This is our cherry tree that grows plums (a long story explained in previous posts).  During the summer we did notice that a small bit of pruning might be needed during the next winter as it was causing a shadow on most of the grass and the flower beds.  It was not until I looked at a photo of the tree as it was three years ago that I noticed it has more than doubled in size during that time.  It would seem when we bought the house this tree had just been planted, and cherry trees (or indeed plum trees) as they are, grow pretty fast.   The photo showed a tiny tree just reaching the top of the fence and a small part of the flower bed it is in.  When I looked outside, the tree now reaches the first floor window and is the dominating part of the flower bed.

A more drastic pruning was needed and today I spent the afternoon with stepladder and saw being as drastic as I could with the tree without hopefully doing it too much damage.   The task made a little bit tricky by the solar powered fairy lights that we put in it a couple of years ago, trying to spot the cable within the branches and not cutting it!

The garden now looks and feels a lot lighter and larger.   Come spring and summer time we shall see that affect it all has.