I know. Gardening hasn't featured on this blog for ages (not even pictures of the summer abundance !). Its title is starting to feel embarrassingly misleading. I sometimes think of dismembering it into several better-focused blogs. Musings and considerations on writing could be added to Constellation, which is a personal anthology, whereas the Gardening Diary…
Cloud garden
I have wanted to write for weeks, but lacked time or mental disponibility. Yet, now I am here, I can't remember any of the things which were burning my fingertips. Writing in English this evening feels like learning ice-skating: a graceless muscle-wringing exercise, where not falling flat on the face is the best one can…
Fake gardener
I am not a true gardener : I don't grow edibles, or so few they don't count. The size of my garden is to blame, but so is my privileged existence in a rich country where it is more convenient and often cheaper to buy food at the supermarket (oh wait... ). I therefore get…
Mind your own business
Minding my own business is something I am quite good at, these days. This discretion is probably less born out of virtue than a consequence of my near reclusion. Apart from school runs and equivalent walking to and fro between children's activities, I am my own company, which usually suits me. I have been spending…
Bye bye turf
That's it, I've lost it. Just like the rest of the country, but on a grander scale. Jugez-en par vous-mêmes : two days ago, I had this sudden urge to move my beloved and innocent acer palmatum Katsura into the shady bed. A modest and reliable potentilla fructicosa inherited from the previous occupants, which in…
White blossom
I am glad Storm Gareth has finally tired of blowing over our isles. Unlike in February, the temperature has resumed normal lows and I need a jumper and two fleece jackets when I go round my garden (using my husband's fleece last as it is big enough to wrap around all the layers). I have…
Number one enemy
Just a short note. You may have noticed my propensity for mentioning slugs and snails. In fact, I believe doing so will strengthen my claim to be part of the great family of English / British gardeners. After all, this island could well be renamed Slugland. One of my first posts on this blog was…
The dead of Winter
January already. I have been thinking there seems to be no such thing as "the dead of Winter". Not these days, at least. Of course, the previous years have taught us that the coldest part of Winter might very well be hugging Spring rather than Autumn, and there are plenty of weeks left for the…
Autumn garden
I have been wanting to write about the garden for so long... A few notes in the Gardening Diary page is all I could manage. But leave it too long and then you don't know where to start, ending up with a disorganised post... Most garden blogs I follow have been stressing what an extraordinary…
Garden (and pond) miscellaneous 3
Our small pond has been in function for 19 days now. During that time, we have had very little rain, almost nothing, and I feel increasingly anxious about it. The good news is, the liner doesn't seem to be leaking, in spite of the fact that it is irregularly supported underneath (very hard to backfill…
Garden miscellaneous (2)
Une matinée bien employée pour une grenouille de ma sorte consiste à : - Déposer les enfants à l'école. - Avaler en vitesse quelque chose et vérifier que les quinze livres sterling économisées sont toujours dans le portefeuille. - Se ruer en ville aussi vite que le permettent des talons un chouïa trop ambitieux pour…
Garden miscellaneous (1)
I've decided to stop pretending there is a theme to what I post about my garden, when all I want to do is to share pictures and let the joy spread. Hence the title. Today is, according to the weather forecast, the last day of sunshine. The mini-summer comes to an end, but, boy was…
May it last !
Few places are as beautiful as England when the sun shines as it does this week - it's that dazzling green. There are so many occasions of exaltation and gratitude that I feel dizzy. Walking accross the field to go to town, yesterday, I thought I would love to have a blog section called :…
Notes on skylarks, memory and happiness
Walking one morning on the Holcombe moors under a bright Spring sun. Distances are vanishing into a gleaming haze and on the banks bloom the first coltsfoot flowers. Up Moorbottom lane, the warm stones elicit sensations of Southern Alpine paths. Lancashire moors, Southern Alps, worlds apart ? Not to me. I walk, grateful for the…
O Spring where art thou ?
Now is the season when blackthorns turn into clouds. Upon meeting their blooming branches, I am never quite sure if it is them, or I, who take off for the sky. This old one, the top of which crowns the end of the path, between oak trunks, sings of Spring. Yet everything in my garden…
In the garden again !
Finally ! A sunny day ! The February big freeze was for me, who am lucky enough to live in a heated house, a welcome thing. I had not seen proper snow for what felt like an eternity, and my daughter had the joy of her first snowman. Being British, the schools closed for two…
Of Winter, and November foliage
I have been a bit busy in the garden, as recorded in my Gardening Diary page. Winter finally seems on its way, and I should be planting the last tulips, had I not run out of decent containers and compost. I have bought a few oxalis corms which also need to be planted. When I…
Releasing a maple
On Saturday, the tree surgeon came and felled the heron's sycamore. He was a young man with hair as red as it comes and a very handsome smile. Did it make the fall easier ? My husband is still feeling hurt and guilty we had to bring it down. Today, as night was creeping…
Gardening Diary
So as not to burden your WordPress Reader, I have created a little page called Gardening Diary (up there in the menu). In it, I intend to record menial garden-related tasks, or events which don't really deserve a blogpost. Why, may you ask, not keep such a diary to myself ? To that question I…
Small is my garden
Yesterday, I finally trimmed the lavender - my only bush produces just enough to make one dried bunch (don't laugh). I cherish it all the more ; after all, each flower stem was cut individually by me and arranged by my kids . Making lovely scented sachets is not for us, as it would be…
In the Writing Garden 