Sensory Garden

I came home reasonably early from work tonight, so went straight out to do a bit of gardening. I can easily lose an hour or two pottering around out there, in a most enjoyable way. After all the hard work, removing the old fence and ivy, trying to dig up the tree stump, and removing the weeds and remaining grass, everything that needs doing at the moment is the fun part of gardening-planning, planting seeds, buying new plants and arranging everything. Tonight I planted the bamboo-it is a phyllostachys nigra-black bamboo. I read that this is a clump forming rather than wildly spreading species. I am pleased as it is my favourite bamboo. I will see how it does in its location, and maybe add another one next year. I also planted a lavender and a cotton lavender, and potted on my sunflower and nasturtium seedlings. Then I planted the rest of the chamomile in pots, and in some gaps in the previous planting. I then had a bit of a tidy up.
The reason for the title of this post, is that I realised tonight how many delightful scents there are in the garden at the moment. I have jasmine and honeysuckle, both of which waft their perfume around very generously. Then there is lavender, cotton lavender-Santolina (curry plant), chamomile, fennel and basil. I love it!
My reward when the jobs were done was a cup of rooibos and vanilla tea and a peanut butter sandwich. (on my current favourite plate-an old enamel one from the market-£1!)
This is what I was thinking of as a surround to the chamomile-this is 20mm gravel as it was described, which seems to be made up of mainly flint, and was so much cheaper than the decorative stones. I think about ten bags would do it which wouldn't be too much.

Bamboo close up.

This is the biggest plant I have ever bought I think. It was pretty pot bound, so hopefully it will be happy now it is released!

I turned a currently unused planter upside down to use as a stand.

The nice smelly plants!