JPM Gardens

As evidenced by the number of posts I manage to make here you can be pretty sure that I a not that much of a dedicated Blogger, I have lots of other calls on my time, family, work, bands, orchestras etc. etc.

My work will always take quite a lot of time and effort, to a great extent that is the nature of self employment, when you are self employed there is no Human Resources Department, no Marketing Department, no Accounts Department, no IT Department to help out we have to do it all.   Well I have made one small adjustment and have started another blog, but one that will not require much in the way of regular updating but one that I hope people will enjoy looking at.

Basically it is just a series of photos of jobs I have done, flower beds, patios and steps.   A little bit of this and that, all the things in a garden that need doing I that I do.

Pop over and take a look at JPM Gardens

Frustration

This weather has really been getting to me.   As always this is a difficult time of year for a gardeners, but this year I do seem to be particularly short of funds, I have work in hand but nothing really substantial, rather than any one big job I have quite a few small ones, but this does mean that although I should be earning wages (when I can work) but nothing or not much in the way of profit.

However trying to be positive I have been able to do a bit of practice, mostly on Trombone, and catch up with a bit of admin, I have to say that my heart isn't in it though.   At least it's better than when I was trying to ply my trade as a pro musician, I remember one year with no work at all from new years eve till Valentines day, now that was tough.

A day at the Museum

We had a little more snow on Wednesday, not much but it certainly didn't do much in the way of aiding the thaw, so yesterday morning once again I looked out and saw settled snow, with the same again this morning, not much but enough to stop me doing any of the work I have in hand, as well as the lack of income I am beginning to get stir crazy, I need to get out and dig, chop, or lop something. I find it very depressing and frustrating when I have work to do, customers waiting, but the weather won't allow it. It is quite nice to have the time off, but when it's not my plan, when I am not in control, not making the choice then it gets very frustrating. And, I need the money to be coming in, especially with income tax due at the end of the month.

At least we did get out for a bit yesterday, as it was my wife's birthday she took the day off and we spent a pleasant couple of hours visiting the Horniman museum. We particularly like the aquarium and the musical instrument gallery, but there is a pretty eclectic collection here, based on the original Horniman collection donated to Londoners back in 1901. It was nice to just spend a bit of time together, just the two of us, no daughter or Mother craving attention, no customers needing stuff done.


After that she went to visit her mother in Hospital (knee replacement) and then we had a nice dinner and a bottle of wine at home. So not such a bad day really ~ if I could just get some work done.

Frosty

Wednesday mornings I go to an early morning prayer meeting at my Church, at the moment this means getting up early (for me) and getting out while it is still dark and before breakfast.   By the time we are finished it has got light and we can begin to see something of the day.   This morning that meant frost and mist.   Walking back home through the local park I was struck by the beauty of the trees covered in frost, I was quite sorry that I didn't have my camera with me.

When I got home I could see some details of the garden picked out by the frost, turning the ordinary into the extraordinary.   While I am not particularly looking forward to going out into the cold again to do some garden work, I am cheered by the beauty of these images.

 

Later today I will be cooking for the final session of the Alpha Course we have been running, this will be quite a big deal, since it is the last night I will be preparing a three course meal including a hot dessert, and as yet I haven't even done the shopping.   So I am in for another busy day, set in a busy week, and next week I start my two days a week in the office, as well as all the gardening work; and this is meant to be my quite time!

A thing of beauty

I may have mentioned that this is a busy period for me, so time for both blogging and Playing are rather limited. I do hope to find a little time next week, but at the moment I am so busy and have so much admin to catch up on I don't know how or when.   I did manage my second outing on Bass Guitar this weekend, I shall try to post about that later, today I want to show you some f the work I have been doing.

As well as all my regular maintenance work I do other extras, I have recently started working on a project that all in all will probably take me till the end of the year to complete. Stage one was to demolish and remove a concrete shed, I sub'ed this out, and am very glad I did as it actually turned out to be a bomb proof workshop left over from the last war. The house is very near what was a major airport at the time and the owner was engaged in important technical war work so he had a very large solid work shop. Once this was demolished and the ground cleared it was my turn, I put in a wooden base for a new wooden shed, and have just built a compost system. Now I know not every one will agree with me but I think this is not only practical gardening, and good ecological practise, but is also a thing of beauty.

I know that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I find beauty in this, so maybe there is a chance for all of us and that in someone's eyes we are all beautiful

New Toys

Today I have spent a small fortune on new toys.   On Saturday it is my daughter's birthday, for ages she has been lusting after a proper digital SLR. She had more or less set her heart on a Cannon, but I felt we should at least have a good look around to see what else is on the market, and make sure that whatever we got did what she wanted and was comfortable to use.   I didn't have too much on this afternoon so we took a little trip to our local camera warehouse.   All the staff there know their stuff and are very helpful.  Since they are enthusiasts they don't mind spending time chatting.   I'm glad we did since when we tried them all we ended up with a Nikon.   It was a good deal and she is happy with how it feels and operates.   So result then!

I also bought myself a new toy.   I now have three chain saws, two of them won't even start, I tried to get them repaired but was told that they are too old and the parts aren't available.   I suspect that they are perfectly repairable but I don't have the time or the inclination to try myself.   After a fair it of consideration I decided it was easier and probably cheaper to just buy a new one.   I have a couple of jobs looming where I could really do with it, indeed it will probably hit payback within a few weeks.   There is also the element that knowing I have it available I know I can take on pretty much any job now.

I now have a working chain saw, hedge trimmer and strimmer, next I need to sort out my mowers.

Cut and Run

There are some really good things about my work, for one I can normally see what I have done, and most gardens look better when I leave than when I arrive, and that makes people happy. I started with a new customer today, pretty much all I did was cut her grass. However this made a big difference to the overall look of the garden and she was very happy to start getting her garden back.

Before I got started

It doesn't sound too much but the whole thing had to be strimmed before I could even think about getting a mower on to it. As we had more rain earlier in the morning the whole thing was pretty wet, in places sodden. As I started cutting with the strimmer a fine spray of water came off the grass, making a mist all around me. I was working with the strimmer for about two hours, and that was interspersed with raking up the cut grass. Only after I had strimmed the lawn, and raked up all the cuttings could I get my mower on. even then with the blade at it's highest setting it still clogged up, however after going over it twice I think it looks quite respectable, but I am exhausted, and my right forearm is almost in spasm..

The Supervisor

For a large part of the morning I was supervised by a large black cat, not sure he was impressed by the noise and the destruction of cover, still he stayed around to make sure I did the job properly.
There is a lot more work to do in this garden, but it is more a process than a makeover, I will be there for a few hours every couple of weeks from now on. After this start I should have it looking reasonable after a few visits, and next year it will be a real garden again.

Finished

That's about it on the work front today, but this evening I will be playing a big concert at the Fairfield Hall with the Croydon Symphonic Band.    Assuming that I manage to get any work done during the day I shall be making a quick change into my concert kit before getting over to the concert hall for a final run through before the performance.   Then on Thursday evening we have a meeting with my daughters teachers, all about A levels, she's only just half way through GCSEs and we have to start thinking about A levels and sixth form already. Like it says on the right I am many things, Gardener, Husband, Father, Musician.......

The House that Paul Built

 A couple of weeks back I was installing the concrete base for a new green house. This base is approximately 3.5m but 2.5m but 10 cm at the thinnest but about 30 cm at the thickest (to allow for the slope) the nearest level place I could put the concrete mixer was about 20 - 30 meters away from the site of the green house. this meant that all the liquid concrete had to be carried in buckets 20 meters and up 35 steps ~ by me.    By the end of the day I was totally shattered and quite glad of my visit to the osteopath.    This is the first time I have had to do a job like this and I was hoping that I had done it right, as I also had to build the greenhouse.  

Well I have now more or less completed the greenhouse as well. This is the first time I have built a green house so I didn't know how long it would take, or quite how complicated it would be.

 

Of course it would have helped if the instructions had been printed in English, rather than something that looked like English, had all English words, but didn't make sense in any language I know. It also would have been good if the holes had been the same size and shape as the glass, I had to make a few adjustments.

Overall I am pretty pleased with the results so far, and the customer is very happy. I still have to put in the automatic vent controls ( they have to be placed in a fridge for half an hour before being fitted) and there are a couple of things, like a replacement for the pane of glass that got broken, I am waiting for before I can really be finished.

Now I am feeling very tired, with a lot of aches and pains from lifting, stretching and getting into some pretty odd angles, so I am looking forward to another session with the osteopath tomorrow, I am definitely in need of the the ministrations.

Progress - sort of

Last week I put up some photos of the job I am currently engaged on, well despite the bitter weather I have been able to make some progress so here are a few more

New raised bed, with rose

This job was originally in three parts. First clear the garden area at the back of the house - this meant removing three large conifers quite a few ash trees and lots of lilac that was spreading everywhere.   As the undergrowth disappeared it became obvious that one of the pear tress and the cherry tree also had to go.   There was also a paved path of rather nasty old concrete slabs and lots of large bits of broken concrete.   The resulting cleared area was then going to be seeded with a meadow flower mix with stepping stones through to the bird feeders and nesting boxes.   On one side of the garden there is a shared drive to access  garages, this is often used as a public cut through and hiding pace for those engaged in nefarious activities.   To add to her feeling of security I put up a trellis the full length of this fence.   The fence is not straight or level so the trellis also looks a little off, but it will make her a bit more secure.



New trellis full length of fence

The next stage would be to clear the wasted area beside the house, breakup and remove the pored concrete and remains of the brickwork that had once been raised beds.   The house had been extended into this area something like six years ago and it hasn't been used since.   In the course of clearing the area I found quite a lot of builders waste from when the extension was built.   This really annoys me, it would only have cost the builder a small amount to tidy up and finish the job properly, instead it is left for the next contractor to sort out his rubbish.   Well after clearing all the vegetation - mostly brambles and nettles but again a couple of trees - another lilac and a sycamore along with a Philadelphus I could start breaking up the old concrete, this proved to be of variable quality and thickness.   I had expected to have this all broken up by now and looking to start finding my levels.

Trellis attached to old wonky fence

Breaking up old concrete

The final stage was to be a deck across the width f the back of the house and going round the side to overlap the paved area.   This would allow me to leave the existing drain and man hole covers, ad make up for some pretty wonky levels without too much excavation.   I had a good idea of the finished garden in my minds eye and rather liked the "feel" of it, I was planing to have a rail at the edge of the deck, which would be on two levels with the slats running in chevrons, the straight lines of the deck contrasting with the softness of the meadow which would blur the harsh straight lines of the fence and the deck.

Well on Thursday the customer threw me a bit of a googly.   She now wants to replace the fence on the other side of the garden and have paving all the way around with no deck.   Someone had told that you get rats under decks and that has put her right off.   This meant that I spent all day yesterday getting prices, making calculations and typing up fresh estimates.   The only actual progress I made on the job was to get rid of my first load of waste (she won't let me have a skip)

This is the biggest job I have had since starting the business, and is rapidly becoming the most complicated as well.

Hard work

Today has been hard work, in many ways just hard slog, but also good rewarding stuff.   One of my customers has been concerned about her pond for ages, it would be filled up, then g down a few inches in short time.   Obviously there was leak, rather than tr to patch I decided tat the best thing to do was to empty the while thing our and put in a fresh liner.   This would also give me he opportunity t level up the edges; when it is was put in there doesn't appear to have been a spirit level available!.

The pond itself is a nice natural type pond with broken paving slabs around the edge over gravel ad some feature rocks.   There are a few plants and lots of frogs, newts and even some toads but no fish.   Today I emptied out the pond, lifted all the slabs and rock, and cleaned up the gravel.    I managed to raise the side that was low with some soft sand and put in the new liner and filled with water.

By this time I had lost the light so I will have to go back tomorrow to finish dressing the pond.   The rocks and paving will go back more or less as they were but I have divided the plants which should leave a bit of room for the amphibians.   I will try to get a couple of photos when I am finished.

Although I really want to get this pond finished I could have done without working tomorrow, as I want to make sure that I am proper set for Sunday, and I need to pick up all the band kit in the afternoon as well, oh well who wanted an easy life anyway?