Red & Yellow & Pink & Green, Purple & Orange & Blue (well not pink and orange)

I can nearly paint a rainbow!

Our deck plants needed a little realignment recently. The gorgeous zygos we lovingly planted in the planter box - excellent soil, top notch mulch, watering system - were not doing well. Turns out they don't like excellent soil, top notch mulch or much water. We were killing them with kindness when all they wanted was to be left alone. Being a succulent (wonderful what you find out when you do a google search) they like to live rough.

So the planter box is now full of marigiolds, they love to be pampered, and the zygos have been rehoused. A quirky planter stand has been welcomed onto our deck and we went in search of colourful pots. Now we live in a world that values all things grey. Tasteful grey. Trendy grey. Sophisticated grey. Boring grey. No such thing as colourful pots, unless you call dark green and a deep dark blue colourful!

Solution? Paint terracotta pots. I still have all the colours of the rainbow from my recent acts of eccentricity, so, voila, matching purple, blue, red and green pots. And it was fun too! I confess to going a little crazy and painting a few others at the same time. The zygos now live happily, if a little neglected, in the colourful pots. They are watered rarely and are loving it, they look better already.

By the greatest of coincidences Ruprecht was helping someone out with her new computer and he admired her beautifully hand painted pots. Turns out she paints terracotta pots too. Two of her pots now grace the deck and next year, when she has her studio up and running, I'm going to have art lessons! No pot, or indeed any blank surface will be safe.

So our deck area is becoming less and less tasteful, trendy or sophisticated by the minute. Love it!

Added to that Ruprecht has just finished installing a K9 letterbox (non Dr Who fans will need to google that). At least he's grey! Happy to be the local wierdos. It's a tough job but someone's got to do it.