Gardening successes and failures

As I've been spending a great deal of time in the garden recently I thought I'd record it at its midsummer peak.  I'm learning to be a bit more relaxed about gardening, realising that there is never a time when everything is looking good at the same time and that some plants thrive unexpectedly while others inexplicably don't even when I do everything by the book.  

So here are my recent successes and failures.  First roses which I grow in pots on the patio.  I have a yellow one called Laura Ford (on the right above) which was brilliant last year but has been disappointing this year, having been attacked by greenfly.  I kept rubbing them off but to no avail and it now looks very sad. Contrast this with my beautiful pink Ballerina, bought for a couple of quid in Home and Bargain.

I've tried growing soft fruit and, for the first time, I have raspberries - not that many but progress on last year.  But my blackcurrant looks rather pathetic I think it needs better soil. I'm disappointed as I had a brilliant one in my last garden.  I have had more success with potatoes.  In fact I have what looks distinctly like a potato plant in a spot where I was expecting to see an echinacea emerge.  I tended it carefully in the spring only to realise it was an imposter which had planted itself in a spot where I'd probably thrown the spent compost from last year's potatoes. This amused me. I reckon, as the daughter of a farmer from Co Derry, potato growing is an innate skill.  We ate the first of my new potatoes from the plants I am growing in a dustbin on Saturday evening.  My book says you can harvest when they flower - only had a few as they are quite small so I'll leave them a bit longer.  They tasted good. 

I have a good crop of peas and beetroot.  I grow peas mainly so I can eat them raw straight from the pod as I did as a child.  Our summer holiday dinner was often new potatoes, peas and butter so we were sent off to gather the peas and then had to shell them. Many never reached the table.  

I am hoping my agapanthus, two of them in lovely terracotta pots which I got as a birthday present last year,  will flower, but though they look healthy there is no sign yet.  The B&Q hydrangea which looked like it was going to expire during the dry weather is now doing better though the flowers are a pale pink and not white as advertised.  Much nicer so I don't mind. 

A final picture of my usual garden companion who has totally destroyed the lawn. and my herb garden in pots.