My Garden in April 2025 - Flowers for Stephanie

I can't believe these photos are taken 20 years apart. Not much has changed, even the door mat is the same. The front door and the blinds have been replaced, the carpet in the hall has been replaced with wooden bamboo, the shrubs have been weeded out and the woodwork has been painted. In those 20 years, several other families have lived in our house as we rented it out while we lived abroad from 2010-2021 and Stephanie is no longer with us.

Peter and I bought the Jasminum x stephanense earlier in April and planted it by the front door in a pot. It is highly fragranced and we wanted it somewhere where we would see it every day.

We've involved our grandchildren with planting flowers in memory of Stephanie as they are too young to have remembered her and sadly our 3 year old grandson never got to meet her, she also has two new nephews born this year.

Our granddaughter planted these Angel Wings tulip bulbs after the funeral in October, given to us by a friend. As she watered them she said 'stay hydrated Stephanie'

They flowered in time for Mothers day.

Our grandson planted a rose bush 'In loving memory' that my mum bought for us to mark the 6th month anniversary.

We also planted some marigolds for great grandad (my father) his favourite flower.

In the rest of the garden, I finally planted the raised beds with a variety of vegetable seeds I had. I'm not hopeful for a lot of them, but I do have a good crop of radishes, beetroot, tomatoes, and one or two carrots, cucumbers, chilli and an abundance of parsley, coriander and Thai basil. 

The garden, although north facing, gets a lot of sun and isn't over looked. The old green house is ready for  the tomatoes and the compost is doing well in the new containers Peter built. We've bought a new post to re site the clothes airer so it doesn't block the view of the garden when sitting outside.

The back of our garden is quite stark with a wooden fence and the bare brick wall of the neighbours house but with do have clear open skies. I wanted to break up the brick work and the fence so I've bought a few fruit trees that are planted in pots to add a bit of colour and depth to the garden.

Apple

Cherry

Pear

They sit amongst the bamboo, magnolia, willow, bay and olive trees and shrubs, also in pots. There are a couple of exotic fruit trees, lemon and orange that are growing very well.

As well as the grandchildren helping out, Olive has been digging.

The front garden has been weeded and wild flower seeds sown.

BBQs are being enjoyed.

And the bluebells are out. Once they've finished flowering, this area needs digging out and the soil will be moved to the front garden to level it up and hopefully with some more soil the trees will grow and we'll have a hedge to stop the local dog walkers and kids from the local school running over our front lawn.

How is your garden coming along? Any plans? Or are you at the stage where you can just sit and enjoy it?