Flower Power

Well, I was a teenager in the sixties after all lol!    I thought I’d start to do a bit with the greenhouses, so started with the leanto one.  It looked so nice all pristine and clean but of course it had to be dirtied up so I got busy with a very dilute wash of water and dark brown.  Soon the glazing was grotty and the paintwork was patchy.  Suitably grungy, I figured.

I retrieved the staging from the demolished wooden Templewood greenhouse, and cut one of them down to fit along the side of the lean-to one.  Some of the flats from the same source, including the one I had in the pergola (with the little hand spade in it) are on the bench.  Two have been filled and have ‘labels’ to show what has been planted.  Also on the bench are empty seed flats, a watering can, more labels and some packets of seeds.

A shelf above holds snail bait, two boxes of fertilizer and some more seed packets.  The shelf is made from part of the piece cut off the staging when I shortened it. The boxes are printies. Under the staging is a large wooden box (made from offcuts) with newspapers and a gardening magazine (more printies – from the pergola).  In front is a bag of seed-raising mix (printie again, stuffed mainly with a bit of tissue topped with 'soil').   A spade is sitting near the door. I think a broom is needed too, to sweep up the soil that has been spilt over the floor!

Two 'tomato' plants are growing in the raised garden bed at the end.  the leaves are actually from a half-scale rose kit from Templewood Miniatures (Fine Flowers in Miniature) - I just used the smallest ones, on a framework made from bits of wire from flower kits.  The 'stakes' are slivers of timber I shaved from a tongue depressor.  I will probably add another thinner bench along the open side of the green house, with a row of seed flats with more 'advanced' seedlings in them.

then I moved on to Rosebud Cottage.  I had a sheet of fine metal rose leaves from Suzanne & Andrews, which I have been saving to use on the verandah trellis here.  These are lovely delicate and lacy leaves, very special.  I used some of the straight edging as the stem at the bottom of the climbing rose,

and cut some of the little branchlets off the four strips of petaIs that come in the sheet. These little bits I could add to different places to get a pleasing effect.  I used the half scale roses from Templewood – itseems impossible to get large quantities of quarter scale roses, which is surprising. 

 The suggestion was to make up the roses leaving off the last two rounds of petals so that is what I did.  I also used some of the second last round of petals to make buds, and found that the sepals were fine to use for them.  The roses came in a bright orange-red, but I painted each one with burgundy for the smaller ones, and each of the larger ones with burgundy in the middle and randomly in places on the petals to give a closer colour to the house and also variation in shading.

The metal takes a while to glue into place, so it took a while but it was well worth it, I think.  I love the way the burgundy of the roses goes so well with the trim on the cottage which is Folk Art colour 754, appropriately called 'Rose Garden'.