I'd meant, on Sunday afternoon only to spend a very short time with some initial planting of annuals in the garden pots. So much for intentions. There's something so deeply satisfying about arranging colourful plants in waiting garden pots when the outcome resembles miniature stand-alone gardens of variety in texture, colour and sometimes fragrance that one gets carried away.

I do. And I did on this occasion, unsurprisingly. It wasn't hot out, the extreme heat we'd been experiencing for the week previously had dissolved to more moderate temperatures where the sun came out just occasionally and there was more than a hint of oncoming rain in the atmosphere. Perfect planting weather.

So I began, carefully selecting for colour combinations, overall appearance and the desired outcome of aesthetic achieved. One pot, then another, and then another. My cache of flowers was being slowly but inevitably depleted. But I was fully immersed in the act of creating beautiful combinations that didn't, it's true, look all that imposing taking each mini-garden in isolation, since the plants were anything but mature, and it would take weeks before they assumed more-than-modest proportions for the impact of a mature flower 'garden' to take shape, but it will.

Before I knew it, the work had proceeded so expeditiously that most of the flats were emptied, and all of the pots had received their share of the flowering plants. For some of them there remains room for additional little fillers, but the enterprise is fairly well completed. I've also got to place dracaenas in the centre of some of the larger ceramic pots.

A garden is never finished, and year-by-year there are additions to make up for invariable winter losses, and ours is no different. I'm looking forward to seeing those giant Dahlias make their appearance, the new clematis vines to put forth flowers, and my husband is making waves about looking at new cultivar varieties of hostas.

I've yet to plant annuals in the garden beds themselves, and have to get around to that, as well. Meanwhile, serendipity had it that Monday turned out a rainy day following hard on Sunday night's rain. Tuesday, which is today, also promises more rain in between bursts of warming sun. Perfect for growing gardens.