Country style - hanging baskets. at my home in France.

I'm a bit later than usual preparing my hanging baskets this year, as the weather was more than just April showers ! We had so much rain & it was cold for the time of the year, I knew the flowers wouldn't profit with the temp. being so low. so hence the delay. Now the sun is shining and the temperature is looking good, so I've made a start and completed 5. Only another 12 more to do! Then there's the troughs & window box's, better get a move on. Last year I changed the theme & chose cane woven baskets, lined with plastic. They looked pretty & country style, but I wasn't happy with the results after a long hot summer, I've now gone back to the good old reliable ones which  I've had for years. Time will tell, I hope 'my man' who waters them, will be happy. he doesn't like change.

I never like the baskets when they're first planted, I always think they look straggly. I am a bit impatient and I do know the plants need time to grow before they can give a beautiful floral display.  So I'm keeping my fingers crossed for good results. The following photos are from a previous year. I'll show this years display in a few weeks when I'm happier with how they look.

I have a lot of work in front of me, so I'll catch up with you as they progress.

a bientot.

Barbara Lilian

Frogs / Froggies & Frogs legs.

We all know the French are known as Froggies & also well known for eating frogs legs.

This is just a tale of tadpoles to frogs, from our river.

For the past week or two the frogs down by the river opposite our house have been making their usual croaking sound which we always hear at this time of the year, meaning the river will now be amass with spawn and tadpoles. I'm sure most children who live near to a pond or stream have trotted off to try to catch tadpoles, in a net or a homemade device from a used water bottle, cut and taped to a branch of a fallen tree which is what my other half did for our grand children ( he can always make something out of nothing) we call him MacGyver ! But he's always there to lend a helping hand & loved and known as Pops. Shortly after this photo was taken the youngest bent down too far, need I paint the picture ! I'll always remember this day.

Two of my grandsons catching tadpoles in our stream.

Not sure if they will still want to do it this year, as now they are getting older.

My childhood memories are of going with my two brothers, carrying a jam jar which my mother had tied with a piece of string around the top to make a handle, we'd walk a mile to the local pond to find the frogs spawn; which we brought home to wait anxiously for eggs to turn into tadpoles and then finally frogs. I don't  ever remember seeing them develop into frogs, something usually happened, either it was next doors cat who attacked them or our own dog knocking the bowl over trying to chase the cat away. Lovely times.

AHOY there !!

Thought these pictures were amusing, taken at our swimming pool.

Sitting on top of the world.

I'll be back soon, hope you will to.

Barbara Lilian.

A posy 'du Muguet.'

One of the many traditions still celebrated in France, on the 1st. May is to give someone a sprig of Lilly of the Valley. This tradition was started in 1561 by King Charles 1X. he decided to offer all the ladies of the court a sprig of Muguet. 'Apporter du bonheur'  (to bring happiness ) to the person you give it to. What a lovely tradition.
My 1st sprig of Muguet was given to me by my old friend Leonard. Sadly his wife had died shortly before we arrived to live in the village. I only wish I could have met her we would have had a lot to share.  I was told she had always loved flowers and had planted them here & there around the village, any where she thought needed brightening up. The village was known by everyone as 'Le Village Fleuris' This was one of the reasons we were attracted to it. We had been searching for some time with an 'Immobilier' for a house to use as a holiday home, at that time not realising how soon it would become our home! On the last day before we were due to return to England he showed us a cottage style house with a barn bigger than the house and much more land than we could ever use. As soon as we entered the village I fell in love with it,  there were flowers everywhere. Which 22 yrs ago at that time was not the No.1 priority. Most of the land around the houses in the village were full of rows of vegetables & fruit trees. Later I did ask an old lady in my poor French, along with sign language why she didn't have any flowers and her reply was, 'if you can't eat it, why grow it'. Yes there was the odd pot of Geraniums at the front door, but rare to see the whole village planted with flowers.
I was in my element & over the time I introduced hanging baskets and a vast variety of flowers they had  never seen before, which I mixed together. I was told by one of the villagers 'that's not how you do it, each type of flower must have it's own pot'. However I plodded along doing my own thing, putting up the odd hanging basket, & filling any old enamel bucket or basket I'd found amongst all the debris which had been left in the barn. Outside was beginning to look quite colourful, even though we were all still sleeping in the one room, while the rest of the house was under renovation. 
One day at the beginning of July I looked out of the window & saw several people wandering around the area at the front of the house, at that time I could hardly call it a terrace; each with a clip board and pencil all taking particular interest in the hanging baskets, which were full of trailing plants, looking OK; but not to my usual standard, however it was the best I was able achieve with the choice I could find in the area. Thankfully I was able to understand more French than I could speak, so I gathered they were judging my floral efforts. I had no idea they were the local commune floral committee !  judging for a competition I had not entered. I was told, 'it didn't matter, they would enter my name for me.' How simple can things be, it could only happen in France. So that was the beginning of the yearly floral competition for me. Never realising how competitive the rest of the villagers would become. I'll continue that story some other time.

My first petite bouquet of 'Muguet' will always bring back happy memories of my time spent in 'Le Village Fleuris'

                                

I hope my posy 'apporte du bonheur'

 will bring happiness to all my readers.





Sowing seeds at the right time - in tune with the moon.

Having had so many failures of seed germination, this time I will do what my old French neighbour Leonard told me to at our 1st house in a tiny village in the 'heart of nowhere' as our English friends described it. Leonard would arrive with match boxes full of seeds, usually courgette, which I duly put into the ground when I managed to find time in between being the labourer, for my husband during our renovation period. He always gave me instructions of when & how to sow the seeds, at least I think that's what he was telling me; as my of understanding of the French language at that time was very limited. So for all I knew, he could have been saying 'put them in a pan of boiling water & cook for 20 mins'. Everyday I  would go to my little veg plot, which indecently grew to a whole field the following year, more about that another time. I waited anxiously for the little blighters to show some sign of growth, & when nothing appeared I'd sneak down the lane to  Leonard's potager to see how his were doing. Leonard's were always up well before mine & at that time I didn't realise how important it was to sow them at the specific time he had told me. Which was in tune with THE MOON. I just thought the precise instructions given were because I was English & he thought I didn't have a clue what to do & he was right. It's taken me a long time to realise that's the way the old folks have always sown their seeds. God Bless old Leonard, I say old with affection as he was a dear man, always laughing, up at the crack of dawn to tend to his potager before the day became too hot, unlike me who tended to my veg, plot if & when I found time. Another lesson I had to learn. When I came to France my gardening attempts were full of mishaps, only ever having grown tomatoes in a grow bag in England. I had a lot to learn.
I'm afraid to admit it but I still have the attitude of  ' it has 2 chances, it grows or it goes '
So this time my seeds will be sown in 'tune with the moon'. That's if the rain stops long enough for me to get out in my garden.

http://www.plantea.com/planting-moon-phases.htm
http://www.gardenersworld.com/how-to/projects/fruit-and-vegetables/how-to-grow-tomatoes-in-a-growing-bag/337.html

http://www.maison-deco.com/jardin/conseils-jardinage

Indoors wth a Home and Garden magazine.

It's really April showers weather in my corner of France. I'd hoped to do all sorts in the garden, but now at my age I only work outside when it's NOT raining. Gone are the days when I'd be a busy Bee doing things like there was no tomorrow. So I've spent some time indoors browsing through some of my old magazines. One in particular it's Danish, unfortunately I can only look at the pictures but the decorating ideas from other peoples homes are so lovely it's well worth it. I usualy bring it back with me when we go to visit our grandchildren. http://www.isabellas.dk/

Isabellas magazine