We’ve had a lot of weather this week, with sunshine, showers, hailstorms and rainbow skies. The apple blossom is emerging as the mornings start to get a little warmer…

A blackbird spends a lot of time perching on the apple tree, singing loudly, probably to tell the neighbourhood that he’s the best and other blackbirds must keep away. He bullies other birds away from the feeders, with his beady eye and fierce demeanour.

I’ve mentioned the ginormous laurel hedge that borders our garden a few times in this blog, because it’s quite a beast. Unhelpfully, it has a rather prominent dead section which reveals a concrete post and wire fence. I’m hoping to cover this with pots of jasmine and trumpet vine, which I’ve wrapped round a hazel and willow tower.

A new greenhouse is hidden under this tarp. I chose a 6×6 timber and polycarbonate greenhouse, because glass makes me worry about breakages. In between rain showers we’ve been coating the roof sections with clear varnish. It should be up soon, which is a very exciting prospect.

The front garden is starting to ‘grow in’ although there’s still a lot to do here. The tulips and ranunculus are finishing, but the wallflowers and saxifrage are taking over. I really like the birdhouse by the front window, and as the greenery around it grows to provide a bit of cover, more sparrows have popped by for a bite to eat…

This is a ‘Pieris’ Mountain fire, a lovely perennial which produces bright red leaves and little white flowers. I was ‘zooming’ with my mum and dad and they mentioned that they’d bought one of these for their garden in Merseyside. I realised I had bought just the same thing at around the same time.

We spent a while trying to remember the name of this plant without saying a rude word. I’m delighted that in just a couple of weeks time – assuming lockdown ‘eases’ as planned – I will be able to spend some much overdue quality time with my parents when they come to visit Frome. I’m greatly looking forward to making rubbish jokes with my dad about slightly rude sounding plant names like pieris and peonies.

I think that’s almost six things from the garden this Saturday, although I would like to include this enormous slug passing by our terracotta snail…

… and these beautiful lilac flowers, which have a sweet scent when the sunshines.

That’s all for this week’s Six On Saturday. For more collections of what’s growing today, pop over to the Propagator’s blog to see what gardeners are sharing this week.

I hope your plans and plants are doing well,

Jen x