A little garden review - late summer

Considering how dry it has been over the last two months, there are some plants that have coped very well.  Above in the triple coloured hibiscus, although I think there are only two colours on it now.  It is in the sunniest part of the garden and has not been watered at all.  Below it is an agapanthus which has flowered really well but which is in a pot, so it has been watered.

Here is the hibiscus again, showing the pink flowers and some of the white ones.  

The other hibiscus, Syriacus Oiseau Bleu, in the north facing border, has done very well too, again, no extra water from me. This is one of my favourite plants and often features in my blog.  Roses in the borders have done well, with no additional watering but those in pots have needed a weekly and sometime twice-weekly watering to keep going.  My ferns in the north border have suffered a lot, despite me adding water bottles near them to try and help.  I am not sure they will come back but we shall see.

We have now had some rain and temperatures are a little cooler,  for which I am very thankful.   

In other news, my cosmos have finally decided to join the party and start flowering.  Hopefully they will go on into the Autumn.  Above is Cupcakes Blush which is one I haven't grown before.

I'm not quite sure what this one is - but it is pretty.

These are at the front of the house - Candy Stripe, which I think is pretty reliable.

Candy Stripe again...

...and again. I like that the flowers are all slightly different.

As all of us need to do, I am thinking about how to adapt what I grow next year.  Cosmos Candy Stripe and Cosmos Sulphureus Polidor have both done well considering and I think perhaps I need more verbena bonariensis. I have some white foxgloves seedlings coming along and have three teasel plants growing on.  

I have also just ordered some tulips - Finola for the front, Ronaldo and Princess Irene for the back. They should arrive September/October time.  

The other thing I need to do is cut down the number of small pots of things I have.  Lots to think about and always lots to do!

Accordion mini journal

For those people who expressed an interest in seeing my accordion journal for the Inchie Challenge, (I am looking at you in particular, kjsutcliffe!) here it is.

It is small and unfolds with the pictures on both sides.

You can also keep it 'closed' and turn the pages like a book.

The simplicity of the green circles for Eucalyptus is probably my favourite from this challenge.

Closely followed by this one, where I took the idea of a circle and complicated it with lots of pattern. I do enjoy drawing mandala-style images.

Inchie Challenge 2026

I have just finished the Inchie Challenge for 2026 - seven days of prompts using little watercolour pieces, two inches square.  This is run by Amy Maricle of Mindful Art Studio and I have been joining in for a couple of years. She is still offering this for free  She also offers Slow Drawing most weeks (you need to be signed up to the free tier on her site) - she does take the occasional week off!  She also offers much more on the paid part of her website, such as an extended Inchie Challenge, but I have not signed up to that.  

This year the prompts were (from left to right): Wildflower; Sprinkle; Blue; Landscape.

(From left to right again): Lines; Eucalyptus; Complicate.  What would you have drawn/painted?

Slow drawing is about taking your time and not rushing to complete something. The patterns are usually based in nature and open to interpretation; in fact, Amy encourages us to make the patterns our own and explore.  Materials are few - watercolour paper/card, a permanent ink pen and watercolours.  It is an hour of quiet concentration that I really enjoy each week.

Another art journal

 I've been working on another little journal as a spin-off from one of the lessons from the art journal course.  It's something I work on every now and again.  

The cover is a 'ghost print' from a gel plate printing session.

This page started as a pastel watercolour background which was decorated with drawn flowers.  The rest of the background was painted with dark blue acrylic paint.

On the right hand page I cut some flaps and added a stamped image.

This page started as a gel print, which was stencilled over, adding paint pen marks and gold squiggles. 

On these pages, there is a collage and a page with a pocket.

Here is the pocket page without the folded paper.  I really enjoyed drawing all the different lines within the circles as it is a very meditative activity.

Wanderlust 2026 - weeks fourteen to twenty-six - Paper Alchemy (part two)

Here are the other pages I particularly enjoyed making from the Paper Alchemy theme of the art journaling course.  Above is a collage of printed vellum, magazine transfers onto sticky tape, material, and photos. It was all about our past. 

We made 'paper leather' for this lesson, using packaging paper and coating it with a mixture of acrylic paint and glue. For some pieces, we added oil and scrunched it up and flattened it out many times which gave it a very 'leathery' feeling.  We also encased thread and sequins in tissue paper, which was rather messy, but fun!

As I make cards, making these cards was right up my street.  Abstract painting, painting an animal (our much missed cat, Scruffy) and then painting the background for one and finally using packaging to make a collage card.  

I used a matcha chocolate wrapper.

Watercolour flowers with added tissue paper foliage and gold accents worked really well.  Painting in the background made the flowers pop.

I did another version in watered down acrylics which worked well, but seems to have lost a bit of expression/spontaneity along the way.  I still like it though!

Making bunting using paper and material was a really enjoyable week.  I chose to make a single piece so that it could go in my journal. Alcohol inks on the gel plate made some lovely papers.

Finally for this theme was looking at the Japanese art of Kintsugi - taking something (usually a ceramic) which has got broken and then mending it, highlighting the cracks with gold.  Crackle paste came out to play here.  The photo in the centre is of Tupholme Abbey.

The crackle paste worked really well.  Our next theme is 'Stories Unfolded' - I think this may be another good one for me!

Wanderlust 2026 - weeks fourteen to twenty-six - Paper Alchemy (part one)

 I was really looking forward to the Paper Alchemy theme for the art journaling course, as I really enjoy working with paper and was eager to see what we would be creating.  It didn't disappoint as these were some of my favourite weeks so far.

Making journals has featured several times in this theme and this journal has pages made using calico, cotton and tracing paper.  The pages sometimes have various layers on them, including gesso mixed with plaster of paris and texture paste, as well as collage.

We worked on the pages, poking through them with an awl and burning through them (this shows one of the tracing paper pages on the right).

We also put items behind the pages and then sanded off the gesso/plaster of paris mix, leaving the image - in this case, paperclips.  The journal is small and introduced me to lots of different techniques, including the binding, where the pages are sewn together, the covers placed over the top and the pages are folded back and glued over the spine. I loved making this!

Another journal made using a masterboard.  The black squiggles represent ancient writing and we had to run the page under a tap before the writing was dry so that the writing was faded and blurred, which worried me initially but which worked well, as the paper had been layered with collage and acrylic paint first and been left to dry.

Collage decorations were added to the pages.

The words on this page were taken from the scrap of book page I used and they jumped out at me.  I love serendipity!

Collaging a scene was enjoyable too, and we added details to our collaged paper. I have a large collection of painted pages, so it was good to be able to use a few of them.

Another journal, but as my main art journal was getting rather bulky, I decided to recreate smaller pages on the page.  (I have since decided to make the extra journal but not add it to my main journal, so this may feature in another post).

Top left is a pop-out/exploding/flower page with stamped art words. 

Behind the starry door is a stamped eye.

The collaged book page door reveals a fold out.

Finally, a gel plate printed door reveals a spinner (with some of my favourite bought tissue paper on the left, echoing some of the colours).

More to come in part two. 

Early July delights in the garden

I spent a while in the garden today and enjoyed seeing what is in flower.  Watering does give an opportunity to look at the plants closely and I find it a meditative activity, although as I have a lot of pots, I have to stagger the watering schedule.  I was also doing a bit of repotting. Above is Clematis Princess Kate.

Clematis Perle D'Azur is flowering now on the metal arch.

Here it is from the other side, with the Buddleia.

Various phloxes are flowering too and their honey scent is lovely.   They seem to prefer a bit of shade. 

Hydrangea Annabelle is flowering although she is not enjoying how dry things are.  

Always a joy every year is Hibsicus Oiseau Bleu. Exotic-looking flowers, hardy and tough, this one always makes an appearance or two on my blog. I think this is quite an early appearance.

Clematis Arabella, scrambling through the border with her purply/lilac flowers.

Bringing me so much joy has been this goldfinch, which was on a TV aerial in the next street, so I had to use my zoom.  It has been singing most of the morning and afternoon and had a beautiful song. What a lovely little bird it is!