December In The Garden - A Time For Reflection

With the groundwork done, I am looking forward to next year and getting the garden into shape. We have decided to extend the vegetable garden, which has meant that no winter garlic planting. I do have a wooden planter standing empty and traditionally you plant garlic at the winter solstice, to harvest around the summer solstice, so I am not too late.

Wild winds at the beginning of last week have bought a number of fences down in the garden, the only problem is that none of them are ours, which might sound a strange thing to say but the problem is that I am not sure how bothered our neighbours are about replacing them. One house is rented and the other neighbour, well if you saw the state of the fences before the wind brought them down, you would have seen that aesthetics aren't a priority.

Normally I would be stressing over such things but looking at the state of the garden at the moment and the fact that you tend to stay huddled inside in the winter, makes me think, don't worry about it, I'm sure they will be replaced by the spring, (she says touching wood!) I'm amazed that many of the trees, especially the oaks and silver birches are still hanging onto their leaves, although the cold snap this week, has probably sent them tumbling to the ground.

The beautiful silver birch in the neighbours garden has now finished dropping it's leaves into our garden, so I plan to get out over the Christmas period and hoover up all the leaves in the garden. We have constructed a cylinder out of chicken wire and posts which holds the leaves and last years supply have rotted down into beautiful leaf mould, so this needs to be removed to make way for this years leaves. When I go for a walk along the cycle path through the leaves to the shops in Broadstone, I am so tempted to collect the leaves as leaf mould is such wonderful stuff.

I didn't get chance to plant my tulip bulbs in November but I remember a piece on Gardeners' World a few years ago, when a gardener did an experiment and planted his tulips in late winter and they came up at exactly the same time as the ones planted in November. Which gives me hope that I haven't missed my chance for beautiful flowers in the spring.

I'm not normally a fan of the winter, I hate being cold, and summer with it's heat and long light evenings is definitely my favourite season but I have decided to embrace winter this year and plan to visit the winter garden at the Harold Hillier arboretum in Romsey for the first time. This is believed to be the biggest winter garden in Europe, so I am rather excited and the light in winter can be absolutely beautiful, so perfect for photography. I am always happy when I have my camera up to my eye and never more happier when the lens is pointed at flora.

Today is the winter solstice. I have celebrated this day for many years with friends. For me it's a time to reflect on the year that's been and to give thanks for all the wonderful things which have happened to me in the year and to welcome the sun back to our hemisphere, which always fills me with happiness.

For us gardeners, tending your garden is a labour of love. I certainly have a long way to go before I get my garden anywhere near how I would like it but that's OK, I have big plans for next year, a bigger vegetable bed and planting up another flower garden with plants which will adorn the barn in which we are getting married in next year. I am going to spend the winter planning and getting out there, when the weather allows, tidying up the bits I missed in the autumn and photographing the plants which are brave enough to be out in the winter.

Wishing you all bright winter blessings and a happy and harmonious 2012

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