Back In the Wild

Written by Clare 

Friday, 17th May, 2013.

  

Believe it or not, we came back for more gardening.  Our thirst for adventure and exploration just cannot be quenched, and MAJ's garden is the home of both.  As a bonus, it's also (partly) home to the lovely MAJ who is always a pleasure to catch up with!

The garden is currently only accessible by a series of side-doors, each of which is guarded by a troll who poses three riddles.  At least half of that sentence is true.  There's a beautiful moment when you pass the final of (actually only) two doors and you step out into a beautiful mass of what is apparently sweet garlic (see left).  Thanks to MAJ for this piece of gardening knowledge.

As it happens, it does actually smell really strongly of delicious garlic - I just hadn't put two and two together because you don't expect such pretty flowers to smell like a vampire deterrant.  Anyway, this tiny patch is probably my favourite part of the garden so far, so it's a pleasure to pass through it on our entrace and exit.

Then there's a path down to the pond, along which there's a gorgeous plant with red leaves, which appears to be in a very loving relationship with a yellow plant from next door which swoons over the garden fence in order to cuddle it.  

Frankly, we're in love with them.

On our previous play-date with the wilderness, we had focussed on clearing the space around the pond, which also made the scrap heap and the back of the garden more accesible. We decided to spend the majority of the day clearing away the general clutter of the garden, revealing some organic routes which trail around some of the gorgeous features such as the clusters of bamboo or bluebells, both of which became more and more vivid as we cleared around them.  

Adding our first day of work to our second had really begun to reveal some gorgeous intricacies to the layout of the garden and a sense of optimism and excitement.  I was surprised to see so much difference so quickly, and I suspect Daniel and MAJ were too.

The process of clearing the garden had also begun to reveal a selection of items, including a piece of rotten wood impersonating the SS Enterprise, a stick which could double up as a pretty sweet wizard's staff and a mandrake/ent.

More importantly, we were beginning to gather materials which had potential for future use in the garden, including a selection of paving stones which we had reclaimed from various plants in the garden.  Naturally, this took negotiation skills and lots of charm. We began to organise a section of the garden to store these handy materials (also including plant-pots and bark) in the meantime.

I have now dubbed this area "the water feature."

 

There was such a visible difference at the end of the day.  We had cleared a vague path, tidied quite a few sections of the garden and MAJ had begun to formulate a vision of what the garden might look like in the future.  We can't help but believe that this garden will be the best garden on Earth.  In the meantime, while we continue to work towards this inevitable reality, you can enjoy these photos of lovely beasties I found...

 Until next time...