I recently put a post on instagram about my garden journal, I was just going through it and realised that I have kept this for over 13 years. Its like my Bible, I’ve kept garden plans, lists of seeds ordered each year, and little notes of what has grown well compared to what’s failed.It makes us the gardeners we are, learning to adapt from those successes and failures is all part of the gardeners year.
Its funny how I have changed my attitudes over the years, to start with I wasn’t particularly interested in flowers at all, just food to eat. I double dug all my beds, probably more than twice a year. Now, years later I don’t dig at all I just mulch, leaving the organisms in the soil to do the work. I understand so much more and I adore flowers and the important part they play as part of the big picture, my garden is full of buzzing pollinators and many more happy annuals than ever before, they bring such a pop of sweetness to the garden. As the flowers slowly die off outside, dried flowers come into their own. I find them so interesting once dried, the colours, shapes and textures are so beautiful and are pretty much everlasting, flowers that you wouldn’t necessarily think of spring to mind, like Crocosmia Lucifer which looks amazing.
In these Autumnal months there’s so much beauty in the landscape around us. I have always been lucky with where I live, it is rural and I have unlimited access to the countryside. I often go foraging for fungi and its not a surprise if I disappear for 3 hours on a dog walk, having been lost for hours in my own little world. I love the solitude and the quietness. There are so many different fungi, mosses and lichens the colours are gorgeous, beautiful hues of soft green blues, like a Farrow and Ball palette on tap. Seems today though the fog seemed to settle eerily around and didn’t lift all day, making me feel all the more isolated and the stillness hung in the air like a soft whisper. The Oak tree evoking a sense of calm and strength like a beacon amongst all this chaos.
