Stroll thru our garden with me

It is Saturday morning and you’ve dropped in for a quick cup of tea.

Bury your nose in pink Perfume Passion and deepest red Black Prince. See, the fig has lost its leaves, leaving a few tiny second crop figs, which will fall to the ground. The hoopoe, from niece Claire, came with us from the last house in Hoopoe Avenue. Where we saw no live hoopoes, to this town where we usually see some on our rare walks. We’re out in the garden, come thru the open garden gate.

Glad you got here before I hung the washing out. Saturday we change the sheets, weather permitting, and my English roots defer to the Germanic side airing the bedding. To my South African eyes, when I first went to Switzerland it was W E I R D to see duvets and pillows gushing from windows all the way up blocks of flats. (An English housewife is proud of making the beds in the morning, pulled up and tucked in ;-)

Herbs, with two basil ‘trees’ at the kitchen door. And the working corner with compost bins. Needs to be shaded for summer. We planted our Hedge Fund, money plant. But it is a conservative investment, preserving capital, sleeping and creeping. At least this year it is a froth of delicate pink flowers. Also here, the neighbour's discarded spekboom which has divided up into metres of hedge! 

Turn to the mountain, the mountain ash trees, the Karoo Koppie.  Walk along Apple Creek, the EE Light Railway and a bank of mint scented Pelargonium tomentosum, which enjoys the shade along this south facing wall of the house, and the dew which keeps it moist in winter’s shade.

Strelitzia nicolai has at last reached wall height, just. The ash planters are filled with sheaves of Chasmanthe leaves, golden because the flowers will be yellow. Lachenalia in coral and turquoise.

Then along our Woodland Walk where the shrubs and young trees are kindly reaching shoulder and head height. Past Rest and Be Thankful where the sun shines on winter afternoons. Say hullo to our little stone elephant, in front of his BIG brother. Delicate leaves of Phyllis against generous big ones of Dombeya. Cross Plum Creek.

Now let us take tea in Paradise, my rose garden. MY rose garden, so it has lots of indigenous plants, with enough roses to pick. Will you have 'Oily Grey', what the Afrikaans and Swiss call 'English' tea, or try rooibos? Or the Ungardener makes a great cappuccino??

Time to stop and smell the roses. Enjoy the details. ‘Aller guten Dinge sind drei’. No longer Osteospermums but reallocated to Dimorphotheca jucunda.  Golden foliage, in this small corner of the garden does, what I see in my mind. When I walk, I like to be on the level. So I can see details, find stones like this one with a flying bird. NOT painted, I found it like that. And Oyster Pearl against our misty mountain.

Oh and did your little girl follow that pink thread today? 

Pictures and words by Diana of Elephant's Eye