Keukenhof in particular, and the spring bulb fields of The Netherlands in general, should probably make it to the top of your to-do list if you’re as mad about tulips as I am. Picture a park-like garden, mostly consisting of spring bulb beds and shrubs planted among bright green lawns; now picture old deciduous trees just coming into leaf high ahead. The trees filter the light and the winding river and water features reflect the light here and there, giving the whole garden a rather enchanted atmosphere.

I love these gardens, but because this my third visit to Keukenhof, I genuinely hadn’t expected to see much new. So it was pleasant to be pleasantly surprised: here’s what I found refreshing and extra-gorgeous on this trip:

Bulb fields at the perfect time: On previous trips, I don’t remember the commercial growers’ fields looking so stunning. The drive into Lisse takes you past rainbow stripes of yellow, blue, red and pink; this year we were lucky to see the hyacinths, single early tulips and taller Triumphs just coming into flower. Previous trips brought me here in Week 1 and Week 3 of April; this time, Week 2 was perfect, although warmer or cooler springs will hugely affect what’s flowering when.

Show-garden areas offering stealable ideas: I loved the Keukenhof ‘Inspiration’ gardens, something that may have featured in earlier years but which I’d not seen before (my other trips were with my newborn daughter and other family, and this was the first trip I had plenty of time to linger). Notice the clever use of trompe d’oeil in this girly pink garden — it has mirrors, empty frames suggesting mirrors, and double planters suggesting reflection. Love it!

Another of the Inspiration gardens was this canalside deck, which at the back features raised planters that hold tiny espaliers of apple trees. The seating area is covered to keep out the rain and furnished with casually gorgeous, just-been-styled-for-a-Gardens-Illustrated-photoshoot elegance. Look at this combination of muscari armeniacum album, with pink bellis daisies, along a lace runner over a simple gray wooden table. If this doesn’t conjure the illusion of effortless outdoor-living perfection, I don’t know what does. Large wooden planters at the canalside, some of which seemed to float over the water, hold a combination of dusky purple hyacinth, mixed tulips and anemona blanda.

The joy of block plantings: Ingenious planting combinations at Keukenhof (crocus, chionodoxa, early and late tulips, alliums) are a particular strength of the place, showing how any garden can keep the interest going for 8 weeks in spring. However, I completely fell for this simple combination of Tulip Purissima and Tulip Flaming Purissima, which was repeated in huge rectangles all around the area around the central pavilion. The effect was full, sweet and feminine — like a bowl of strawberry ice-cream (a bride among the tulips looked perfect; I think she was a model on a shoot). Keukenhof always does this to me: it was here I first became betwitched by the Keukenhof ‘blue river’, the mass plantings of muscari armeniacum, and I ended up buying 900 bulbs to carpet a corner of our garden. (Thank God I didn’t get the ones that seed around freely; mine bulk up rather than seeding. I have muscari armeniacum Fantasy Creation, a gorgeous double; pots of this double muscari feature heavily in my Rare Plants for Rare Diseases sale next month). There’s something about Keukenhof that makes me crave mass planting on a grand scale, even if my garden doesn’t have the space for it.

Isn’t it all a bit contrived and un-natural, those bulb beds?

If you think a garden like this isn’t your thing, you may be surprised. No, there’s nothing naturalistic about Keukenhof — “Oh, look, 350 hyacinths in a rectangle”; it’s enough to make Piet Oudolf spin in his grave if he were dead. As breathtaking as I find meadow-style plantings to be, I don’t believe that nor any other loose planting style is the only kind of garden beauty.

Wandering amongst these spring bulb beds, with sun filtering through the breaking buds of the old oaks above, may not make you feel you’ve stumbled on something secret or half-wild. But its formality is wholly a part of its charm. Exploring Keukenhof is like walking through a Klimt design or the contours of a Moorish mosaic: the artistry of the creators, and their mastery over their materials, is part of the wonder.

A few practical notes – make the most of Keukenhof

Don’t worry unduly if you’re thinking of coming to Keukenhof but have limited mobility. Free wheelchairs can be reserved in advance and borrowed for a refundable deposit, and today I also discovered that for €10 non-refundable rental you can borrow an electric mobility scooter. Plenty of older guests get about the garden’s ample 32 hectares with this assistance; I had to use one myself for today’s visit, after badly injuring my foot a few days before.

Do consider bringing a lunch or at least a hearty snack with you; there are plenty of benches and some picnic tables, and a packed lunch leaves you more money for the gift shop.

Thanks, Keukenhof PR team for the press pass; my kids still had to pay, but as my husband was pushing my wheelchair, he came in on my pass. At €14.50 per adult excluding parking — and with children over age 11 paying full price — this is not a cheap outing. But you’re bringing your sandwiches, right? So there you go. Guilt-free and gorgeous. Go!

I’ve decided it’s sensible to keep my gardening New Year’s resolutions short and realistic, but still of a certain scope, so there’s some sense that I’m aiming high and not just planning more of the same in the garden this year.

Last year one of my key gardening New Year’s resolutions was to stop and sit in the garden more (done) and the previous year it was my own personal Eatin’ Project I was planning, trying vegetable growing for the first time (done).

Gardening resolution one – water those vegetables

Speaking of vegetables, this year I will do the edibles better, because I’m resolving to plan my watering properly. The beans and other edibles never had the best chance because my watering was so erratic, but 2012 is the year I will irrigate. Must find a good leaky hose supplier. Suggestions?

Gardening resolution two – force bulbs properly

I will not mess up my hyacinths next winter. This year I could have (just barely) have had them flowering for Christmas but I never brought them in from the cold conservatory to the warm sitting room – I never realized I had to until @imogenbertin set me right. Here in Scotland I have to plant the prepared bulbs in August, as soon as they are on sale, so I can get them into the light by October, and into the conservatory by November. Until now I’ve never known I needed to do a final step of bringing them into the warmth in December, but I will get it right in 2012.

Gardening resolution three – love my window boxes

I’ve never done window boxes well, but this year my mother-in-law gave me books on the subject, the bare windowsills of our roadside cottage here at the market cross are desperate for plant life, and I love the idea of challenging my worst gardening vice – I willfully, spitefully neglect container plants. So, window boxes it is. Secret weapon in the war against my neglectful side: when I prepared the new window boxes last week, I mostly used plants I’ve grown myself, so their said, thirsty faces should (I hope) move me more than the nameless, shop-bought trays of pansies I’ve watched die in my window boxes in the past. I’ve chosen vinca, fern, schizostylis, hosta, hebe, lamium and ivy, along with a rash of bulbs and tubers including cyclamen coum, muscari armeniacum fantasy creation, Kaufmanniana tulips Heart’s Delight, triteleia (formerly brodiaea) and autumn crocus to plug gaps between the plants.

Gardening resolution four – train a stepover apple

It won’t really be a stepover apple, because the single tier I’m planning will be about 90 cm off the ground, so I guess we can call it a leap over. I’ve chosen the Apple Greensleeves on an M106 rootstock, and since it’s on the north side of the short fence, the horizontal cordon will only see the sun if it starts at 90 cm high. I’ll let you know how that one goes. I credit this resolution to Helen, who was tweeting about the stepover apples she was planning; it’s something I’d always wanted to do, and who was I to resist a three-year-old tree on sale for just 9 pounds sterling?

Gardening resolution five – easy cutting garden

Earlier on Stopwatch Gardener I video blogged about how to nip out cosmos to encourage more side shoots and robust flowering, and the US flower farmer Lisa Ziegler who taught me that technique has now inspired me to try her scheme for a 3′ x 10′ cutting garden. It’s meant to be a low-maintenance plot of zinnia, celosia, choice sunflowers and lemon basil. Any advice on telling my husband I plan to remove 30 square feet of lawn?

I really want to know what you all are planning for the new year — please drop me a comment below before you go!

The resurgence of growth in the April garden is magnificent. But as welcome as spring bulbs are, they can make for a patchy looking landscape.

Gardening experts talk a lot about planting combinations, and I have come to appreciate the importance of using plants together, especially spring bulbs with something more weighty like perennials and shrubs. If you’re an old pro, none of these combinations will be new to you, but for newer gardeners, here are a few spring planting combinations worth trying:

Pulsatilla vulgaris and vinca minor: The fantastically fuzzy buds of pulsatilla are marvelous in late March and early April. The out-of-focus blue in the background is the ground-hugging vinca minor: this periwinkle is much easier to manage in a garden than its big brother, the greater periwinkle vinca major. Some gardeners will warn you away from any periwinkle as too invasive, but this is quite manageable in my garden and flowers profusely in April if I cut it back hard in autumn.

Osmanthus delvayii above plain and parrot tulips:This very slow growing shrub is a froth of white for a few weeks in April, and the way it spreads its arms over the tulips reminds me of a tiny flowering cherry tree. Its heavenly, lily of the valley-like scent is fresh and clean, never overpowering. Not to be confused with Osmanthus burkwoodii, which has bigger leaves and smells like toilet duck. The tulips shown here are purple Passionale and the orange parrot, Professor Rontgen, but any pair of contrasting colours would look good.

Emerging roses above fritillaria meleagris: The snakes head fritillary picks up the red tones in the emerging foliage of many roses: here it’s the Portland rose, Rose de Rescht. So many emerging perennials offer wonderful foliage which looks great
next to bulbs and can help disguise their dying leaves. Try to plant the snakeshead where you will see the sun coming through it, so it lights up like an elaborate checked lampshade: otherwise it can look like a dirty purple. I like the white version of the snakeshead even better, and it’s fairly easy to grow from seed; if you can wait a few years they’ll reach flowering size and you can fill a corner of your garden with these elegant little bulbs.

Grape hyacinths with aubretia: Someone else mentioned this combination and I’m so glad I tried it. The muscari hold their heads above the aubretia, which is that fabulous rockery plant that spills its purpleish flowers over stone walls. “We should get more of that,” was my husband’s one and only comment about the aubretia last year. He doesn’t usually say much, so that means something. If you don’t want to find the grape hyacinth appearing all over your garden, snip off the flower heads before they go to seed.

Hyacinth with wild violet, aubretia and vinca minor: I’m not a great fan of monochrome schemes, but this one sowed itself and was winking at me from the border as I was thinking about this blog post, so I had to mention it. I recall wanting an all-blue border at a certain stage in my gardening life, but I got over it.

What I won’t show you today is a picture of my raised bed, which has eight lovely broad bean plants and eight plastic milk bottles (these bottles are God’s gift to the vegetable gardener who needs a cloche or drip tray. I also plant a punctured or bottomless milk bottle next to new shrubs, to give them a good 2-litre drink when I water.) This time, the bottles are covering baby beets and lettuce.

This is why I was saying last year that I wanted to keep my new vegetable patch in a bit of the garden I don’t see from the window: I hate the plastic, fleece, netting and so forth that vegetable growing so often demands. But I’d like my seedlings to survive, so I’ve rolled out the plastic.

Like the hosta halos and wire plant supports that have now disappeared beneath the delphinium foliage, the cloches won’t be eyesores for long; they should be unnecessary in a few weeks, when the frost danger has passed.

What are your favourite planting combinations in your garden? I’d love some more ideas.

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It was pretty awful to end the gardening year with a blizzard on 26 November. Last year it snowed for a month starting just before Christmas Eve, and I thought that was bad. We’ve now had 2 feet of snow in two weeks, with a low of -14 Celsius.

When I was little I loved snow so much I prayed for it, but I have a hard time liking it now. That’s despite having seen how well it protects my plants. I didn’t lose much in the garden this summer, and yesterday I was able to dig out helleborus foetidus from melting snow. It looked like it had just lain its head down for a rest, and it stood up again.

This proof of life was interesting, but it didn’t change the numbness I’ve felt toward the garden since the blizzard. It’s the kind of ennui that defines ennui: defeated, empty, apathetic. Usually on a tea break or before falling asleep I wrap myself in thoughts about the garden: plans for new roses, spring planting combinations, schemes to get height into the border. But these last two weeks, the thoughts won’t come. It’s as if the garden had been compulsorily purchased and a high fence erected between me and it.

But today I did five minutes of what could pass for gardening. All I did was push pea sticks into a bowl of hyacinths I’ve been forcing. I got the most fleeting taste of that mad joy – nurturing a plant that needs something, studying its miraculous form, anticipating bloom-time.

Okay, it was barely gardening, but it was enough to dig me out of the snow and help me stand up again.

I’ve written a sonnet about the snow. Want to hear it?

Snow angel

The flakes are smudges on the whiter sky,
its blankness scribbled over left to right
by airy, aimless polka dots of snow;
Its business is silent smothering
of branches, berries, buds that don’t protest,
although I do; the plants have left their things
along the border by the garden wall
and snow is gaily claiming everything,
dizzy and oblivious, like one who
forgets the morning by the afternoon;
The garden’s gone, why do I seek it here?
perhaps the snow knows what it has to do:
protect what has withdrawn into the earth
and mark the place to watch for white rebirth.

The very last of the snowdrops have just gone over. Delayed flowering has made for the loveliest and unlikeliest of bedfellows: snowdrops on crocus, daffodils and tulips emerging together with the hyacinths, and delphinium foliage that’s now growing like a rocket. With so much noisy life finally breaking the winter silence, I’ll be free of all the planning and the purchasing — mostly bulbs, mostly unnecessary, but what else was I supposed to do in January? — and can start planting.

My enthusiasm for the Eatin’ Project is growing — just. After all the faff with early vegetable seedlings and sorting the raised bed, I’m feeling protective towards these baby plants. That said, I have turfed them into the bed already — heavily protected winter cos lettuce, with a pot of carrot seedlings at the middle — both to see if they’re made of strong stuff and because the lettuce, for one, really did look ready. The carrot container is raised that extra bit above carrot fly altitude, and the seedlings are inter-planted with spring onions to throw any highfliers off the scent.

It just doesn’t feel like gardening. In my greenhouse are glossy hellebore seedlings, hair-like snakeshead fritillary seedlings that have just emerged after a year in pots, and white cosmos planted just weeks ago which is already pushing up its first leaves. I look at them and I feel actual joy. They’re all sharing the greenhouse with the newer cos lettuce seedlings — but I look at them and I feel nothing.

I think it’s because the lettuce has no prospect of being beautiful. This afternoon I let out a yelp when I saw my first morning glory “Grandpa Otts” seedling raise its heart-shaped head. I consider this the most beautiful seed-grown plant in my garden, with violet flowers so intense they make me feel my vision is being pulled to the end the spectrum. My passion for roses, too, is down to the aesthetics: the first time I saw the David Austin Roses catalog, I couldn’t believe anything could be so beautiful.

I do like the ferny carrot foliage, and the strawberries I’ve edged the bed with (thanks for the idea, Grace) are pleasingly pleated. But the aesthetic aspect of the vegetables I’m growing is pretty rubbish. The two pear trees I’ve put in are a different story: I love the progress of their lengthening, pointy buds and I know blossom is on the way.

I need to persist with this project. And last weekend it was a bit thrilling to plant some vegetable seeds with my three-year-old daughter. “I’m a gardener!” she said. That’s my girl.

What’s your feeling about the beauty of vegetables? Do you need beauty in the plants you care for? Can you give plants the love they need if you don’t admire them?