nd birthday so it hasn’t been bad luck for him so far.

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An ex-neighbour of ours once famously remarked, “You’re never more than 6 feet from a rat”.

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We awoke this morning to find the drive and several of the flower beds with puddles of standing water. Nothing like as bad as the floods of 2007, but at least then it had been raining! We don’t seem to have had that much rain so far this year and if it did rain last night I never heard it.

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Each summer me and my gardening chum Sylvia like to visit Winterton Open Gardens. An annual event held over a weekend in July, where the residents of the village open their gardens to the public in aid of local charities.

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How are you supposed to get anything done in these temperatures? It’s freezing, and that’s during the day, I shudder to think what it’s like in the middle of the night. Thank goodness for central heating!

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Among the plants we brought with us when we moved here, were several clematis. Unfortunately, most haven’t done well, in fact of the 10 or so varieties we brought only 3 have thrived and prospered.

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