Sunrises and Sunsets, Stars and Sunshine

Where are the weeks going? I'm loving the autumn colours, so many rich reds this year and fabulous weather for October too, what's not to love? As well as the autumn leaf colour there are still many flowers around in the gardens and sales area for buying. The Asters are bursting into life like many coloured stars threaded through the borders, the Persicarias are still going strong, having already been in flower for two months and annual Cosmos still has many more buds to come.

Still lots of fresh cut flowers from the
gardens for the cafe flowers

After I've done the cafe flowers on a Wednesday I treat myself to a lovely
mocha, well Wednesday is my Monday, and everyone needs a wee helping
hand on a Monday

All the vibrant colours have inspired me to get creative with my camera again,
These are all leaves from the nursery

Such a range of colours

I also did some flowers too, so much colour for October

Aren't these pretty

I love Nigella, it's my favourite annual and will be featuring a lot in our wedding net year,
coincidentally it's common name is Love in a Mist

Beautiful blues

Asters big and small

Apart from being arty I've been working on winter proofing the nursery. I've started taking in our lovely vintage trays on the track and consolidating the sales displays into the sales area only. This is easy as there is getting less looking good perennials. At this time of year autumn coloured trees and shrubs, evergreens and fruit trees are the stars of the show.

Crab apples in the sales area

We had another lovely sunny week and weekend which has meant I've got on with lots of tasks outside. I've divided and re-potted all the Veronicastrums now they've finished flowering, re-done some of the sales tables with new plants and winter and spring bedding. I've also got some of the borders weeded, enjoying the autumn flowers and watching the bees enjoying them too. I've got some potting done before the cold weather really sets in. The tunnel is now stuffed full with a lot of this years propagation and there is no more room. Propagation has gone really well this year with seed sowing, cuttings and division, meaning lots of new and interesting plants for customers next year. Fortunately David is building a wee tunnel behind the office as a work shop and I've negotiated part of it for winter to store some plants in. The workshop tunnel in true Quercus style was built from left over tunnel pieces, wood and a tunnel cover the farm didn't need, recycling again.

A very full poly tunnel

On Saturday evening we were along at Whitmuir at the evening dining event marking the re-opening of the cafe under the farm after the Edinburgh Larder's year at Whitmuir. The food, atmosphere and company were fabulous, we shared a table with Linda and Andrew and had a good blether and a few wines!

Misty trees on the way to the nursery on Sunday morning

The fern sink

The ferny old china sink has filled out nicely over the summer, in it you will find:

Drypoteri erythrosora 'Brilliance'

Dryopteris clintoniana

Drypteris felix mas

Asplenium scolopendrium 'Angustatum'

Asplenium trichomanes

Woodwardia unigemmata

This painted lay was enjoying the sun like me

Monday sunrise

My feature tree in sunrise mode

On my Monday off I had a lovely long lie and then got the front garden tidied, hopefully the last time this year. Lots of weeding, a bit of cutting back, some flowers for the gin bottle vases in the kitchen and then some of the most tender patio plants in to the greenhouse in case of an early frost. I also took quite a few photos of flowers in the front garden but they are on the October bloggers in bloom blog.

Aeoniums tucked away in the big greenhouse

Seedheads of Eucomus autumnalis which has done well again this year

After the gardening I did some baking, made bread and cleaned the house, all domestic goddess like.

Another lovely sunrise on Tuesday

On TUesday afternoon we were off to Lanark to do several things; errands and bank, get chicken food, take both cats to the vet and me to get my eyes tested! Both cats were in for a general check up, their jabs and to get their cat looked at (yup not just me). Milly's eye has turned red-orange but is fortunately not anything worrying, just a change in the pigmentation. Poppy's eye has been problematic for a few years and the vet now thinks it is time to have it removed in case it begins to cause other problems for her or gets caught. She has no sight in it any more and has adapted very well to having only one working eye. And my eyes? Well as I thought my right eye is perfect but lazy lefty needs reading glasses! I have decided to start a new trend for the monacle. It worked for Mae West

Mae West @google

It was a rush home to get changed and organised to get down the motorway to near Carlisle where I was helping David and a fellow ecologist mist net bats. I took my camera equipment in the hope it would be a clear night and I could experiment with night sky photography. The site was near an old lime kiln with great views over the Eden valley and Solway from the hill above. It wasn't even that cold an evening and the dark skies meant the milky way and millions of stars were perfectly cleat.