hollyhocks and acanthus

There are 2 self-seeded hollyhocks right by the front gate.

A few days after the pic below, a couple more are in bloom plus the pink one on the left.

The salmon-pink hollyhocks bloomed yesterday (June 11th)

I finally got around to moving that cerinthe (pictured below a few days ago) that self-seeded so close to the house. It had no room there so the root did a right angle turn away from the wall and has been growing quite happily. Plants are so determined to grow no matter what.

Red-Stemmed Hollyhocks

I never noticed before if some of the hollyhocks had red stems. This one certainly does. There's a ladybug on the leaf.

another white foxglove, to the left a chinese lantern and a poppy (the flower was orange), that holly in the background doesn't have berries - so what's the point of it!

Polly Pocket on the table in the back garden. You can just see a  purple delphinium I just bought, some snapdragons which have self-seeded, the centaurea montanas still in bloom.

Finally I have monkshood in my garden. After failed seeds a number of times, I bought a plant. It was called a "wildflower" so it was less expensive and quite small at first but it looks great now.

These Nasturtiums Fruit Salad appeared to be coming back from a really poor state with the tiniest, tiniest leaves coming out. I was devastated when the slugs ate some of these new tiny leaves therefore a generous use of slug pellets. I must take more photos as I think I'm now down to 1 plant.

I was very impressed with these acanthus in a nearby garden. I can only dream of such acanthus, compared to my one specimen bought last year at Havant Garden Centre.