Surprise!

At best, my gardening can be described as haphazard, with at least half a dozen projects on the go, none of them finished.

Creating a new border, I strim off the grass, throw in a few plants and expect them to fend for themselves.  Usually this is a dismal failure and I remember them a few weeks later to find they are swallowed in couch grass and bind weed.

Sounding like the Tories still blaming the previous government years into office, I am still blaming the cold in February and the rain in April for all my current failures as I struggle to bring my half-dozen projects back to some semblance of order.  Weeks back, before our friends arrived, I realised the cottage borders were a disaster; the bushes burnt and shrivelled, only slowly recovering and smothered in rampant weeds. So I filled pots with cheerful geraniums and hoped no-one would notice the borders.

Our friends now departed, reluctantly I headed back down to the cottage to try to do something with what I laughingly had called "the hot border", where last spring I'd dug out yet more builders rubble, scattered some summer bulbs around and hoped for the best.  I don't even remember if they flowered last year. I was too busy to notice, trying to keep the young trees and new hedge alive in the field with twice daily watering.

And there they were. In all their glory. A feast for the eyes. Did I really choose those colours? These last few days, despite the earlier weeks of cold and wet, the lilies have all burst into magnificent bloom, towering above the inconsequential weeds below.  Just sometimes haphazard gardening works. And it's such a wonderful surprise when it does.