Gardens visited today

Testing whether I can allow peeps to peek at an album. Garden Photos (Click on 'Garden Photos' to bring up the album in Yahoo Photos, a separate browser.) Finding this link I think I've also solved my problem about the links starting with a bullet on a new line. Yeah, yeah, it takes time and once you'd done it you (me) are (am) brill but it's a beggar wading through. Anyway, if this works, you can see some pix of gardens I visited today. I must have been drawn to water features .. maybe it's the Aquarius in me. Let's see!!!! (how exciting!) Yayyyyyy, that seems to have worked! This way I don't have to have a page as long as your arm if there are lots of photographs to view. Phew, guess who's grinning now? So, cake .... I succumbed. At The Cottage, a garden loved and cared for by Bob Lightsey and Neville Edwards, there were some delish looking cakes including a Cinnamon Swirl, which Bob had baked ... I suspect he had a hand in the bright pink strawberry cake but there was also pecan and chocolate cake as well as scones! The guys' garden was really appealing with little nooks and crannies, a shaded area, which in their garden flourished, a garden hut (like a beach hut) with decking in front with comfy chairs and overlooking a pond. They certainly know how to recycle, too ... see the 'garden' made out of an old washing machine. In my garden it would be a heap of metal. In theirs it's a sight to behold! Well, it just didn't seem right to have a cup of tea and not sample Bob's baking! The gardens in Sutton were open for charity, under the National Gardens Association scheme. Marigold Cottage garden tended by Stephanie Lee and and her mother, Betty, is in the Daily Telegraph Good Gardens Guide for 2005. Stephanie is a consultant in garden design and I'd say she knows what she's doing! The Driftwood garden pictures, the 75 year old Phyl Shaw said she wasn't happy opening her garden since it wasn't up to last year's standard - due to the weather and she hadn't yet planted her borders properly. See the border picture? If that's not proper I'll eat my hat. Owners of the Moorhen garden, Philip and Michele Hurst, had a Monet type bridge (cept in metal) over their pond which was filled with koi and even had a sturgeon lurking at the bottom and looking at the fish that was the best place for it! Once again, a very pretty summerhouse. Next time I'm asked if I know of any gardens for a magazine feature, I can say YES!!!!