What a busy year!
Looking back, horticulturally, I had great intentions of course to visit as many new gardens as possible and in addition to having had the privilege of repeated visits to Kew Gardens and RHS Wisley, close to me, I ventured up to Shropshire, Wales, Oxfordshire and West Sussex in one trip in June – bagging quite a few beautiful gardens from Powys, Wollerton Old Hall, Blenheim down to Arundel Castle Gardens (remarkable) – and explored many of the gardens in the Dordogne in the Autumn. And I visited David Austin Roses twice.
This coming year, if I am more organised, I will make sure I can attend all of the RHS London Shows, and Chelsea and the Hampton Court Flower Show again. Maybe even Chatsworth if the weather is kind. The Temperate House at Kew reopens next year too.
East Anglia, in the summer, has a cornucopia of renowned gardens worth a week or so (though that is my busy time at Petersham Nurseries so will have to be carefully planned). And the National Garden Scheme – now there is a treasure I have yet to fully plunder! Loseley House in the summer too – and Denmans and Merriments and …. Alnwick for the Cherry Blossom, Knightshayes for the spring bulbs … I think I shall have to make a list.
Petersham Nurseries naturally has featured regularly in my postings and has been a constant seedbed of inspiration for me. I took on a full time role at the start of 2016 so naturally by gaddings about elsewhere have been more limited but the extra time I have spent there has been a joy – for the team I work with, the workshops I’m involved with, the environment I work in and especially the people who come through the gates every day that inspire me. These all serve to keep fresh my love of all things horticultural, to urge me to learn new skills and add to my gardening knowledge – and to better communicate it all to you good folk.
But enough of that, I’ll spend a little time before the whirlwind that is Christmas whisks every planned moment into chaos and look back at the year through these pages and appreciate my share of horticultural pleasures – and be grateful I have been able to share my visitings. Looking back over the statistics for the site, I’ve published 71 blogs this year, a little less than 2016, but have had visitors looking in from over 150 countries – it’s definitely a world wide web. Thank you all for taking the time to pop by
Wishing you all the Merriest wishes of the Season and all good things for the New Year.
If you are ever visiting Petersham Nurseries, please come and say hello.
Teddington Gardener
The Teddington Gardener 
That is just too much to keep up with. There are more gardens and garden events in that small area that we have in our entire state!
Lovely Picutures!!