You will just have to use your imagination.
Yesterday I went to the Warehouse and they were having a sale on bulbs - 40% off. I did find blue hyacinths and also bought 100 ranunculus and some more anemones. It said to soak the ranunculus in water for 2 hours before planting. I put them were the creeping buttercups like to be, on the border.
I scattered the mixed anemomes in Snowy's bed perhaps I should have stuck with white ones, for the 'snowy' theme, but, too late now. The hyacinth I buried next to the steps on in the front gravel bed.
I'm a bit of a loss as to what to do with the sunny gravel bed garden. There grows a leggy gardenia, ginger lily that gets bushy and then scraggly and dries up in summer, bright red nerines (spider lily), and then further down, I've got my olive tree in a big pot, a thin stone trough of alyssum, there's more rocks further down the thin wedged shaped border that's an almost perfect isosceles triangle. At the far end I think bindweed is creeping through. I've planted metrosideros Tahiti, thyme, calendula, echevrias, dianthus, borage, and viola. There's also phacelia coming up. I've put in the purple convolvulus marinus. The theme seems to be purple and reds and grays. There's also a bearded lily that's been there forever. I also have english lavender which will be purple and spanish lavender which is wine colour.
If I could, I would take out the gardenia as it was going yellow, even though it's flowers perfume the entrance, and the ginger lily which spreads. I considered growing a mini bottle brush, but as I already have metrosideros Tahiti, I think having it's overseas cousin might upset the balance. Also, I've read cistus - rock rose, might be good there. But I haven't seen that in the garden centre.
Another option would be to espalier a fruit tree on the sunny brick wall, but I don't really have a clue how to do that. I'm thinking of removing the alyssum from the stone trough and putting in succulents and other dry mini alpine plants there. I will need to remove the soil and put in a proper gravelly mix. Those poor hyacinth found it a bit too damp and clayey.
So..that is my task for the week.
Hooray, the council replied back and said they would send my neighbours a surveillance notice and advice on how to remove their privet.
Now I'm just waiting to hear from the magnolia people for advice on which magnolia to plant on the road side verge.
