Flower, flowers everywhere but not a drop to drink

My husband is a great gardener, he sees nothing in hard landscaping on a mere whim. Me however, well I am always thinking I might get it wrong, choose the wrong flowers that don't go together, not put the right soil with the right plants or buy something that's going to grow to big, the list goes on........

However I woke up on Saturday and decided that I would do some planting this spring. I told Mr T-C and thought the boys and I would have a little project this week.

Sunday came and I was woken up at 8am by Mr T-C saying that pancakes were ready and shall we go to the local plant nursery later to get some plants for me, cue smiling Natalie

We all jumped in the truck and made our way there. I picked the flowers I thought were pretty.

While I was choosing the boys ran round and then helped us load our new treasures



I was so surprised at the prices, not expensive at all. Mr T-C said that plant nurseries are much better than garden centres, have a look for your local one here

While I made lunch the boys brought the flowers down and I was then given a bit of tutorial by my husband on how to make a hanging basket. He runs his own aquatic landscaping business this is what he told me to do which I followed to the letter

Get yourself a basket, we had ours from years ago which we found at the back of the shed, you can pick them up second hand from car boots too

Line with a hanging basket liner (we bought ours from the nursery at £1.50 each)

I put some old pond liner in the bottom to stop the water just running through, if like most normal people you don't have old pond liner hanging around just use a black bin bag, cut a couple of small holes in the bottom so the water does not sit and go stagnant

Fill the basket with a 50/50 mix of mud (I was corrected, it's called soil!) from your garden and multi-purpose compost. Quill our little Jack Russell sat and watched me for ages, bless him.

I arranged the flowers on top of the soil to check they would look nice and then simply planted them in.

The boys and Mr T-C then found lots of other containers we had, once started I just went with it.

The boys found their watering cans and loved filling them up and pouring the cool rain water over mummies new creations.

Once they were in bed I went out with a cup of tea to inspect my work, I felt a real sense of achievement and happiness which is a feeling I am slowly getting used to after a fraught year.
Today was a good day, we even managed to accessorise the hanging baskets with some old necklaces.

Take care, Natalie xx