Do you hope your garden looks as good as last year???

I Do! I was looking through last years photos of my small garden, all in pots and its as lush as a lush thing in lushville. Every year i strive to do as well, and to have it looking better than the previous year...but i have a niggling doubt that it won't be half as good... I lost the Phormium for some reason early this year, and one Nigra bamboo, but replaced it with an Arrowe bamboo. I know it's early on, but I'm sure it looked better last April in comparison?

Better get cracking and i hope it warms up!

Last year:

 

I'd quite like my garden to look one tenth of how good *yours* looked last year!!!!

I've not lived here 2 years (yet) but, I do know that last year it looked better than when I moved in

Interestingly, I was looking at photo's of my own garden in April last year and was so surprised to see a) how much was accomplished from when we first moved; but, b) how much it has evolved since even then! I love how gardens evolve. Even today my garden is different (better? ) from how it was last week

So, in full answer to your question: no! I hope it looks better than last year, ad infinitum

 

We now spend more time in our garden because we retired last year so it's looking alot better slowly

 

I've only had my house (and subsequently my garden) since the end of last summer, so it's all kind of a work in progress still, lol. Maybe I'll take stock next summer, as I hope it'll look a lot different by then!

 

I've abandoned the back garden for now. It's horrible. I'm incapacitated due to injury at the moment but when I'm strong again I'm going to completely change it.

 

This time last year we were in our old house and I miss that garden to the point of heartbreak. I must stop looking backwards though, it's not helpful at all. This new garden is coming along though and I am beginning to appreciate the work we have already done. This time next year it will certainly be better

 

Mine wasn't its best last year as our weather here wasn't great for most of July and August. Plus dahlias in pots just didn't work, so I'm putting them in the ground again this year.
All the weeding I'm doing now will be another factor in how well it turns out.

 

I hope mine does, but in reality, it probably wont.

In a couple of weeks time, I'll be digging the front garden up to lay pipes. This digging should have been completed around November last year. As this will be a building site for most of the summer, the front will certainly look worse.

The rest should be better though. If the plants on order actually arrive and survive...

 

I do love your garden, small gardens are often seen as difficult, but I personally dont think they are. One mistake is to use small plants, but they dont really have any impact, whereas 1 large plant does, and then work around the,.

Its something I have had to adapt to in my current house which has a small garden. I used to have a big garden and my style of gardening was more cottage garden, and it worked. However, when we moved to a new build house with just grass and a fence, they just looked lost, no height, everything looked very flat.

Anyway, I digress, in answer to the original question, yes I do, the structural plants should look even better and I have built around them.

 

That IS lush @simon n , love your little decorative items too

It would have looked better, if I was staying. But I got a new build garden to get stuck into in around 6 weeks time and its an awkward shape, triangled off to a slope but it is mostly flat, there's a strip to the side and I get a shed chucked in too. Just glad I put most of my plants in pots rather than the ground now. Haven't got the guts to go over there with a shovel and start looking at the soil, plan for this year is seed, see how it goes then get digging next year.

 

I think if it was me, I would plant a tree in that spot at the end of thegarden , and then move the shed just in front of it. Do you have kids? If so, how about also making that space behind the shed a little den. That should then open up your garden for whatever you want.

 

Your garden is beautiful @simon n
Mine can only look better because I didn't get much done last year. Between having new fencing put up, a raised bed built and some gravel laid at one end of my back garden, then rubbish wet weather all summer, most of the plants I had in pots stayed in their pots.
This year WILL be better though because I'll be creating a memorial garden for my Mum, who sadly passed away at the end of February after being diagnosed with terminal cancer in January.
That's the plan for my front garden.
My back garden will be used partly for growing veg and partly for growing cottage garden/cut flower plants.
Both gardens are a blank canvas so I'm currently trying to work out what I'll grow and where I'll plant it

 

Hi NCFC Thanks for the ideas, we got a nearly 10 yr old and a nearly 3 yr old. Funnily enough as soon as I saw the corner I thought tree/shed/plants at the back and using the side bit for running round. I did think about digging that bit out and putting some sort of cover over it so it's like a bit of a cave for the kids but it may be too much potch for this year. I've got a choice of 5 trees here already but not sure yet. I also thought of moving the shed on the other side as there's a row of about 15 houses down that stretch and only 3 the side where the shed is now. Think the fence will have to go a bit higher too for more privacy.