Forget Amazon Japan. Who needs to sit at a screen when it's gloriously warm and sunny at breakfast time? Instead, I pulled on Simon's big gardening boots and spent two happy hours tidying up the garden,
enjoying the soft, low sun, the pale blue sky and the fiery colours of our Japanese maple.
I cut down all the sadly dying and decaying sunflowers, keeping a few heads for seeds for the hamster and to illustrate the Fibonacci sequence to Alice and Phoebe (I think the hamster was the more impressed). I even found a couple of flowers still hanging on and doing their best to impress.
I love the garden when everything is just going over, tipping into dark colours and skeletal forms, but still with a few splashes of brilliant colour from nasturtiums and dahlias. I took photos of the remains of the red cabbages, looking eerily like fossils or something you'd find on a beach.
I waved dried-out stems of hollyhocks covered with seed pods over parts of the garden like a magic wand, hoping that a few will germinate next spring. But as hollyhocks are notoriously fickle, I also collected plenty to try again with later.
And Phoebe and I performed our annual ritual of picking and opening the reamaining runner bean pods, and being amazed at their beautiful colours and markings.
There are days when I see nothing in the garden. And there are days, like today, when I see it all. Just as well, as much of it it will be gone for ever so soon.
I did the same in our garden yesterday, in tee shirt, with bees and butterflies humming and fluttering on the apricot-coloured flowers of one of the buddleias. It was spring-like, if not summer-like. But for us in Norfolk at least, batten down the hatches time over the weekend, with gales and heavy rain on Sunday, and showers tomorrow. Still, there is always something to do indoors, baking a walnut cake with coffee frosting, finishing off an afghan I hope to sell, carrying on knitting a chevron-patterned scarf, having another browse through sewing books..... snoozing..... snuggling with a good book under a comforter.... hard life, innit??
Posted by: maggie | October 30, 2009 at 13:31
What glorious colours. It sounds like a really pleasant way to spend a morning, and you are completely right that the flowers and plants that are slowly losing their umph have a new, different beauty. Beautiful colours of beans, I hope some of your hollyhocks will take hold and come up next spring. Your Japanese maple is a stunning colour. Hope you have a great day.
Posted by: Jennifer | October 30, 2009 at 13:52
I no longer have a garden, now living 23 stories up. So it's nice to see yours and read about the puttering around that makes gardening so much fun.
Thanks.
Posted by: Red | October 30, 2009 at 13:56
I start my belated allotment clearing tomorrow. Am hoping for a sunny windless day and good stuff on Radio 4 to keep me going.
Posted by: Janice | October 30, 2009 at 14:40
Posts like this make me miss gardening. Being like Red, I am now thoroughly in the city and do not have the nice gardening beds. My potted plants will have to do for now.
Posted by: Amy | October 30, 2009 at 17:39
What gifts you have
#1 - to see it with such grace
#2 - to show it with such style
Thank you!
Posted by: Marti | October 30, 2009 at 18:50
I found you again. I used to read your blog and I have three of your books. And then I lost you. I MISSED you so much. I think of you often. Especially when I see green and orange fabric, and when I see bulbs to plant. I'm glad I found you again.
Posted by: deb | October 30, 2009 at 20:35
Just to say - I love your blog, always read it and I rejoice to have autumn colouring on your blog just everything goes wild in the early summer garden around me.
Posted by: Elizabeth | October 31, 2009 at 02:26
Our fall faded long ago and is now covered with snow :(
Thanks for all your beautiful photos and posts, I want to visit the UK so bad now!
Posted by: Captain Momma | October 31, 2009 at 02:54
Hello,Jane, I am a long time follower, who forgot to mark the lovely baking book which was on your reading list recently. It had a white iced cake on the cover. I would really appreciate it if you could tell me the title/author. Thanks so much. Your posts always cheer me!
Posted by: Lindragon | November 01, 2009 at 17:35
I love gardening like this - inspired rather than planned! Your photos look like paintings, so beautiful. I can see the cabbages on a Kaffe fabric.
Posted by: catherine | November 01, 2009 at 23:43
Beautiful, all of it! I'm going to try that with my hollyhocks as they are my favorite flower. Your garden sounds like a lovely slice of heaven.
Posted by: Jessica | November 03, 2009 at 00:35
Gorgeous colours and shapes - I do love your photography...feeling inspired and might take a course myself... xxx
Posted by: catofcuriosity | November 03, 2009 at 10:49
What a wonderful day! I long for a green thumb - but just wasn't blessed to have one!! Your photography is so beautiful.
Posted by: Caroline Rose | November 03, 2009 at 11:09