Silver Medal Winning Lawn Mower Arrives!

Great excitement today as our silver medal prize in Britain's Best Gardeners' Garden arrived and we are now the very proud owners of a sparkling brand new Premium Cobra MX51SPH lawn mower!!  It just so happened that the lower lawn was just ready for mowing so it was put to instant and immediate use.  It's MUCH lighter that its Haytor predecessor and cuts like a dream. Having a Honda engine, it's SO easy to start and they are renowned for their easy starting reliability.  It has a very handy compartment (much like a glove compartment in a car) for storage.  Surely such a useful feature HAS to have been designed by a female?  We could hardly have won anything nicer or, in our case, more useful. 

 A VERY

  BIG 

thank you to the lovely people at Cobra for their generosity. 

 This mower has gone to the very best home!!

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PTC Salutes the Marines!

We are very proud to have been given a Royal Marines' flag and within 30 seconds Al ensured it was fluttering in the sunshine beneath the Union Jack - which, I notice, is looking a little the worse for wear.  Anyway - thank you, Ian.  It has already been commented upon by several visitors to the garden!

Garden Aerobatics!

We enjoyed another afternoon of aerobatics from a Pitts Special biplane which was put through its paces just the other side of Martley Hillside.  We even saw a Spitfire on its way home.  Honestly!  The things we see in our garden!!

Much Buzzing in the Lavender

There are SO very many bees in the garden - mostly on the Lavender, I've been trying to photograph them.  VERY difficult - too many and all too unpredictable!  Anyway there's definitely no shortage of bumble bees in Pear Tree Cottage garden

Another Successful Garden Visit

The weekend saw another garden visit - this time by the Black Pear Gardening Club of Worcester.  Chris swapped from afternoon to morning so at 8am prompt (yawn!), it was mission on!!  I mowed and edged, weeded, tidied whilst he trimmed the Berberis, cut the Yew hedge and even gave the sofa a haircut.  32 club members came on a sunny Saturday afternoon.  Lucky me!!  Dave & Di came over and served the teas and cakes and even washed up!!! Another £191.00 was made for the National Gardens Scheme.  Afterwards a bottle of fizz was duly enjoyed before a dinner of beef puff pastry pinwheels with Arran Pilot new potatoes, Greyhound cabbage and Early Onward peas all straight from the garden - deeeeeeliciousness!  A good and very worthwhile day all round.

Eggs for Sale!

PTC got a new eggs for sale sign today!  I bought the hardwood frame (I think it may have been a fire screen originally) for £5 from a junk shop in Wales and we cut out and painted a rectangle of ply and suspended it from 2 hooks.  Don't look too hard at the lettering: a calligrapher I may be but, a brush is much more difficult to handle and behaves nothing like a nib!  We hope that, as it's not all rigid, the wind won't blow it over.  My theory is that it should just swing to and fro in the wind. For now, it's on test and we'll see what out our customers think!  Talking of freedom, the girls were out on slug patrol in the garden yesterday but, as we have a party of garden club visitors expected tomorrow afternoon, I didn't leave them out too long because I know what a mess they make!

Loads of Lovely Lavender!

The lavender is looking especially pretty and is absolutely alive with bees and hover flies.  I must pick some for lavender shortbread.  Our lavender border began life as self set seedlings in Mrs. Slingsby's gravel.  Chris's job was to remove all the unwanted seedlings and we got lucky!!