"The leaves fall patiently, Nothing remembers or grieves .................

The river takes to the sea The yellow drift of leaves." -   Sara Teasdale

I'm way behind in sorting out photos and social media stuff but I wanted to completely taking my two days off last week and not think about fallen trees, damaged plants, greenhouses and farm sales!

early morning October sun 

October colours

My favourite kinda morning, sun and blue sky, chilly but not frosty, no wind -

autumnal mornings at their best.

Throwback Thursday - October 2015 - still getting to grips and over the shock of being a nursery owner (look how awful the potting / wee shop area looks ) and today - 6 years later - I have learnt SO much about running a business, running a nursery, I'm always learning about plants and gardens, even after 35 years in the biz and I've met so many fabulous people along the way. But most of all I've learnt so much about my self, I've grown as a person and in confidence (not just the waist line ) and the knocks and negatives just make me stronger and more inventive

I spent Wednesday working through my shattered greenhouse shovelling up 6 crated of shattered glass which was everywhere, in every plant and pot. Crating up most of the plants, which will need tidied up and repotted. Once emptied of the glass and the bulk of the plants moved out it was much easier to see the damage.

It was quite an emotional day as there are my personal plant collections, collected over many many years and my greenhouse I have had for nearly 30 years, taking from house to house with me as I moved. Its very sad to see it in such a state.

Ginger and Spice Autumn Biscuits

Pre heat oven to 200C / 18oC fan / gas 6

300g plain flour                                                                        100g diced butter

1 tbsp mixed spice                                                                     2 tsp ground ginger

100g light brown sugar                                                            1 egg

25g chopped crystalised ginger                                              100g honey

~ put all the ingredients into a food processor and combine until you have a reasonably stiff dough.

~ Roll out until the thickness of a pound coin, use your cutters to make the biscuits and line up on baking paper on a baking tray.

~ Bake in the oven for 10 minutes or until golden. Remove from oven and dust with icing sugar.

Love my purchase from Junkshopantiques today. Thanks to Bracken for modelling this chunky Hungarian chopping block. Going to use it as a plant stand Viki has lots of amazing new stock in, including great enamel and galvanised pots which would make great planters

Bracken at his best

So now we have to deal with this. After having no water 2 weeks ago at home, brown trickling water last week, now we have a bit more of a trickle but with added E-coli Another tenant up the road had the water tested by the council after it stopped running and its come back with a boil or bottled water warning as it contains E-coli and other unsavoury things Further testing is to be done on it.....................

Another one of our meadow areas got its autumn haircut today. Thanks to David for strimming the orchard, then after i'd raked it lifting all the strimmings away. I then took the lawn mower over it twice, so we certainly worked off our Saturday night take away this morning Now we can really see the trees and shrubs again. The crab apple is laiden with fruit, so I'll get that picked soon, apparently crab apple jelly has been mentioned.......... better get the jelly bag out in the Quirky Bird Gardener kitchen

Early autumn morning sunshine, still lots of colour in the nursery and gardens I can't even name a favourite, they are all fabulous in their own way

Achillea 'Walter Funcke'

Borage

Helenium 'Chelsey'

Helianthus 'Lemon Queen' 

Helianthus 'Lemon Queen' and Eupatorium

Inula magnifica 

Miscanthus sinensis 'Kleine Fontäne'

Sanguisorba 'Pink Brushes'

Sedum (Hylotelephium) 'Herbsfreude'

Solidago rugosa 'Fireworks'

Monday and a day at home, trying to get the untidy hoose back under control, making apple jelly, peeling pounds of apples and a walk with David and Bracken through the woods. Discovered quite by accident another cool feature on my phone camera.

Arrived at the nursery on Tuesday on my day off to pick up a delivery to find this! Someone has reversed into our fence, smashed it and then driven away and not told any one!!!! Broken 3 fence posts and lifted one out the ground despite being concreted in. Delivery to Linlithgow done then dinner with Betty and Daniel.

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