Autumn Leaf Hopscotch

The autumn leaves in the south of the UK have been wonderful this year.  I have been seeing fantastic artwork, collages and patterns made from leaves.  This weekend a brief chat with my 7 year old about what use we could put some of the many leaves in our garden led to a eureka moment.  What garden game would be great to play with leaves outdoors?  We came up with autumn leaf hopscotch.  Hope you like the idea.

As it’s such a simple project  the photographs may explain it all. However we had such fun concocting it, counting, sorting, and deciding which leaves to use and then working out patterns for each number I thought I’d share a bit more detail with you.

We used leaves from the garden, but this activity is a great use of all those leaves bought back from an autumn walk that you never know what to do with.  Ours either lie dried up and shrivelled indoors or wet and soggy outside.  Flat leaves seem to work best, but you don’t have to use pressed leaves.  For some leaf shapes turning the leaf to its underside meant it was easier to lay them out.  It also gave us a chance to explore the vein patterns underneath and also note the different colourations.  Some of the leaves were really beautiful on their ‘other’ side.

As for the hopscotch – do you remember how to play?  I had to think twice.  I had played it with my son when he was small and just learning his numbers, but not recently.  He obviously had not played it in the school playground (ever? or in recent past?) Oh dear the demise of playground games.  I’ll be popping a piece of chalk in his pocket this week.  I have a little book which we use as our Games Bible,  called 'The Games Book -  how to play the games of yesterday' which is currently available on Kindle.

Here’s a quick run down of the rules just in case you can’t remember either.  You number squares from 1 to 10 in the pattern shown in the first photo.   The aim is to be the first to finish to square 10.  The game can be played with a group or just one person.  You throw a small pebble onto square one.  If it lands fully within the square you jump over the square containing the pebble left foot in square 2 and right foot in square 3.  Continue hopping and jumping until you reach square ten then turn balancing on one foot and hopscotch back to squares 2 and 3 to pick up the pebble from square one.  If you touch a line, lose your balance or miss a square. Your turn is over and you must start at square one again.  You must never step on the square which has your pebble.

 

 

This is how we spent our Sunday morning - a great way to be out in the clear frosty air.  If I had thought about it I would have used a fir cone instead of a small stone just to complete the autumn theme.

By the way 2 little points to note.  Yes you will step on the leaves and patterns and mess them up, but that can be easily rectified.  It was a lovely calm dry sunny day on Sunday.  This version of hopscotch probably won’t work on a windy day!

 



Stourhead Revisited: The Beauty of Autumn Colour

Last year we visited Stourhead, Wiltshire, one of the best landscape gardens in the country.  It was so beautiful we couldn’t resist returning again this year.

There are over 600 species of trees and shrubs in the landscape gardens assuring a fantastic long-lived autumn display.  The expectation was for a good spectacle of autumn colour this year.  The wet summer helped the trees to produce large numbers of leaves whilst the spell of warmer weather later in the year allowed trees to increase their sugar levels.

We were not disappointed.  We visited slightly later than last year and some trees which had been in full autumn colour had already lost their leaves.  The carpeting of the ground was prefect though.  Other foliage, not in full colour last year was truly stunning.

If you read last week’s post you will know that I saw autumn colours at Wisley with a group of gardening buddies.  This visit turned out slightly different.  It was just me and my seven year old who made the trip.  The gardens are a fantastic space for children.  They have plenty of space to run around, points of interest, a grotto and are great for hide and seek. 

The beauty of the gardens make it almost compulsory to take photographs.  In fact the day we were there nearly everyone was busy with their cameras.  However, of course, I should have realised that it’s not just adults who want to take shots – 7 year olds are pretty keen as well.  So note to self, if I want sole use of my camera then I need to make sure that my son remembers to bring his. 

 

 

I was pretty pleased with the photo of the acer palmatum at the beginning of this post. As we walked away from the tree I noted there was possibly an even better shot from amongst some very ancient rhododendrons.  Click went my camera, thump went my son as he slipped of the branch of the rhododendron he had been climbing.  Silence for a very long couple of seconds and then a tremendous yell.  He had bumped his head and slightly hurt his hand, but thank goodness in the main was fine.

I am a strong proponent of children tree climbing.  However Stourhead with its many ancient specimens is not the location to practise this skill.  The thick branches of the rhododendron were also mossy, very slippery and clearly unsuitable for trainers.  My autumn colour visit to Wisley had been the perfect combination, today I had not achieved that.  But I had learnt a lesson about cameras, 7 year olds and trees not mixing. 

I have no doubt we will be visiting Stourhead again.  And when we do it will be 'remember that time you fell off a tree'- the memory of the glorious autumn colours will be relegated to second.

If you would like to take a look at last year's post here it is.



Share Some Local Autumn Colour

I recently sent out a newsletter featuring the Woodland Trust’s Top Ten Woods for Autumn colour. I hoped it would inspire families to get out into the woods this half term. The list certainly got me yearning for a helping of autumn colour. If I am lucky this week I may get to visit one of those woods on the list Stourhead, not really a wood but a landscape garden.


However I feel I have been really lucky already. On Thursday I visited one of my regular haunts, RHS garden Wisley in Surrey with a group of gardening chums.


 

Its wide range of deciduous shrubs and trees give visitors a lovely selection of autumn colours and vistas. Also unlike some gardens, I have recently visited, the herbaceous borders remain intact ensuring that structure is retained through the garden.

I have been pondering as to why I enjoyed my walk around  such a well visited local garden much more than anticipated.  There is no doubt that the journey there is like visiting an old friend, conferring a level of certainty and comfort. However this time these feelings were tinged with surprise and delight when I saw familiar spots lit up in a different light and colour. 

 

But it may be that the word 'friend' is the key here.  Walking around the gardens with like-minded people and sharing expressions of delight when colourful and beautiful foliage was spotted was a truly enjoyable experience.  Was the sense of well-being I felt at the end of the day due to the walk in the fresh air, stunning vistas or chats with friends?  I'll never know that main cause, but it was the perfect combination.

But it may be that the word 'friend' is the key here.  Walking around the gardens with like-minded people and sharing expressions of delight when colourful and beautiful foliage was spotted was a truly enjoyable experience.  Was the sense of well-being I felt at the end of the day due to the walk in the fresh air, stunning vistas or chats with friends?  I'll never know that main cause, but it was the perfect combination.

This coming week we will be out on family walks in the woods and perhaps that visit to Stourhead.  We had a fantastic time there last year.  It will no doubt be a different sort of shared experience!  Hope you also manage to get out and see the autumn colours close to you.  You may not have to travel far.

PLANTING SPRING BULBS WITH YOUR KIDS

Planting spring bulbs must be one of the easiest kids gardening activities. Many do deserve the label ‘easy grow’. All you need is a trowel, bare patch of soil and bulbs. There are loads of easy grow bulbs. Simply either follow the instructions on the packet or from your supplier. If planting direct into the ground a marker ( made by your kids ) reminding you of their location will mean you may not disturb them.


September is definitely the month for buying and planting the majority of bulbs that will flower the following spring. This year I have already bought mine for planting this year, which meant I had a wide choice at the garden centre.

Narcissus 'Sealing Wax' Bulbs

I choose 40  Narcissus 'Sealing Wax' bulbs which are described as great for inexperienced gardeners and for those that like low maintenance gardens.  I will report back in the spring.

Also in the shopping basket was an old favourite and, perhaps the most popular narcissus of all, Tete a Tete.  I always plant these in pots, which can then be brought close to the house or indoors when flowering. So kids can always easily see what has been grown.  They grow to about 15 cm.  I always plant all of my bulbs slightly closer than the instructions and these I plant always much closer together to make a compact display.

Allium Bulbs

My final item was a selection of allium bulbs. I have not always had a great deal of success with alliums. They are so spectacular and majestic in the border, with such lovely seed heads I am trying again this year.

When planting any bulbs with your children I would always get them to wash their hands after. You may also need to manage expectations. Those spring months are a long way ahead. I always mention to my son that they will flower about the same time as his cousin’s birthday. Connecting their flowering time to mothers’ day may also work.

Another easy grow bulb are grape hyacinths Muscari. You may also remember as a child growing hyacinths in a glass container showing all the lovely white roots.

So if you are wondering what to do in the garden with the children this weekend planting bulbs is your answer. You and your family will be really pleased with your efforts next Spring. Hold out with tulip bulbs though until late October.  They are best planted later in Autumn.

Autumn Colours at Stourhead

We hadn’t planned to visit, but after a whole day of rain we needed to get out for an autumn ramble. Helpfully the evening before Radio 4’s PM programme had interviewed the head gardener from Stourhead.  The passion he displayed for the garden was infectious and helped us to decide that a visit to see the Autumn colours was a must. We were not disappointed.

Situated in Wiltshire just off of the A303 it is one of the best landscape gardens in the world. With tremendous views, situated at the source of the river Stour, which then runs south all the way through Dorset until it reaches the sea near Bournemouth.



Its a great garden for kids, as well as everyone else. There was a tree trail highlighting champion trees and a simple spotter’s guide on offer. However there was no play area. None was needed.

The garden was very busy – lots of people must have been listening to Radio 4. There were lots of families with children and all seemed fully occupied with the endless opportunities for collecting leaves – we played a game matching the red of my son’s jacket, running around, clambering over tree trunks and stumps, jumping in puddles and mud courtesy of the previous day’s rain and playing under branches full of beautifully coloured leaves.



The vistas were spectacular, the light superb and the refection of water from the beautiful lakes mesmerising. No human being could be unaffected by the rich tapestry created by the trees. It is a garden that has a restorative effect on adult and youngsters alike. 

Now enough of me waxing lyrically.  I just hope that everyone sometime somewhere gets to experience such beauty.

Apple Day and the Abundance Project

Picking apples from a tree must be one of the most valued childhood memories. Its great to have apple trees in your garden, but the harvesting, storing and preparation of them can be a mixed blessing. Having given away loads of our apples to family and friends and stored away several box full we were still left with rather a surplus. Kingston’s apple day solved our problem for us.

We took our apples and some empty bottles to Kingston Environment Centre. Here we washed them, cut them up into large pieces and put them, core and pip and skin as well, into an apple grinder. Next the pulp was placed into an apple press. A couple of turns of the screw and hey presto we had our own apple juice. Ours was particularly pretty as the addition of some apples with pink flesh added a perfect blush to juice.

Apple day events are held all over the country usually as close to Apple Day on the 21 October. A friend of mine who lives in a village in Somerset takes all her apple to the village apple press. It would be great if urban communities could have something similar.

Yesterday we learnt how easy it was to make pressed apple juice with just a bit of arm power. I also found out about Kingston’s Abundance Project. There is no more a sorry sight that seeing fruit rotting on the ground because nobody has harvested it. The project aims to rectify this by harvesting the seasonal glut of local fruit, such as apples, pears and plums and redistribute the surplus to the Kingston community on a non-profit basis. A great idea and we will certainly be helping to pick next year.

There is also a national fruitshare scheme where you can register as a fruit seeker of a fruit sharer. Rather like the landshare scheme.  With projects like these lets hope in years to come we will all be eating local apples and fruit going to waste will be a thing of the past.

An Indian Summer in the Garden

I read this week that an Indian summer can only occur in October.  Well if that is the case then ours is about to start tomorrow.  If you are a gardener, love gardens, have a young family then you are going to just love having summer at this time of the year.  Or are you?  It certainly great to extend the time you can get out into your garden and enjoy it.  But is it great for everything.  Are those plants and animals who use temperature to determine their behaviour going to get slightly confused?

In my garden the gains of warm sunny days are:-

• Those green tomatoes that never ripen may actually all turn red this year.
• Its been a great season for raspberries and they are still producing fruit and those apples may just ripen on the tree before becoming fallers.
• For everyone growing pumpkins -  as a plant that does not like the frost, they may just get to stay in the ground until the end of October. 

Being in the garden this time of year enables us to listen to the acorns dropping and spot the squirrels squirrelling away those acorns. We have fantastic spider webs in the garden with highly active spiders for at least the last month. Tonight we are going to take full advantage of the warm, but dark by 7 o'clock, evening and do a torchlight safari.

On the minus side I am still having to cut the grass, with the help of my six year old, who is really keen to have a go at the push mower.   The pots and the remaining vegetables are going to need watering. My harvest of fruit and vegetables is ripening like mad in the kitchen.  So there is an urgent need to store, cook and/or freeze them.

This heatwave must be a goldmine for phenologists ( those who study how plants and animals are affected by variations in climate).  My garden certainly looks a mismash of plants from all seasons.  I have full red holly berries, together with a rose which started flowering in May and still has buds on.  I know in Dorset there are still swallows around and wonder if they will now be leaving later then usual.

I will be making to most of the sunshine and be out in my garden this weekend. Its a great opportunity for everyone else to do the same.

What to do with all those Leaves in the Garden



Making Leaf Mould

We have been making leaf mould in our garden and have done so for the last couple of years. It is an easy gardening activity for children; one that gets them into the garden in the autumn. Leaf mould is organic and involves no carbon footprint. It is simply a case of raking up the leaves, bagging them and storing them, and then waiting.

Here’s how we do it. The garden has leaves mainly from Silver Birch, Goat Willow, Oak and a little bit of Acer. We rake them into piles and bag them up. I know that many people use black plastic sacks. We recycle and use the plastic coverings you get when clothes are returned from the dry cleaners. We like it best if the leaves are dry as they are not so cold to handle. As water is an essential ingredient for leaf mould we place couple of holes in the plastic bag and the add water.

A couple of times I have left some bags of leaves under shrubs and find that as the plastic begins to disintegrate and worms worm their way into the leafy mixture the leaves return themselves to the garden with very little help.


The filled sacks then spend the following 18 months in an old dustbin in the garden. We spread the leaf mould out onto the soil early spring as a kind of mulch. This is another gardening job for the children help with. I have also sieved the leaf mould and used it with potting compost for transplanting seedlings.



Last years leaf mould

 The people at Gardening Organic have more detailed advice about what to do.

But why oh why is it called leaf mould? There is nothing messy or mouldy about it. It doesn’t smell and once rotted down turns into a lovely friable material. The name conveys up images of fungus and stained walls and must surely put some people off. How about calling it leaf compost or leafy soil?  Love to hear your suggestions.

Let me know what you do with the leaves in your garden. Please please don’t say you take your leaves to the local rubbish tip. We find it so simple to recycle them inside our garden and hope you can too.











Gardens to Visit with Your Children in October

The Eden Project Cornwall

Thousands of families will currently be thinking about where to go in the autumn half term holiday with their kids. If you live in London, the South East or Scotland there are some great ideas on garden destinations on kidsinthegarden . The winter garden at Hillier’s garden in Hampshire will be looking particularly good. The Kids Guide has some suggestions for gardens to visit in the North West of the UK.

Most of the RHS and National Trust gardens will have some sort of family event and/or trail available at this time of year. There will also still be plenty to see if you have a botanical garden located close to you.

A good choice this time of year is a visit an arboretum or a garden with woodland. Nothing beats a good play in the leaves. Here the opportunity to pick up leaves, conkers and fir cones should keep everyone amused. We always come away with our pockets full of precious collections. The Woodland Trust has an ‘autumn colour’ search category for its index of 1,000 plus woodland sites across the country.

The Royal Parks in London are all free to visit and all have gardens and/or woodland gardens. As a family we will be visiting Kensington Gardens next week, both the Peter Pan-themed Diana Memorial playground and the outdoor exhibition by Anish Kapoor of large reflective metal structures.  I am intrigued to see what my son will make of them.

I love visiting a Wetlands Centre this time of year.  Not only is it a good time to see the winter birds just arrived in the UK you also get the evocative sound of rustling wind in the reed beds. So they are great places to play sound games with the children.

If you have a favourite garden to visit this time of year please leave a comment and share it with us all.