I rather like having a wander round the garden after a holiday, seeing what’s changed, what’s appeared and what’s on it’s way out…

…the roses are not bad for half way through September. This one is called Champagne Moments, one of my favourite roses for flower power, the only downside being it only has a gentle scent. It’s usually a creamy white, but for some reason these particular blooms look blush pink,maybe it was the early evening light!

The clematis over the arch by the patio still has a few flowers, despite me giving it a good hack before I went away. They looked lovely with the sunlight behind them.

This is actually a clematis shrub, it doesn’t seem to be grown very often but I like it for it’s late blue flowers. It’s decided to grow rather sideways this year over the path!This is one of the plants I bought at Harrogate show this year, it’s a Rudbekia, I wasn’t sure about it at first as the first few flowers looked pretty weedy and insignificant, but just look at it now, covered!!, It’s pretty big too, about 30″ tall, makes quite a statement!

I planted this heather just before I went away, having treated myself on Otley market, heathers are quite useful for early autumn colour.

This euonymous alatus or spindle tree is part of my newly planted autumn border. It’s just starting to turn red. In years to come I’ll hopefully have a good display of autumn colour.

The leaves of the cotinnus coggyrhia look amazing next to the pieris planted underneath. As you can see I’ve left a few allium seedheads and astrantia flowers to add a bit of winter interest, if they last that long.

There was a little parcel waiting for me when I got home, a memory pebble for Zach, it’s a natural stone carved with his name, only about 3-4″ round, a company called Villager Jim make them, I thought they were a nice subtle memorial to have in the garden, tucked away in a quiet place.

The overall picture of the garden is still very green, hopefully this week I’ll have chance to do some more tidying.