Friday, April 27, 2007

Impressions of Bliss


April at Bliss is a wonderful time, especially when spring turns into summer so very early and we have the warmest April since goodness knows when. The birds are singing, the bumblebees are humming, the Russian Blues Sam and Pippa are frolicking amongst the daisies, and the April sun is smiling down on everyone.


The south borders are looking lovely at the moment, so much is in flower; columbines, geraniums, tulips, daffodils, ajuga reptans, chives, clematis, aubrieta, lily of the valley, lavender, saxifraga, forget-me-nots, rosemary, alliums and centranthus ruber.
A close up of a part of the south border.

Apart from Rosa Moonlight, Madame Alfred Carriere and Sombreuil, rosa Blanc Double de Coubert has also decided to join the club of June roses flowering in April. The scent of this rose is heavenly and its flowers are whiter than white.

In the ornamental vegetable garden there's an early harvest of salads and radishes. Delicious!

The bed with broad beans (in flower already) demonstrates clearly that a kitchen garden can be pretty as well as functional. On the four corners of the bed I've planted box for all year round interest and centranthus ruber is brightening up this bed by flowering its heart out and it's also luring pollinators into the vegetable garden.

This is another bed planted with box and bay leaf on the 4 corners (2 of each), forget-me-nots and chard. In the middle is a standard gooseberry that doesn't take up too much valuable space. Lots of veggies or herbs can be planted underneath.
In the Victorian greenhouse the tomato plants are growing away like there's no tomorrow. In 2 weeks time, they have tripled in size.

And look who we've got here, it's our cheeky friend robin redbreast.
The lovely lilac pansies are still going strong and bring lots of joy with their happy, smiling faces.
Last year I planted two grapes, 1 white and 1 blue and this year it looks like we are going to have a lovely harvest of grapes in autumn for the first time, if all goes well. Something nice to look forward too.
In the front garden, the Irises are in flower. This is a very pretty one isn't it? I've named it Abra, because even though I called another, this one came.

Madame Alfred has decided to take over the whole pergola and smother it with her lovely scented flowers. It's wonderful to come home and walk underneath the pergola and be enveloped in a cloud of rose scent. Truly blissful.
I'll leave you with our darling Dolly Daisy, who is expressing extremely well what we at Bliss feel at the moment; rolling in clover and daisies.

Have a wonderful weekend!

We come from the earth, we return to the earth, and in between we garden. Unknown

26 comments:

Kylee Baumle said...

They just spoke on our local news of the unseasonable warm weather you've been having in Europe. They showed children frolicking in the water fountains in Paris. This weather certainly suits you there in the Netherlands! Beautiful gardens!

A wildlife gardener said...

Fabulous! Dreamy pussycats, beautiful flowers, paths to wander along, daisies on the lawn...bliss!

Lilibet said...

I showed your blog to my husband and he now longs to move back to England and have a proper garden. What a wonderful garden climate you have in the Netherlands.

The BBC is reporting that this past April was the warmest in 300 years.

I love your blog. Reading it has resulted in me pottering in my own garden much, much more than I ever have before. I need fashionable footwear, though, and will keep my eyes out for something pretty!

Anonymous said...

Another lovely and blissful walk through your garden! Everything looks so lush! Lovely photos.

Anonymous said...

Prachtige plaatjes met zo'n sprookjesachtige sfeer en óók nog een moedig roodborstje die zich in het poezenparadijs waagt...je zou bijna gaan denken dat je even met je toverstafje hebt gezwaaid- maar het is natuurlijk allemaal "noeste arbeid" ;-)

Het is wèl een mooie Iris, welke had je besteld??

Garden Cats + Crafts said...

Liebe Yolanda, wunderschön Deine Fotos vom Garten, noch schöner: Dein Garten selbst. Ich finde es zauberhaft, Deine gesamte Katzenbande jetzt immer rechts zu sehen. Alles zauberhafte und schöne Tiere. Ich wünsche Dir ein wunderschönes Wochenende und hoffe, dass es bei Euch nicht so heiß ist, wie hier. Ganz liebe Grüße, Birgit

OldRoses said...

I wish I had your artistic eye in the garden. And I love how your kitties are enjoying themselves.

Carol Michel said...

It all looks wonderful. You are having the opposite spring from us. I think we had one of the coldest Aprils in a long time. I hope you don't end up with a too hot summer! By the way, I am seriously coveting that trug with the vegetables in it!

Robin's Nesting Place said...

This is indeed bliss!

Loretta said...

I love your beautiful cats and how they are enjoying the weather and the lawn daisies (I planted some last eyar in my lawn and I'm waiting for them to take over) and the beautiful iris- the Netherlands must be such a fresh climate to garden in!

Happy spring!

Christa said...

Your garden looks so beautiful. And I like your cats, too!

How exciting to see grapes forming on your grape vine. I am trying to grow grapes for the first time this year. The vine is just starting to get its first little leaves now. We've got a long way to go.

I like the quote at the end of your post.

Have a nice weekend!

Sigrun said...

Deine Bilder sind sooo zauberhaft, das Häuschen würde ich gerne besetzen! Die Katzen nehmen den Garten ein genau wie bei uns. Heute habe ich 6 Tomatenpflanzen geschenkt bekommen und habe überhaupt keinen Platz. Vermutlich setze ich sie in Töpfe an die Hauswand.

Sigrun

David (Snappy) said...

What a beautiful garden you have.I love the mixture of flowers, and vegetables.Your kitchen garden will inspire me when i finally move into a house with a garden.How long have you been at where you live now?
The Madame Alfred look divine too, if only we could smell them too.
Nice Iris too...great photos!

kate said...

Your garden tour was a wonderful treat today! I love your wooden basket filled with chives and radishes. The kitchen garden is wonderful to look at. I love the way the path winds through the south garden - The Columbines are amazing as are your roses- well, everything is amazing. Bliss doesn't quite describe what I am seeing ... it is much more heavenly than that.

Vita is staring me down while Pippa is looking off in the distance. Surprise will no doubt appear as I scroll down the screen. All of your cats are beautiful - I like Vita the best because of her name and
Surprise for her wonderful life story!

stadtgarten said...

Your garden looks wonderful! It seems to be incredible that it is april now and not june!
The shed looks lovely now!
Have a nice weekend, groetjes, Monika

Unknown said...

Beautiful, Yolanda Elizabet! What is that perennial geranium you have in the south border? It looks an awful lot like my geranium phaeum 'Samobor' but mine is just now sprouting out of the ground!

SchneiderHein said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
SchneiderHein said...

Hallo Yolanda wir waren ganz schön verwirrt. Du hattest zwar von Sam und Pippa als Eltern geschrieben, aber auf den Fotos des Bliss-Teams haben wir sie garnicht als Russen wahrgenommen. Sie wirkten dort zu Braun. Da ist das Foto auf der Gänseblümchenwiese doch viel aussagekräftiger! Schön wie die Beiden schmusen.
Liebe Grüße Wolfgang & Silke

Libbys Blog said...

Sorry I haven't been visiting much this week, to see why visit my main blog! I love the way you have painted your shed, it will really lighten that corner!!! Your garden is really charging along, I am pinching lots of ideas, from you, I hope you don't mind!!!
All your lovely puss cats, funnily enough I said to hubby yesterday about getting another puss cat, we have always had 3 and since Chimarni went , the house seems empty with just 2! I shall have a look at the burmese rescue and see whats, what!!

Green thumb said...

One look at your blog and I feel everything is right with this world(except maybe slightly unusually warm summer).
I feel like rolling with darling Dolly Daisy, enjoying the bliss!

Anonymous said...

beautiful photos! This is a great time of year for all Gardens, with lovely new things happening every day in the landscape.

Naturegirl said...

Sigh..this was truly a blissfull post! The flowers the cats the roses your garden shed..love what you did..oh I'm jealous as we have such a long way to go! The trees are JuSt budding and only the early Spring bulbs have blossomed! I have been in Arizona and oh the blossoms!!!I shall show you in a few days. hugs NG

Garden Cats + Crafts said...

Yolanda, ehe ich es vergesse: Natürlich halte ich Dir ganz fest die Daumen für die Mouse Trowel-Ausscheidung. Und natürlich habe ich schon vor ca. 2 Wochen für Dich gestimmt.
LG Birgit

Sanna Tallgren said...

Your Garden is so beautiful. From here up north, I would call that a summer. I can´t enjoy that kind of views for some time.

Your cats are amazing. How many is there, ten?

It´s so nice to visit here, when we just have spring waking up. Trees got they tiny, tiny leaves this weekend. That´s allways so amazing to see...

Yolanda Elizabet Heuzen said...

Hi all and thank you for your comments!

Kylee: very unexpectedly summer has arrived while we were waiting for spring. We are enjoying the lovely weather to the full!

WG: Bliss is the right word, isn't it? ;-)

Julia: your comment made my day!!!
How wonderful that Bliss has given you the insentive to go out into your own garden more and enjoy it. What a happy result! And you are right, this April is another record breaking month. We are having a lot of those in the past few years.

Layanee: thanks and glad you enjoyed your walk!

Marleen: leuk he, dat roodborstje. Daar had ik al zo lang op zitten wachten dat ik daar eens een foto van kon schieten en hoera, het is gelukt! De iris die ik had besteld was Bold Print, een witte bloem met mooie paarse randen.

Birgit: Hier ist es nicht so heiss. We live close to the sea so there is almost always a cool wind from the sea. Glad you liked to meet my sweet Pelznasen. ;-)

Oldroses: thank you for your lovely compliment. It really is lovely to see how our cats enjoy the garden.

Carol: the only thing that is predictable about the weather in the Netherlands, is its unpredictability. :-) I did notice that you had such a cold spring but hopefully you're back to your regular schedule now.
Oh yes, that trug, quite a few garden bloggers loved it. I'm now going to triple your coveting by telling you that I have 3 of them, a small, a medium and a large trug.
:-)

Robin: yes indeed!

Loretta: what fun that you planted some lawn daisies into your lawn last year. Here there are many people that don't want them in their lawn and use lots of poisonous stuff to get rid of them.
Personally I love those daisies to bits!

Christa: so you are growing grapes for the first time too? We must compare notes! ;-)

Sigrun: yes, the cats take over the whole garden and they are welcome to it. I know the problem of having too many plants and not enough space. Hopefully there will be lovely ripe tomatoes for you in a few months time!

Anonymous said...

Lovely garden you've got Yolanda.
Again very nice pictures.
The cats look at home in your garden. They must love the place.
Keep up the good work.
Ciao