A long weekend

I took the day off yesterday because we had workers coming for tiling the upstairs bathroom and  the loggia. The other rooms will have wooden floors as soon as I’ll have the windows mounted (soon, apparently…). As I’ve learnt you have to stay home and watch workers doing their job, at least for the first day, you hang around them, you ask if they want coffee, you show some empathy asking some silly questions about their job and meanwhile you check on them, you see if they have understand how you want the job to be done. Because when some jobs are done, they’re done. You can’t take the tiles off the wall, can you? They did a good job at the end of the day and we were pleased to see those bare rooms are finally getting a proper ‘shape’. I’m really looking forward to sit on the loggia and have a cup of coffee while I watch the garden, or the stars at night, or a storm coming… I will post some pictures of the loggia later this month.

Knowing we had the monday off all the weekend tasted sweeter somehow, more relaxed. Sunday we went to a flower and gardening fair in Pordenone, not far from where I live. I must tell it wasn’t as I expected to be, the quality and quantity of the plants shown weren’t noticeable, just consider I didn’t feel like buying anything: and this is bizarre, believe me!

There was a few nice exhibitions made by some garden designers, the one above is the best one, in my opinion. Very simple but cozy, almost shabby yet very sweet.

The more stimulating thing is that even though we didn’t buy anything (well almost anything…) we went home bursting with new ideas that will help us solving some hardscape and furniture issues at home. Above all I found this beautiful pergola:

If you can imagine it without roofing (as I wish I could put only a fabric sheet) this is the fair copy of what I’ve sketched (this is the south facing side of the house):

I only need to define how many billions this trick is going to cost me…

Under that pergola we are going to put a big table and some chairs to share dinner with friends on summer. We even found something we’d like.

The best stand was one of old and english roses, I didn’t buy anything though, I have enough pots at home and the roses were already too forward for the season which means: troubles!

Pictures quality is rather poor and I’m sorry, I took some quick snaps while there was no people walking in between…

Probably the best part of the exhibition was dedicated to orchids. I’m always amazed by their beauty but meanwhile I’m a little afraid of them, they seem fussy and I don’t want to make them die…

Those little white orchids seem to look past and sigh: “Tomorrow I’ll think of some way . . . after all, tomorrow is another day.”

Another good idea (everything but new, though) was this fancy fence that Ale wants to copy for the veggie garden… rather French I’d say.

A pretty wide area was dedicated to food and cosmetics, things that are averything but related to gardening, in my opinion, however you go to a gardening fair and you find stuff like hands cream or essential oils or people selling cheese… or chocolate… They are tempting though!

Yesterday, while the workers were tiling, we worked all the day in the garden. I planted a few more spring bulbs (trumpet and tiger lilies, crocosmias…) while Ale moved some compost from the pile (the dogs found a couple of mice on it and hunted them down), I finished chopping the grasses while Ale dug a new stream of ground and then I burned the hay from the chopping in the gravel garden, as I can’t leave the mulch over. We finished the gardening day after the sun set, watching the fire sparkling in the air. I chopped one of my fingers too and this morning I came at work with my back aching but I found another box for me: this was the time for hostas and they look pretty good, so I think I’m going to order more next year. My mum loves hostas too, so we placed the order together and hopefully in a few years we can swap plants.

Every plant came into a plastic bag, with its plastic label to place in the pot and at least 4-5 ‘eyes’ each plant. I ordered them at hostaparadise.com they shipped the stuff the day after I paid with paypal and the plants arrived within a week. Good quality plants and rather good prices, it depends on what you pick. I had only a few hostas so I’ve picked some of the cheapest as they probably are the healthier and the faster growers and a couple of big ones like ‘niagara falls’ and ’empress wu’ which worth a little higher price.

What are you doing tonight? I think I’ll be potting hostas in the stable… What a relaxing plan! 🙂

Tags: gravel garden, hostas, planting bulbs, Pordenone fiera dei fiori, projects

• 6 March 2012
• Cà Rossa, Trips and reportages
• 32 Comments