John's Garden v Jeff's Garden

I found six mosquito bites on my ankles and knee last night. Ouch they were itchy. I used my special pen that the Burlington's gave me. Later I took an antihistamine, Iboprofen, rubbed Benodryl into the affected areas. I woke up at 2:30am scritching and a scratching. I washed them and cooled them with a cold towel. Got back into bed, they were red hot, burning, itchy and swollen. I made up my poultice of bicarb and water and applied it to the bites and went back to bed. This morning there was a trail of white powder again. Grandma thought the boys had been messing and Huffle thought Hansel and Gretel had been trying to get home.

In the morning they were itching really bad again. I had another anti histamine, another Iboprofen. Uncle Grump would be scared of my fat ankles!........ And they are getting bigger!

We skyped Madamme Courvoisier and Mikita. They had been busy gardening and we told them we were off to 'John's Garden' today.

We all had a trip to 'John's Garden', a garden centre with a difference. It was set in a beautiful wooded area. The trees were really straight and tall. The place was really nice although I would have liked to have seen it set out more as a garden than it was. The woman who worked there followed us about. It was obvious we were going to buy things and had she left us to get on with it, we possibly would have bought more. We got quite a few things. The boys each chose a pack of bulbs to plant when they got home. Small chose a red anenome and Smallest chose a Multicoloured Dahlia.

We drove to a place where Grandad had seen hanging baskets for sale and he bought us two for the front porch. They had a trust box on the front of the house and you picked your basket and put your money in the box.

We found another garden centre on the way home. It was only a small one and didn't look like it had much in there so Grandma and the boys stayed in the car. Grandad, Huffle and I got talking to the owner. There are a lot of plants we grew back in England that we are not going to be able to grow here. We chatted about it and the owner said he thought we would get very frustrated in our first few years. He told us to have a look round his garden. He had set it up really nicely around his house but with labelling so you could see what the plant looked like. I liked this place much better than the first one we went to. We looked around the greenhouse. Grandad chatted to him about Trilliums. Whilst I was walking around I had an idea that maybe I could work there for free, for knowledge. I thought if I don't ask, I'll never know. So I did. The man said I could. He said if I could give up a morning a week, he would teach me as much as I want to learn, have fun and get 15%off all plants. WAHOO. I'm going to do it. How exciting.

When we got home we had a sandwich. The boys friends 'The Jays' came over and they all played in the garden together.

Grandad, Huffle and I started clearing a border in front of the barn for some plants. This one was the Hot Border where we put in reds and oranges.

Huffle secured some things on the barn. Grandad and Huffle played tidy up in the barn.

Look how pleased he is with the placement of the spirit level!

"I need to put this spade JUST here"

Grandma made dinner

Grandad and Huffle cut down some diseased trees and found some raspberries growing. Yesterday, we found two peonies and some geraniums growing in a compost heap at the bottom of the garden. result!

The Jay's went home. We got Smallest in the bath despite the fact that he was kicking and screaming - he hates me you know. I bathed him and got extremely wet because he kept kicking water at me (whilst telling me hated me). Small came in eventually and went into the bath. Grandma called us for dinner. She had made a Roast Beef dinner. We had Yorkshire Flat, gravy (from a whole pot of Bisto!)! The boys complained the carrots were too hard. It was a lovely dinner and we all liked it really (except Grandma, who never does after she's spent half a day cooking). We have decided to rename her 'Grandma in her slippers cooks with Many Pots'.

We had Summer Fruit Pie and Custard. Ummmmm, nice despite the fact it was squashed!

Grandma put the boys to bed, read them a story while Huffle, Grandad and I played with technology.

We have had forecasts for lots of snow tomorrow and Tuesday. If we get enough Grandma is off snowboarding. Grandad said his knees won't let him but he is going to try skiing on the black run. He says "I won't mess about with anything else, straight to the top me!".


Note: Mrs Rumbleskins. Grandad thinks (and we agree) the best way to get Moss out of paving stones is to use a thin weeding knife. Hard work but it should come out easily. Satisfying once done! I shall be willing to give any gardening tips once I am established in my new 'job'.

P.s. Thank you and Hello to my new reader 'Mikita', hope you continue to read this when you get home.