Thursday 8 September 2016

Picture Perfect Project 2016: September: The Loss Of Our Beautiful Sycamore Trees

Hi Honeys
Welcome back for the ninth post in the Picture Perfect Project.  A wonderful link up which encourages bloggers to take more photographs, improve their photography skills (and so improve their blogs) and mostly to have fun!

Picture Perfect Project September

I can't believe it's September already!  We've slipped over into Autumn and ordinarily I'd be looking forward to watching our furbaby Jade playing with the leaves in our back garden while her daddy tries to rake them up but that won't be happening this year :/

Jade is fine honeys, don't worry! As is her Dad, thank God, but our gorgeous sycamore trees are gone!!  I'll explain...
Our back garden, behind the house, has become so soulless.  There is a long lane running behind the houses on our street and this lane used to be lined in trees, including the ones standing guard on the other side of our tall garden fence.

Over time the trees have been removed and a neighbour wanted the last remaining trees trimmed back because they were very, very tall.  A workman from the company used by our local council called and spoke to both my neighbours & myself and he did ask me, since the trees in question backed on to our property, if we minded.  Thinking they were only planning to decrease the height of the trees, as they did last time, I said we didn't.

Well, what actually happened is they went ahead and took the trees away altogether! I spoke to the same workman next morning and told him I had understood they would be shortened not taken away, he told me that was the original plan but that my neighbours had then told him to take them away.

Losing Our Beautiful Sycamore Trees
It breaks my heart to look at this photograph honeys, it really does :/  We bought this house largely because of the garden and those gorgeous sycamore trees.  For years now it's been my sanctuary from the world, a place I felt at peace and safe and now it's just a big open space with no heart. I am completely without joy out there.

The workman I spoke to said he really had thought my neighbours and I had discussed it, but that with patience I would have them back.  He said they hadn't killed the trees just taken them down to stumps. He says Sycamores grow very quickly and they could be back again within around eight - ten years. Patience indeed.

I'm trying desperately to find a rainbow in this huge, dark cloud honeys and it's really hard.  My Polly Anna mode doesn't seem to be working today.

We still have our little apple tree and we were already planning a little seating area out there too.  Do you remember the bench we bought earlier this year? Hubby had said it must have been made for me because the back rest is made of wrought iron and has a rose pattern...

Bench for back garden

Well honeys, if we've lost our gorgeous trees (for a few years at least) I've determined to make this little seating area as beautiful as I can.  I'll use pots and planters and hopefully bring the garden back to life that way.

Hubby has another week's holiday planned in a couple of weeks and he's planning on lowering the height of the back garden fence, maybe we can take a trip to B&Q while he's on holiday to shop for some pretty annuals, plants that live all year long.

On to our tiny front garden then... 

New additions to our rose bed

Do you remember my pretty rose cuttings, taken from a bouquet gifted to me by my dear best friend Miriam?  They'd been carefully nurtured all through last winter and finally put outside in their pot only to be set upon by magpies!!  They'd even grown tiny rosebuds!!

Well, I moved them and for a while they were safe until, again with the attacking magpie!  Something needed to be done honeys so the decision was made a few weeks ago to bed the remaining, precious cuttings in the front garden.  So that's what we did :)  On a lovely sunny day, they were bedded in, fed and watered and (touch wood) two of the three cuttings seem to be doing just fine out there :)

I'm so hopeful that they'll take root and thrive.  Can you imagine how beautiful our tiny rose beds would be with Gramma's fabulous bright pink roses, Mum's gorgeous red roses and, hopefully the cuttings, which when they grow buds (which they've done twice now! magpies!!) are a stunning shade of vanilla cream.

Speaking of our other roses, as you can see in the photo above, we had quite a windy mini storm that robbed Mum's beautiful roses of their petals but they'll grow again  and I did get some photos before the winds...
Mum's Roses
Gramma's rosebush is far more established and weathered the storm far better.  It's been through storms before, and when the storm was over it still had this gorgeous bloom low down on the branches...
Gramma's Beautiful Rose

Far higher up the branches were these gorgeous buds beginning to bloom...
Lots of gorgeous rose buds about to bloom
I had assumed these roses survived the winds because this rose bush is the oldest, and more established but thinking about it, maybe it's because they are sheltered by the huge lemon cypress shrub directly behind them?

So, that's a slightly sad update from the garden for this month honeys. I'll leave you with some pretty summer roses to (hopefully) make you smile :)
Summer Roses
Another month gone honeys, this has been such a fun link up, do please check out the other bloggers taking part, and huge thanks as always to the lovely ladies organizing the Picture Perfect Project:

The Picture Perfect Project
Beth at Our Pretty Little Girls
Courtney at Sweet Turtle Soup
Desiree at Macke Monologues
Elizabeth at Chasin' Mason
Stephanie at Wife Mommy Me
Whitney at Work It Mommy

Thank you, lovely ladies, for letting me be part of this fabulous project x

If you've missed my other posts in this link up you can find them here:

January - Snow & The Garden Sleeps Beautifully..
February - Last of the Winter Holly
March - Spring in the Garden 
April - April Showers Bring May Flowers..
May - Sunshine & Fun in the Garden
June - Garden Smiles :)
July - Tales From the Garden..
Aug - Roses, roses everywhere..

Till next time dear ones, smile lots and hug even more :) Huggles always xxx

2 comments:

  1. aww that makes me sad. Our yard is surrounded on two sides by trees and then the neighbor's fence on the other side, so it's a little sanctuary. I would be totally bummed if it were any different. Trees always look so naked when they get a trimming. But taken to the stump, crazy.

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    1. Hi Courtney, thank you for understanding x I so loved those trees, I cried for the best part of two days after they took them away. I know they'll grow back eventually but our garden feels so empty and soulless now. I'm hoping I'll have some prettier garden pics to share for the next PPP post. We may not have our trees anymore but we can try to make what's left pretty with the new bench and maybe some planters. Thank you so much for visiting, sending heaps of huggles always xxx

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