I get like this. You see I have looked after these babies since March. I remember when they were just a twinkle in a Chiltern Seeds Spring catalogue. I scattered their tiny shuttlecock seeds, and made sure I didn’t sneeze at the wrong moment. I pricked them out so carefully, holding them by a leaf…
Category: Musings on Life
Lazy Days of Summer
This has been a good summer. The hot days have stretched on and on and on. I’ve been wishing we had a porch and a rocking chair. On the weekends I have been getting my gardening jobs done before about 10am, and then it is time for a Sat Cap (Saturday Cappuccino) with Stevie. Then…
Reach out and touch me
I have been talking recently about sensory aspects of gardening, with colour and form. Today it is the turn of texture. Specifically, flower texture. When I was a child, I liked fluff. I remember staying in a hotel one night and having an incredibly fluffy blanket. I kept pulling off bits of wool all night and in…
Shelter
I wrote a post last Sunday called From Screen to Green which was all about ways to entice children away from their devices into the garden. My two daughters had just returned from Australia that morning. I always encourage them to spend time outdoors on the day they return, as daylight can help to re-set the…
From Screen to Green
We’re halfway through the summer holidays in the UK and I wonder how many households are having arguments over screens? If left to their own devices my children would spend hours in front of a screen. As I would have done at their age. And did, in fact, with the telly. Screen-time can be creative…
Glamour
Regular readers will be aware that last weekend I was engulfed by a) envy and then b) admiration for Sarah Raven at the Perch Hill Open garden. Some of her style seems to have rubbed off on me! I should say that I am possibly the least glamourous person in the world. I don’t wear any jewellery…
Time Travel
Warning: there is a certain amount of ‘twee’ in this post. I am not one who harks back to a perfect past, but I do have a fondness for pretty little towns. Tenterden is a pretty little town. This is the Town Hall, with the twelfth century St Mildred’s Church tower behind. Tenterden was once…
Basking in the glow of a beautiful friendship
On Saturday I had a visit from a special friend. It had been hastily arranged a few days ago. She now lives overseas, so this was very exciting. We met twenty years ago when we were both training to become Speech and Language Therapists. I remember coming out of one of our first lectures and…
Frown Lines
I’m in the White Garden at Sissinghurst. I’ve come over all Bloomsbury. I’m going to be haughty and let my frown lines show. Actually I love frown lines. I particularly love Anna Soubry’s frown lines. I love a woman who embraces her frown lines. I think frown lines go hand in hand with integrity. But…
Phloxy Lady?
Last week I posted about Phlox paniculata ‘Coral Flame’ in Boring… But then I felt guilty for leaving out the equally fabulous ‘Purple Flame’, so I thought I would give her a post of her own too. Here she is, with ice-cream swirl buds just bursting. There are lovely tones of blue-lilac, but with pink-magenta in on the…
I’m not beautiful. I’m feisty.
This is a quote from my step-daughter. To give you some context, we were having a discussion about someone being beautiful. ‘Like you. You’re beautiful.’ ‘No I’m not. I’m feisty!‘ I love this. I love that she chose feistiness over beauty. She is feisty. And beautiful. But she chose to identify as feisty. When I…
A different angle
Summer is really for just enjoying the garden. There are minor chores, if you want to call them that, but really these a pretty pleasurable: deadheading, tying in a tendril here, pulling out a weed there, eating a strawberry, sniffing a rose. I do a lot of basking. We can call it mindfulness if you…
