It has been a manic few days, but good ones nontheless. This weekend was our 2nd anniversary of meeting, and thus becoming a couple. It seems like only yesterday we met, and fell in love. How time flies, it’s a scary thought.
The beloved got an extra day off work and we went to Corbridge, not very far from where we live. We spent a lovely few hours ambling about old shops. It is rare that one can find a perfumery nowadays, but they do have that very thing (which could be smelled before it was seen)!
The hedge in the garden is now also much neater, and has gone from about 7 feet to around shoulder-height. The difference it has made is enormous.

At the moment i’m trying to get the house looking better, and feeling cleaner. I washed all of the covers from the sofa at the weekend, and am eagerly preparing for Autumn’s arrival (it is my favourite season) by airing the old French quilt that we have on our bed, and hoovering under the bed. It feels good to open all of the windows and let the cooling breeze into the house to blow away the cobwebs. Now is also a great time to turn on the boiler to make sure that’s working, which i have been doing for 30 mins a day.

I’m off to finish my blitz of the house, then to relax and read a really good (but very sad) book called ‘How Much of Us There Was’ by Michael Kimball. Not for those who cry at the beauty of a field of daisies, nor anyone who is prone to hormonal bouts of wailing - it’s likely to induce both :-D

I have been growing lavender for a few years now. It seems to fit with my gardening principles of most things in the garden having a use. There are very few plants in the garden that can’t be used either medicinally, cosmetically, or aesthetically. I believe in gardens that ‘work for you’, and there is no feeling in the world like getting down on your hands and knees and smelling a new rose, or the first fresh buds of lavender that come into flower.

I try to use all of the herbs and ‘useful’ plants in my daily life. For instance, using lavender heads to scent laundry, roses to make rosewater. Rosemary, sage, lemon balm, mint, thyme, lavender and sweet cicely in the kitchen. This makes gardening important and gives it a sense of being useful as well as pretty.

In the old house i had a large collection of various herbs, which i left to my mother when we moved. I managed to get what i could split and transferred, and now i have the fun task of finding more unusual yet useful herbs. I have been reading a very interesting book by Stephanie Donaldson called ‘The Shaker Garden: Beauty through utility’ which is a fascinating book about the Shakers, their customs, and how it related back to their gardens. Did you know they were the first people to sell seeds in small packets to the hobby consumer? Their beliefs meant that they weren’t permitted to grow anything that was in any way beautiful, or not useful. Although those thoughts are largely outdated now (i don’t think i’ll go to hell for growing a few cosmos because i find them pretty!), we seem to have lost the drive for purpose in our gardens. Let them not only be beautiful, but give something back to you. Grow a lavender hedge and use it’s blooms for lavender bags, grow rosemary or mint for your Jersey Royals, or plant an apple tree.

But also consider the manner in which you garden. Going organic will mean you have a healthy garden, it’ll be healthier for you to work in, and will encourage natural pest control in the form of thrushes, blackbirds, ladybirds, parasitic wasps etc. Weeds are a pain, but they are also an important food source for wildlife, insects, butterflies, moths and beetles, and the animals that feed off those insects. Keeping a ‘fallow’ patch of ground, maybe even as small as 1sq metre, that you can plant native wild flowers on. Small things like this, can make a huge difference to the survival of rare and native beasties. To get more information, you can go to the BBC’s Breathing Space site and find out more there.

In a few years, you’ll be reaping the rewards of your garden tenfold - and after all, isn’t that what a garden is for?

[Orange Hawksweed 'Hieracium aurantiacum' attracts a plethora of butterflies to our garden and is also pretty in the lawn - and no more rampant than the common dandelion (and i think just as pretty)]

Although i am of the belief that flowers look best in their natural habitat, there are times when nothing looks quite so beautiful than a vase/jar/teapot/glass full of summer flowers. I tend to only choose to take flowers from plants of which we either have a lot, or have become damaged in some way. A windfallen rose, for instance, in my eyes, holds just as much beauty as a completely perfect specimen. I also try to make assets of plants not traditionally used as decoration i.e. dandelions (we all have them, might as well make the best of their lemon-yellow flowers) and montbretia (which is flippin’ everywhere). Dandelion leaves are also good in salads, and for pets if you have rabbits or guinea pigs. Just make sure you choose specimens that aren’t likely to be used as the local dog toilet!
Some of the prettiest flowers have to be sweet peas, and as they smell fantastic as well, they are perfect for a beautiful, blousy arrangement. In my vase are some snapdragons, montbretia (argh!) and sweet peas.
Next year we’re set to have a bed just for the annuals, our ’show’ part of the garden, which will look splendid. They’ll also make for some wonderful cut flowers, too :-)

In the garden, on a warm late-afternoon, i was pottering. Just pulling some of the weeds, picking caterpillars off the purple-sprouting broccoli etc. As i brushed past the sweet peas, their scent was that of the warmest summer day. Their blousy petals blowing gently in the hazy afternoon breeze. The Cerynth’s deep blue and violet flowers, hidden amongst the mottled-green leaves. There was no noise but what was being said in my head, no sounds save for the odd bird singing, or dog barking in the neighbours garden.
A ripe pea pod hung on it’s cradled stalk, waiting to be picked. Which i did. I ate it straight off the plant, it was sweet beyond belief, even the pod (they are a completely edible type of pea). It tasted good because i remembered planting those seeds, and watching hopefully, as the little pea plants grew.
The sweetcorn are large, not as large as some, but now they have finished ‘flowering’ they will be producing the cobs ready for late september. I can feel Autumn in the air, Summer makes way for her, the nips in the air, the berries ripe for picking. We can all enjoy the fruits of our labour.

[our peas!]

[peas again]

[tomatoes]

[moth-eaten (or should i say caterpillar eaten) purple sprouting broccoli]

[our sweetcorn with it's 'flower']

[Cerynth]

I have spent a relaxing (if strenuous) afternoon attending to the garden with the fiancé. I mowed the lawn, whilst he weeded, then we changed roles as he cut the huge hedge which threatens to engulf the whole garden. That’s privet for you.

The garden has changed, changed beyond belief, since we moved in. I love being able to go out into the garden and just dabble, not taking it too seriously. There is something magical about mud, birdsong and sweet peas.

The sweetcorn is now growing at an alarming pace, although no cobs yet. The peas are becoming ready for harvest, as are the blackberries in the hedge. The purple-sprouting broccoli has been ravaged by cabbage-white caterpillars, but as we’re doing the whole-9-organic-yards, it is left to me to remove the blighters before they get too big. Who cares what the leaves look like? We only eat the ‘flower’ anyway :-)

There are two welcome additions to the garden. Firstly, Limax Maximus or the Spotted Leopard Slug (see picture below). Now, although everyone makes slugs public enemy #1, this one feeds soley on fungus and decaying plant matter and is doing wonderful things to our compost! The other is a field mouse, also taking up residence around the compost heap.

This coming week is going to be stressful. Mainly because my car has broken down (and been towed to a garage miles away!) and i have yet to find out what’s the matter (suspect starter motor) and how much it’s going to cost (eeep).

Now i’m off to get an early night before i have to ring the garage to see how my little baby (car) is doing, and finish what was started with the privet hedge.