Writing: ink, tea and neckache.
On cushions, caterpillars, cats and fidgeting....
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Wait, wait and wait a little longer...
On the joy of not cutting back in autumn.
Seed-brained...
Several years ago I hosted a propagation workshop and we explored the topic of growing plants from seed. I talked about seeds waiting for the right moment to germinate, knowing that winter had passed, measuring the temperature or daylength, and sensing when they were at the right depth to break
Rip it up and start again...
Years ago at a National Garden Scheme event I got chatting to another garden owner about re-vamping tired borders. I explained that I was trying to carve out some pockets of space in an overcrowded bed, to add in some earlier colour. She shook her head slowly. ‘You won’t
Sweet, gentle October.
...and so the show goes on...
Trouble in the bluebell woods...
Our problem in the bluebell woods arrived much as Ernest Hemingway once described bankruptcy. Slowly at first and then all at once. Four years ago at the height of the pandemic, a huge beech tree in full summer leaf came down in the middle of the night, in a June
Behind closed doors...
P.S. - the best pictures are at the end, with an autumnal offer too....
Plant-a-glow-glow*
October’s shortening days can fill me with autumnal gloom or delight with a blaze of brilliant colour - sometimes both in one day. A forty-eight hour spell of misery-inducing rain was followed by three perfect days earlier this week. I spent every possible moment outside, alternating between slow, steady
Subtle, shimmering September
Plus - visiting the homes of dead artists, and a foodie heaven in a shipping container.
If a tree falls in a forest...
...yes, it makes a sound, and everything changes.
Seeds, success and plundering pigeons...
We re-open this week! For Opening times and visitor offers scroll to the end.
Four down, two to go...
Hang in there, Persephone.
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Birthdays, butterscotch and foxy bulbs.
It’s been a while…. and much has happened since I last posted anything here. The gardens have closed for the winter, our new heat pump has been installed (yes, the house is warm, yes it’s wonderful, yes you can ask me about it if you really want to…
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Peregrines, plumbing, and a test of Steve's patience...
Last week we took our campervan to Anglesey, anticipating coastal walks, wildlife spotting and - for me, not Steve - the possibility of a sea swim, given the hot weather that was predicted. Then, as so often happens once I settle into a holiday mindset and the to-do lists evaporate,
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Bowls of Beauty
On Paeonies, drunken bees and Glenda Jackson
meadow, wildflowers, poppies, cornflowers, meadow orchid
When is a meadow not a meadow?
I have my head deep in a border, prising strands of horsetail out of a clump of geraniums. Out of the corner of my eye I spot a visitor heading purposefully towards me. I’m fairly certain I know what she will say. ‘I have to ask you’, she says.
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Froth
I love a bit of froth. Cappuccino, proper beer, a steaming bath with a cloud of bubbles on top, chocolate Aero, confetti (sadly banned at most weddings now - see below), fireworks, Thalictrum aquilegiifolium… May is the frothiest of months. Cow parsley foams around the knees of the flowering hawthorn
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Everything, everywhere, all at once.
If April demands patience, May demands speed. We spent much of this year’s chilly April watching and waiting. Waiting for strong roots to grow so that plants could be despatched. Watching for fresh shoots to form that we could harvest for cuttings. And waiting for the soil to warm
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Feeling the pinch...
Brutal, but necessary...
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The end of the affair...
Like most relationships, it started tentatively. I couldn’t see the attraction at first. I stated too loudly that we weren’t a good match, but I went along with the idea, kept the communication light and friendly, laughed at all the jokes, played nicely. And then, without quite knowing
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Led by the nose...
...via the tulips.
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Everything you never knew you wanted to know about....
.. powering your house from the sun.
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Fresh starts and loose ends..
Sharp-eyed email subscribers to my posts may have spotted an oddity at the end of my last post - some idle notes I had jotted down and forgot to remove before hitting the ‘Publish’ button. The notes were not intended as a ‘teaser’, but since a few of you have
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Made of stardust, powered by sunshine
A question - what is the most important invention on the planet, ever? The wheel? Fire? Electricity? Friends, I give you the humble leaf - home to the cleverest bit of technology on the planet - the ability to literally make stuff out of nothing more than air and sunshine.