The bench that we were asked to renovate was this one (I had to take the photo from their website, as I completely forgot to take one before I started doing it up!). It’s a really nice size and would work well in a large or a small garden. When planning what to do with it, I had a smaller space in mind. I wanted to come up with something that was flexible and would add some all year round colour to a garden or yard space. Something like this would work really well in a rented flat, as you can easily change and move it around. I had the idea to create some sort of living bench, so that you could grow plants on it in some way, but I also wanted to keep it functioning as a bench. By adding some baskets on to the bench, I could have the living element of my plan and by just having them at one end it means that you can still sit on it.

You will need

A sleeper bench (plus a drill and a mallet to be able to put it together)

Some garden paint and a paintbrush

Wire baskets

Spray paint (and acrylic sealer if you wish) and a lot of newspaper!

Some screw-in hooks

Step 1

The first thing I did (before putting the bench together) was to paint the bench. After much deliberation, I decided to paint the seat in sage and the legs in forest green (we already had this dark green as we have painted our shed this colour). The wood of the bench is quite light, so it took three coats to get the coverage that I wanted. Once the paint had dried we put the bench together – it did take a while to get the legs in securely but we did it in the end!

Step 2

It took me a while to get around to step 2, because it was so windy here at the weekend! I had wanted to spray paint the baskets on Saturday but it was just too windy. On Sunday morning it seemed like it had calmed down a bit, so I gathered everything I needed and went outside to get started. As soon as I started, the wind picked up again – argh! So our patio is a little bit blue in places now…oops! Make sure you have a lot of newspaper down underneath the baskets when you paint them. I used this paint, which came out a little more baby blue than teal which I expected, but I still like the contrast of it with the bench colours.

You can fix the colour with some clear acrylic paint once it has dried, if you wish. I got this from B&Q but they don’t seem to have it on their website so I can’t link up to it – sorry!

Step 3

When the baskets are dry, you can work out where to position them on the bench and then just screw them in by hand. I put two hooks on the front and two on the top – the ones on the top will help to keep the basket in position. I can tell you that this has worked really well, even on a windy day! Then you can fill it with your plants. We have herbs in the top basket and flowers in the side one.

Ta-dah! That’s it – the bench makeover is complete. You just need to wait for the sun to come out and then you can enjoy sitting there with a cuppa!

I’m happy with the bench to plant ratio here – and I’m pleased that this will work out in terms of flexibility. The baskets can be easily removed in winter, or if you need more space for sitting on the bench (just watch out for the hooks when you sit on that end!). The possibilities are endless in terms of colour as well, and it would be easy to repaint the bench or the baskets in future. So if you need me, I’ll be sitting on my bench with a cuppa, tending to my new plants…

***This post is written in collaboration with MKM Building Supplies, for which I received the bench and £50 for supplies.***

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I also painted underneath the pebble dash and the door and window frames, so it’s looking super smart for the first time in a long time! You can just about see that the front has been dug over, and Tom worked really hard doing that. He’s planted some wildflower seed so hopefully we’ll have a mini meadow in our front garden this summer!

I thought I’d share a few photos I took in the garden – I know I do this every year but I just love the flowers so much![/vc_column_text][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” interval=”3″ images=”7313,7314,7326,7315,7325,7324,7321,7322,7320,7316,7323,7317,7318,7319″ onclick=”link_image” custom_links_target=”_self” column_number=”2″ grayscale=”no” choose_frame=”default” img_size=”large”][vc_column_text css=”.vc_custom_1428958028357{padding-top: 30px !important;padding-bottom: 30px !important;}”]We didn’t get out in the garden much at all this year, so really hoping that this year will be different…fingers crossed! Hope you had a super weekend too! :-)[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

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A few months ago we bought a few new plants with vouchers that we were very kindly given by our friends and family for our wedding last year. I say a few, but we did manage to fill the boot of Keith’s car!

Over the last few years we’ve done a lot of major things in our garden – we removed two conifer hedges that were down each side of the garden and dug out part of the existing lawn to create some wider borders. We dug up the front lawn and removed an ‘ornamental’ ash tree (!!) at the same time – but haven’t actually touched the front garden since then. Once we’ve had our building work done, I’m really hoping we can make a start on that…Anyway, these plants would fill in some of the gaps in our borders very nicely, and we started by working out where they would go:

Then, after a bit of well-needed weeding we got them planted!

We were really grateful to have Helen there to help us – especially when it comes to pruning our hedge at the back! Things were starting to come together nicely once we had got the new plants in:

Our borders have filled out really well since then. Now that Autumn is well and truly here, the leaves are turning on the willow and things are dying back a bit. We realised this year that it’s much easier to cut back the willow early in the year instead of now, because all of the leaves have fallen off and it saves having to remove them! I’m really pleased that we chose to put it in. I realised that this photo was taken before I made my bird bath – the birds have finally got the hang of it now and they love it!

Our yellow rose has done so well this year after we gave it a really good cut back at the start of the year. It has produced so many flowers and is even still going – I took this photo last week when I went to hang up some washing!

Hopefully we’ll be able to remember some of these things for next year. I guess it’s quite useful to document this on my blog – I must remember! There are so many things that I’d like to do in our garden next year, but if this year is anything to go by then I had better not make too many plans…in the meantime, I’ll enjoy the last flowers before winter comes!

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Today we realised that our lovely little tree is in blossom! Yay! This tree was a very special present for our wedding from Tom’s Granny, so we’re so pleased to see it in bloom for the first time Here’s to many more blooms!

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I’m so excited that spring is in the air! As you can see, our lovely crocus pickwick are in full bloom and we’ve got plenty of other bulbs popping up now too. We spent a bit of time out in the garden this weekend doing a few little jobs to tidy up. But the main job we had was to build the base for our new shed which is arriving this coming week. 

Putting a shed base up sounds pretty simple, right? Wrong! We were hoping to get it all done and dusted yesterday, but then we realised that our drill was broken. So that meant a trip out to B&Q for a new one before we could do anything else…and then (obviously) the battery needed charging for 3 hours before we could get started! Argh! Eventually we managed to get it built in our garage, so that today we could ‘just put it in the ground’…

But it wasn’ quite so simple as that! Because we live on a hill, getting the ground exactly level is quite tough so that’s why we decided to get the base in the first place. But we still had to make it as even as we could, which took a lot of digging. After lots of hitting with mallets and checking that the base was level, taking the whole thing off and starting again, we finally finished! Tom came up with the good idea of putting some flagstones as steps at the front to help support the base.

I really hope that we’ve done it ok! At least someone else is putting the shed up The reason that we’re getting a shed is that we’re planning some major building work this year, which will mean we don’t have a garage anymore…I can’t say any more than that yet because we’re still waiting for planning approval and I don’t want to jinx it! But if it all goes through then you’ll be hearing lots more about it!

I definitely need a cuppa after that…look out for another post later today – how to make your own raspberry curd! Hope you’re having a great weekend whatever you’re doing!

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Today was an exciting day, because we planted a special tree in our garden! The reason that it is special is because Tom’s Granny bought it for us for our wedding. We knew we wanted to get a cherry blossom, and chose Incisa which is also known as ‘The Bride’, which is quite fitting! We bought online and decided to plant now so that the tree didn’t have to make it through the tough winter. 

Hopefully it will be ok in these gales we’re having at the moment!

Grow well little tree!

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This weekend I went to York to spend some time with Mum and Dad before our wedding, which is now less than 2 weeks away! Mum wanted us to do something crafty and booked us into a workshop at Softpots on Stonegate. Softpots is run by the lovely Annie Austen-Meek, who invented the concept over ten years ago, originally to transport plants practically and safely. Softpots are flexible and are kinder to plants, allowing them to ‘breathe’ and drain freely. Not only are they practical but beautiful, and it is very therapeutic making them.

We spent an hour with Annie and she showed us the basic techniques of making softpots, how to decorate them, which shapes to use and what does and does not work for a softpot. The workshop was incredibly informative and invigorating, and just left us wanting to make more! We made two pots each in just one hour, and in fact, are already planning our next pots! Here we are with our creations:

We’re so pleased with our pots – I’m particularly proud of my pink softpot, which I have nicknamed ‘The Mystic Beetroot’!

I love the hanging softpots too – the whole concept is so versatile:

Annie has also created The Softpot Garden, where you can admire and even buy your own softpot to take home. It’s like a little oasis in the centre of York!

You can make your own softpot in workshop sessions starting at £10, and we would highly recommend it! Check out the website or find out more on Facebook. Thank you again, Annie – we hope to come back and make more softpots with you!

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It has been a bit of a gloomy day today – I’m just watching the news and am surprised to hear that some parts of England have had snow today! So to cheer you up, here’s a lovely photo I took a few weeks ago. This is a daffodil obdam – simply beautiful! I haven’t used any photo effects here, I was just lucky with the light

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Today we’ve spent the whole day in the garden, which has been so lovely! The weather was sunny but not too hot, which meant that we could tackle some of the jobs that we’ve been meaning to do for ages. This involved a lot of digging! The first job was digging up the strawberry patch, which had pretty much been overrun by weeds as you can see:

The plants had also spread out quite a lot, so some of them were growing in the lawn! Having cleared all the plants I was really pleased to find that our peonies have survived the winter – they are quite difficult to grow but they are in quite a sheltered corner. I’m really looking forward to seeing them bloom this year – hopefully I’ll be able to get a photo!

This year, we’re trying to keep the strawberries a little more contained, so we made a little area for them using this willow edging – it looks a little bit like an Anglo Saxon settlement, but I’m hoping it will stop them spreading too much! It will also help to keep snails at bay, so fingers crossed…

After lunch we carried on digging in order to get rid of more weeds! We cleared the raised beds ready for planting and tidied up around them. This is what they looked like before and half way through:

Once cleared, we planted some veg – carrots, spring onions, courgettes, rocket and spinach. All of these things seem to grow well in our garden, and we’re hoping that they’ll do even better with these raised bed covers that let light, air and water in and keep everything else out! The woodchips around the edge should help us to keep control of the weeds.

The final job was to plant some potatoes in pots – we’ve gone for Charlottes because you can pretty much do anything with them and they’re easy to grow! As they grow we’ll keep covering them with soil until they reach the top of the pots.

I did have a little incident whilst gardening today – I stood on a rake and it hit me in the face! It was just like in a cartoon and it really hurt…my eye socket is rather sore now! So to make myself feel better I took these lovely photos – I can’t remember the exact name of the ones on the right hand side but I’ll look them up and let you know when I next do a gardening post.

Hope you are having a great weekend!

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Apparently, it is spring…but you could have fooled me! It is snowing as I write this, and as I look out at my garden it seems as though spring is on hold. The bulbs have half come up and have realised that it is far too cold to contemplate flowering – I just love how they do that.

We do have some beautiful crocuses that have decided to brave it, and it was quite sunny a couple of days ago (only briefly, which fooled us because it was still freezing!). I managed to get some lovely snaps of them and they are really beautiful!

This variety is called Crocus Pickwick and I love the patterns on the inside – so striking.

We’ve got lots of lovely spring bulbs waiting to bloom, so hurry up sunny weather!

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I love cold and sunny winter mornings when everything is covered in frost. It always looks so beautiful! Now is the time of year when I only really get to appreciate my garden at the weekend when we’re not going anywhere, because during the week it’s dark when we go to work and dark when we come home. This year was a write-off when it comes to the garden – it rained so much this summer that I spent most of my time looking out of the window at the rain and wondering if it would ever stop!

So today I’m at home, just doing a few jobs around the house and a bit of crafting this afternoon, and I decided to go out and take a few photos. The frosty leaves look so wonderful – I’m glad I went out just when the light was right!

When we first moved in to our house (which is almost three years ago now) there were various garden ornaments which the previous owners had left behind. I’m not really a huge fan of garden ornaments, so the meerkats were quickly disposed of, but there was one that I couldn’t bring myself to throw away. This could be to do with the fact that we gave him a name, so I felt a bit more attached to him – thank goodness I didn’t name the meercats! This is Hadrian, and he still lives in our garden:

I’m not sure if he is actually Roman – I suppose he could be Greek…But we live near to the Newcastle end of Hadrian’s Wall, so we couldn’t really call him anything else! Tom’s Mum thought that he looked a bit chilly when she first saw him, and decided to knit him a scarf with scraps of wool that she had left over from sock knitting. I’ve heard that a mini bobble hat might be on the way at some point too, so he’ll be toasty warm all year round!

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