Starting a new garden is always exciting; daunting too. And our particular garden, being a hundred years old, had traces of many a planting disaster venture. More recently, though, all had been overgrown, and invaded by rampant phygelius (Cape fuchsia), ground elder, vagrant raspberries, bindweed and Spanish bluebells. The two front garden beds (south-east facing) were covered with concrete slabs and Spanish bluebells.

Most of it had to go.

1: Because we’d had to rent between selling one house and buying another, I’d brought only a handful of plants from our Much Wenlock garden. Among them was yellow toadflax (Linaria vulgaris), a favourite flower since childhood when I’d first seen it lighting up the verges of the Shropshire Hills. I’d grown it from seed, bought on-line from Jekka’s Herbs. Now, by some pleasing accident, it seems to have grown up with some purple toadflax.

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When we moved into The Gables, just under a year ago, my most pressing concern was vegetable growing. I knew we would miss the produce from my allotment plots of 16 years (if not the heavy labour), so tackling the most weed-infested areas to make beds for food crops was my first priority. My thinking here was that these beds would be cleared every year, so repeat ground elder and bluebells wouldn’t be quite the same bother they would be in shrub or herbaceous borders.

I made a start last summer, but then the following months were mostly too wet and cold for gardening. And then in spring the house roof had to be taken off and rebuilt. And then the building work on the rear extension began, all of which saw parts of my territory invaded, first by a mountain of broken roof tiles and battens and then by piles of construction materials. There were times, too, when I couldn’t reach the projected vegetable plots in the back garden, it being uphill from the house, other than by climbing a ladder. All of which means that bed making efforts were piecemeal and, in the end, things (vegetables, herbaceous perennials, herbs, developing shrubs) were planted out wherever there was a space at the time.

2: But it’s all alright. Everything is growing all over the place. I have yellow courgettes at the front door, which is actually quite handy…

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3: The front garden bed is also yielding some very nice Charlotte potatoes (despite going in very late). The building debris and old mortar from the lifted slabs seem to have provided some good drainage in our heavy-ish soil:

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4: In the spring I’d sown some marigold (calendula) seeds, obtained from the Bishop’s Castle seed bank (local growers’ donations) and they’d germinated prolifically. So I planted them out all over the garden, front and back, because you can’t beat marigolds for their spirit-lifting qualities. And now we have masses of golden heads, which of course are edible too:

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5: And on the eating front, since spring we’ve done rather well with all manner of greens, but most particularly the Romanesco cauliflowers, which I haven’t grown before. They are much sweeter than white caulis, and if you cut them and leave the stalk, they sometimes produce more sprouts. They don’t need much cooking either.

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6: But best of all, are signs that the runner beans are thriving. I have three varieties growing together: Emergo (white flowers), Painted Lady (red and white as in featured photo), and St. George (red):

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I mean to say, what could be lovelier than this Painted Lady bean flower. And then to think: there will be beans!

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Six on Saturday  Jim at Garden Ruminations is the host. Please pay him and his splendid garden a visit.