Gardening in January

I don 't recommend it. The sun was shining just a tiny bit, so I quickly put my gardening clothes on and headed outside to do battle with the tangle of roots of Sneezewort and Michaelmas Daisies which are heading in all directions and thriving too well in an area I intend to plant a shrub (Viburnum bodnantense "Dawn") which has been languishing in a big planter for 3 years now, being intended as something I was going to take with us and plant in our next garden . . . I have abandoned that hope now, and will put it in when I have finally cleared the Achillea and M.D.s.

I enjoy a challenge, but this one will take a bit longer than the half an hour I managed out there before it started with mini hailstones! The water level was so close to the surface anyway, and although I had my stout kneeling mat beneath me, water was squished over the edges and through the handle cutout! Anyway, I got a complete large rubber trug bucket full of weeds and roots out and I have distributed them to grow on in the wilderness in front of the paddock.

I had my rubbery gardening gloves on but they did little to dispel the cold of the mud that is my long border right now, but I warmed up a bit when I pulled out some half-dead Pansies in a planter and replaced them with some corns I found in a margarine tub in the barn which were wanting to grow and had been overlooked.

One of the positives was that at least the house felt warmer when I came indoors again - we are virtually out of heating oil and no money for any more this winter so things are a tad chilly. Now I'm tucked up on the sofa again, with the wood burner throwing out lots of heat - the best place to be right now.