Astrantia

The astrantias are just coming in to full flower so I couldn't resist finding one to blip today.

As it is the first Saturday in the month it was Stokesley Farmers' Market. As well as my usual purchase of Yorkshire Rapeseed Oil I wanted to have a look for some plants for the bed which Guy has been digging over for me. We had to take most of the plants out from there when they were replacing the windows in our conseratory. It had got very overgrown anyway so what came out was either put in the green bin or our garden compost. I need plants which will do well when they are mostly in shade. There is a short period mid-morning to lunchtime when it gets the sun (should it be shining) but otherwise it is in shade. There were 3 plant stalls in the market. I bought two plants from the first one I came to and then discovered a stall which isn't normally there. It was advertising the up-coming Open Gardens in aid of Teesside Hospice. I know the lady who was in charge of the stall and she is a very knowledgeable gardener. She suggested a few plants but having already bought two I settled on just one. It is a white hellebore, according to the label, donated and sold in aid of the hospice. It cost me £4 which was good value as it is a reasonable size plant.

I spent an hour digging out the dreaded geraniums. These seed themselves like mad and are taking over. Then I put in the new plants and called it a day.

Finished the ironing while watching tennis this afternoon. It's always a pleasure to see an empty ironing basket.

I'm pleased and humbled that I have had 2 donations to Diabetes UK already and the Million Step challenge doesn't start until July 1st. Now I can't possibly back out. My target is to do 500,000 steps over a 3 month period and I am pleased to say that I have managed over 5,000 steps every day this week.