Lil's return

She's back, full of the joy of life and completely unaware of how close she came to meeting her maker. Yesterday, for the first time since the accident, my lovely Lily was allowed to run off her harness (she can't have a lead yet because of the injury to her neck) did she enjoy it! I, on the other hand, was on tenterhooks in case she jumped too high, or ran too fast, or (God forbid) picked up a stick and swallowed it.

We were out for just 30 minutes, as opposed to her usual two hours, but when we got home she crashed out as though she had been running all day.

I took her to my favourite place in the whole world, along the Greensand Ridge to a place called Boughton Monchelsea (http://www.boughtonplace.co.uk/). From the ridge you look out over an ancient deer park to the Weald of Kent below. We walk there often, and I always come away from it feeling uplifted.

Anyway, things are thankfully getting back to normal...lots of gardening and pottering about the allotment, a fair bit of design work, and rehearsing for a play I'm in in the autumn, 'Stepping Out', which involves learning to tap dance! Now I'm no Cyd Charisse but I'm really enjoying the old step ball change and cramp rolls - even though it was so hot last night that we were all begging for mercy after two hours!

One more final pic of Lil and I promise I won't bore you any more. It's just so great that she's survived it

Lily and Hampton Court update

All those lovely people who have expressed concern for my beautiful Border Collie Lily will be pleased to hear that I picked her up today. We have had a few scares over the last two weeks and it has been touch and go as to whether she would survive, but she's home! She's looking a bit battered and bruised and gets tired quickly, but it's wonderful to have her back again (I realise that the non dog-lovers amongst you will find all this completely incomprehensible).

Anyway, on to RHS Hampton Court Palace Flower Show. I tried to keep a journal each day and failed miserably, of course, but here are some of the scraps I managed to record:

23 June: Arrived at the site at about 7.30am having left home at 5.45. The RHS have removed the turf on our plot, but that's all. Just a 6 metre by 4 metre rectangle of bare earth which over the next two weeks will be transformed into our garden. By the end of a very hot and difficult day we had pegged the garden out, taken levels and started digging...

30 June: (Did I say I had diligently kept at record? No, I did not.) Up at 5.30am to hand over the plants I've been nurturing at home to Quentin (Stark, our brilliant nursery man) to transfer them to Hampton Court with all the rest. It's wonderful having the plants here now, although I think I've gone overboard on the quantities. The advice is to decide what you'll need then order another 60%, but I think I'll only use a quarter of what's been delivered.

The trees are in! It took a fork lift truck and 4 big, strong men plus Wendy, and God knows how we'll get them out again...but they are so beautiful. Slender and white stemmed, leaves trembling in the breeze.

It's now 8.30pm and I'm so tired that as soon as I get to Jodie's (my neice who lives about 2 miles from HC) I'm going to bed.

1 July: Spent the morning cleaning the three clumped birch trees. I've got one of those E-cloth things and it was brilliant at cleaning algae from the trunks and branches. Had to be careful not to damage their peeling bark and it took ages,but it was worth it. They have emerged even more beautiful than before.

Strangely, although I've been looking forward to it for ages, I was scared to start the planting. I kept finding other things to do to delay the moment. Finally, when I couldn't put it off any longer, I plunged in with a grouping of Veronicastrum, Sanguisorba, Orlaya and some catmint. I did prepare a planting plan, but I don't like to stick slavishly to them. It all depends so much on the individual plants that I prefer the freedom of designing as I go but with a rough framework provided by a plan. This is especially true of this garden. I really want it to look as though it hasn't been especially planted out but has just happened, in a very relaxed sort of way.

I didn't finish planting until about 8.30, then ate at Pizza Express in Hampton Court for the second night running, totally exhausted and glad to be staying with Jodie.

There is more to come, promise, if anyone's interested. Now the pressure's off and the show's over I'll update the blog more frequently. We still, however, have to break the garden up and leave the site as we found it, so back on the chain gang tomorrow!

Lovely Lily

I know some gardeners aren't keen on dogs, but I am. I have a beautiful Border Collie called Lily, and last week, while I was building the Hampton Court garden, I got a phone call from a neighbour to say Lily had swallowed a stick while being walked. To cut a very long and distressing story short, a stick measuring around 8 inches went down her throat, pierced her oesaphagus and (it was initially thought) entered her lung.

The reason for this additional post today is that after writing the first one, all jokey and upbeat, I suddenly felt disloyal. Isn't that stupid? So I thought I'd share this with you. She's going to be OK I think. She's had two operations, one to remove the stick and one to patch up the internal damage it had done. She's alert and drinking and eating small amounts, and I'm hoping to have her home some time next week. The moral of this story is 1) don't throw sticks for dogs and 2) there are more important things in life than winning flower shows