The Cottage Smallholder

About fifteen years ago I found a wayside stand selling large bags of daffodil bulbs for next to nothing. Each spring I had enjoyed the sea of daffodils that bloomed outside the scatter of cottages. I snapped up several bags to plant in the front of the cottage. These are the paler daffodils in the vase.

I used my grandmother’s trick for planting bulbs. To give a natural look to her planting schemes she gently threw the bulbs on to the ground and planted them where they fell.

A few years later I spotted more daffodil bulbs for sale on Duchess Drive. and I planted another load in the front garden – these are the yellow ones in the vase. The pale daffs flower a month earlier than the yellow ones so we have a good few weeks with our own sea of daffodils. Today I noticed that we have a new one which I suspect is a cross between the two, or perhaps this third one has always been there, I just haven’t spotted it before.

Until I decided not to buy flowers anymore in January 2007, I never would have dreamt of picking our daffs. They make such a wonderful display. But actually having picked a few bunches this year there are still hundreds left.

When I stepped into the kitchen with the large bunch of flowers this morning Danny’s comment was
“Why it’s all yellow!”
He gasped when he saw the tiny vase of dolls flowers. This arrangement wins hands down for colour and interest this month. The flowerless violas that I planted in November have finally perked up. There is the exquisite flower of the saxifrage (bought from the secret garden stall a couple of weeks ago). Forget me nots (Myosotis) that have opened by our front door. Primulas collected from the hummocks that sit in every border and have drifted onto the lawn. There is a cluster of teeny flowers from an evergreen viburnum. Pulmonaria with pink and blue flowers on the same plant. A snippet of wild rosemary from Italy which has suddenly burst into flower.

In the big vase we have daffodils, willow twigs, Elaeagnus, Bridal Veil (Spiraea Arguta) – just coming into bloom, bachelors buttons (Kerria japonica), and a nameless evergreen shrub that grows either side of the entrance to the pond garden that is covered with tiny lemon scented flowers in the spring.