I know, you wait ages for a blog post then three turn up all at once !

Nice to see all familiar faces in front of me at the start of the day’s discussion period.

We had eight enthusiasts book in for the seventh regular monthly workshop of the year.

The ten o’clock start found the workshop pleasantly cool, a situation that was not destined to last.

The main topic of conversation was in fact the weather and the way that the previous six months of extremes had had some dramatic, and  in some case disastrous consequences, for bonsai.

In fact as soon as the sun got out the studio got hot so quickly that all the talking stopped and most folk decamped to the fresh air outside.   ” New ” regular Norma in front of me here with some of her trees on the table to the left.

” Old ” regular Gary with another table full of trees.

Angela, who hardly ever misses one of our monthly workshops, settled down beside one of our big bits of hemlock raw material.

Seemingly  listening with rapt attention to me rambling on, we have Dan and Rowena, who are rapidly gaining ” Willowbogger ” status, together with Antony who gained Willowbogger status years ago !

Dan’s nice Larch raw material was the subject of discussion.

Then Antony and I turned our attention to his own Larch, clearly having had a great start to the year, and now with all that growth having gained us loads of vigour the tree can be cut back to reveal our original structure.

Dan and Rowena got on with working their trees. This greenhouse is roofed with bronze polycarbonate sheet which keeps it a little cooler.

My faithful assistant Caz spending time with Penny and Angela.

Summer pruning on some of Angela’s deciduous bonsai.

No doubt that Terry D. has attained Willowbogger status with his regular attendance at these and Peter Warren workshops. Here he de-wires his nicely developing Cedar.

Then outside on one of his other trees.

Penny looking very pensive all on her own in the studio.

Of course, she was not on her own because the day’s photographer must have been in there as well ,  my grateful thanks to Peter G who was behind the camera for all these image and is therefore not recorded himself,  what would we do without our G-man !!!!!!!

I took the photos of the tokonoma myself the following day.

Antony’s nicely developing Scotty, styled by Caz.

Ferny type thing as an accent.

A cute wee pot borrowed from Jean’s ceramic collection.

Last, but very much not least, this lovely Claire Wakefield piece of ceramic, also from Jean’s pot shelves.

A brilliant day, tiring but very rewarding.