Through my kitchen window, I look out on the back garden with a mix of scrutiny, impatience and thankfulness that even in the barest of days, I’ve some plants that have come to the fore now.

Right in view, in the trellised midway section of the Japanese garden, is the potted Korean Abelia. Still a young shrub but now settled in its pot with tiny, pink bell like blossoms hung all along the bare branches. It is called ‘white forsythia’ though not related nor pure white! Being alongside the stepping stone path, I can appreciate its miniscule beauty in passing and just about smell the fragrance, though it is overwhelmed by the nearby flowering Sarcococcas.

A couple of years ago I purchased the Japanese Salix ‘Mount Aso’ and planted it alongside the willow boundary hedge where it became strangled with the bindweed that its larger, native, willow neighbours cope much better with. Thus in early Autumn I moved it to the Japanese woodland part of the garden, besides an Aralia, and yesterday was pleased to see how much it has appreciated the move, judging by the amount of ‘pussy willow’ catkins it has now.

And with one or two dry bright days between bouts of rain and the odd snow day, the garden tidy itch has to be scratched. I tend to leave seedheads, dry grasses etc to overwinter, but even these are past their best so out come the pruning secateurs.

But before the cutting down, I take some last appreciative looks with the camera. And because there are so few jobs to do at the moment, there literally is time to stop and stare – at the structural architecture of last year’s growth and especially now, the plush new growth of mosses on the rocky cascade and stone isolates scattered around the Japanese back garden

Mine is far too sunny a spot to try and re-create a Japanese zen garden dominated by mosses but even so I can appreciate this most humblest of plants.

And since there is so much detail to be had each year in the garden I’ve added a gallery of “Plant Art” that takes a closer look at their aesthetic forms, as seen through my camera, with a touch of edits in Lightroom

Meanwhile there is new life in all the bulbs springing up as well as the pop-pom dahlia seedlings on my windowsill, which are about to sprout a second pair of leaves, and thus require potting on. And soon I’ll be away for 3 weeks and will undoubtedly worry about their care as well as miss what the garden has to offer. Hence this closer look now!