So. Here we are again I’m back in Spain. Just for a change. This is my summer routine now. I shall be here a lot. I have dates booked through to December. Well New Year.

I drove down the wiggly round again late on Thursday night to pick up Ian from the airport – which always gives me time to reflect. This time to reflect on the last 12 months. . Well it is a long and wiggly road.

What have I learnt? ~ learning a foreign language is harder the older you get. That the Spanish don’t mind you making a plonker of yourself. They like it that you try. Not that you try to be a plonker. That you try speaking in Spanish. But I am trying. Ian says that constantly. Especially when I get my words mixed up in a restaurant. I’m still not allowed to order certain things – my accent is poor. That’s great coming from a Glaswegian. But he’s right. I’ve learnt that I love the Mediterranean diet. It’s worked wonders for my waistline. Shame it’s two weeks off and three weeks on. Like the inches. Two off. Three on. We’ve made new friends. Oh. There are lots of things. So why reflect on the last 12 months?

Well. It’s a year ago this week I collected the keys to the new house. We were at Chelsea when we had the call. We had completed. The house was ours

The next day I was on that flight. This year no Chelsea for the first time in 25 years. Big school boy error. But I was here to celebrate. I just had to live Chelsea from the blog posts of other bloggers. Who collectively saw more than I ever do, discussed it in so many different ways and photographed it from ever available angle. Except as one of my favourite bloggers Jack Wallington said. Not through the garden. You get front. Back. Side views. Enough. That’s Chelsea. So last week.

It was this time last year I was also on my way to collect Ian from the airport so he would have his first sight of the house since we completed. Friends have asked has the novelty has worn off yet. Are we bored? The same people who asked me if I was bored once I retired. The answer was then No. the answer now is doubly no. I don’t like the new house and garden. I love it. The good thing is that so does Ian. Phew.

It’s been a great year. Lots of visitors who I think have loved the house the garden and the lovely white town of Competa as much as we have. Frequent flyer points. Spanish lessons. Tapas. Lots of. New friends. A whole new experience. The aches and pains of s new garden. Gardening on a slope. Difficult soil where there is soil. Dry. Heat. Rain heat. Mosquitos. But new plants. New scents. New adventures.

So we get back at the house at 2am. All I want is to sleep. Ian gets the last flight out on a Thursday or a Friday once or twice a month now he is working again after a 3 month break. He straight away notices that the Bird of Paradise on the path from the gate had flowered.. I never think he notices much but even at this time of the night he sees the beauty that is the flower. ( to be honest he notices more than I give him credit for. I didn’t think he’d notice the new jug either which is strategically placed out of his eyeline! – he did )

He went straight for the blue and white bird of paradise – Strelitzia Nicolai – one flower on the large plant. We had one flower last year and they are pretty stunning. This one does look like a bird in flight. Even in the poor light he manages to see something new in the garden. Wait till tomorrow when he sees it in the daylight. Will have to think on my feet. Is that pot new? Oh no. It’s very last year.

A few days later I notice a second flower. Magic. Doesn’t take much to keep me happy.

This spring has been magnificent for the Strelitzia Reginae. The one in the pot has been blooming for ages and there are at least nine stems ready to flower. The ones planted in the garden are smaller and the flowers not so showy. But this one stands heads and shoulders above every other one.

A year on I still got excited at what appears in the garden. I have done a full year now and we have had a pretty wet winter and a cold Spring. Yes. I know it’s all relative compared with the weather in the Uk. It’s not been as constantly wet or as cold but there have been extremes here. It didn’t just rain. It chucked it down for weeks – the reservoirs filled up. Bits of road washed away. A river ran through our bank for three weeks. But the gardens looked good and the wildflowers were amazing. Oh. And it doesn’t look like water restrictions will be in place during the hot summer months.

Nature is a wonderful thing which none of us can control.The roundabout which isn’t a roundabout at the back of the house was awash with wildflowers and the verges on the way out of town a veritable jewel palette. But they disappear as quick as they arrive. Now the sun has come in full force they have gone. Here today. Gone tomorrow. I keep telling Ian that’s why I have to come out so often. I’m scared I might miss something.

Back in the garden I continue to get excited. I cut back some oleander which had gone crazy – and found a pomegranate. I know. How do just find a large tree. WeI did which I noticed a few weeks later to be in flower. They are gorgeous these flowers. I can’t stop looking at them to make sure they are real. I shouldn’t really as I have to trample over other stuff to see them. The excitement of getting my own fruit in the garden. Who would have thought that the 12 yr old in Cardiff buying pomegranates for about one month a year and eating them with a pin would one day hopefully have his own. Fingers crossed they continue to form the fruit. I must dig out some pins. That’s how we ate the fruit in the 70’s. Cut in half and picked out with a pin or was it just me?

Before I went back to London two weeks ago I planted the red geraniums in the wall planter. Which gives it a true Mediterranean feel. Shame the night after I planted them there was a storm and the wind took the tops of 4 of them. But they have recovered and I think look great. Right plants for the right space.

Talking of the right plants for the right space. We have a pretty large bottle brush – Callistemon – at the back of the house. Now I’m not a great lover of these. But hey. In the right space with a nice blue sky they add a fair bit of colour to the garden and this one will need a bit of trim in the Autumn as it’s getting too straggly.

But I’ve changed my mind. In a Mediterranean setting it works. Well I think so anyway.

The pineapple guava ( Feijoa sellowiana) is starting to flower. Only a few so far but the two bushes we have are full of buds. The flowers are so pretty and the petals are edible. Not that I have yet. But I will.

The fruit which comes later I tasted last year. They are a bit of an acquired taste. A friend likened then to germolene. Trust me if they smelt like it they be dug out and burnt. That and TCP must be top of my list for awful smells. Can you still get them!

We have a lot of succulents all around the garden but don’t ask me what one this is as I have no idea. I need to get a book and look them up. But this one is flowering for the first time. Well the first time since we have been here. I’m interested to see what flower it has. But these things are lethal to a gardener who doesn’t wear gloves. And wears shorts. Talk of spiteful. They spike me every time.

We have a number of these dotted around. Most are now in flower and add a welcome bit of orange to the garden. I’d photograph the ones on the bank. But I’ve said before. The bank is steep and takes no prisoners. I have already slipped once and I have no intention of slipping again. It’s not a pretty sight and I don’t want to be laying there for days.

I bought alliums from Peter Nyssen this year to see if they would grow in the new garden. I admit to the random planting of a couple here and there. Not in any designer way but largely to see if the area was suitable and would they grow! By and large it’s a yes. One or two spectacular fails. One planting that needed a helping hand from the twitterati to identify – allium summer drummer – but now I know where they work and grow well I will be on the old computer box to place an early order. Next year I may even label them. Now that will be a novelty.

The allium with verbascum was a random planting. But I like it. The reflections in the pool are alliums that are ever so gently going over. I love the seeds heads and hopefully the Higgledy seeds of calendula and nigella are going to keep coming. So far so good. I also scattered other seed there too. Yep. Another don’t ask.

This was a random planting on the bank. Dry. Poor soil. Not deep soil. But the flower heads are some of the biggest in the garden. Next year there will be more. If I can get on the bank.

The work on the prickly pear continues. A weekly dose of a neem oil/water mix sprayed all over has resulted in some pretty good and clean new growth. That will keep Ian happy. In London he loves his tree ferns . Here he likes the large palms and the cactus.

I’ve planted pots. Not too many as they need watering . But I bought some portulaca for the white wall planter. But they didn’t work so I’ve planted hem in Pots. Good choice. . Boy. They are so colourful.

As well as these there are the obligatory geranium pots to brighten up the terrace. Yes. You did probably hear someone – Ian – say. No more pots.

We have a large grape vine over the terrace. A black grape. We didn’t have too many off the vine last year but this year there are a lot of buds.

The shoots are all tied in and it’s beginning to give some good shade. We won’t be making wine that’s for sure but if I get enough to make grape and rosemary jelly I’ll be happy.

The garden is definetly a spring and autumn garden. It’s nice in summer but the heat of July and August usually means things either go dormant or slow down. And you have to water. So a lot of the garden has drought tolerant plants.

These hotentot figs –Carpobrotus edulis have been in flower for weeks now. These two if turned over looked like a hat at that recent wedding. You know the one. You watched it. We all did. Just some won’t admit it.

The last time I touched one of these plants I had s mad dash to the pharmacist as I stupidly then touched my eye. It’s poisonous. But smells like pop corn. That’s probably why it’s called the pop corn Senna. Well it’s flowering and I realised what it was as my legs brushed past it and the wast of popcorn hit me. Too late. I had to run in and shower. I wasn’t risking it. But it’s a pretty flower and such a shame the whole plant is poisonous. But then sonare many in this garden.

There is so much going on that I’m hoping to be able to sit and enjoy the garden. But I suspect not for long. When you are only here for two or theee weeks at a time you can constantly be in the garden. Often at the end of the day you look and wonder what you have done. But the aching joints tell you you’ve done something.

In contrast our London garden is very very different. A terraced house in South London where we have recently renovated the front wall, the path and added new railings. Window boxes of lavender and new lollipop bays from The Nunhead GardenerOh And there are my favourite agapanthus in pots. All easy to maintain and easy to water. Ignore the bins. That’s the next project.

The back garden is small. Very small but full of pots. The tree ferns are in pots. The foxgloves and the the clematis. All in pots. The garden is fed with alpaca poo courtesy of Lou Archer. Well not Lou but her alpacas obviously. She has s new product which she launched at RHS Chelsea especially for tree ferns. A must have for me when I get back and it’s on her Website

I pinch myself black and blue on a regular basis on how lucky I am to be able to garden in two very different environments. It’s been a huge and steep learning curve here in Spain with some disasters along the way. I’ve planted. Changed my mind. Replanted elsewhere. I bought pink geraniums for the garden. Too pink. Is there too pink? There is.

So I gave them away and bought red. Which is what I wanted at first. I bought a climber that hasn’t climbed so out it’s gone to be replaced by a red Passion flower. And on it goes.

But patience is a virtue. Sadly not one of mine.

So. We m here for another week. How many more plants can I fit in!