Hello Friends!
There has been a huge increase of subscribers here and I have no idea where you’ve all come from, but WELCOME and I hope this newsletter is lives up to expectations! It’s mostly just me wanging on about the things I’ve been doing the garden, with a (sometimes unhealthy) dose of other stuff. I can’t think for a second that all of you new people are ready for my ramblings, so please don’t be worry about hitting unsubscribe if it’s not for you. I’m now going to switch off new subscriber notifications because it’s becoming a bit terrifying and I need this newsletter to continue on its brain-dumping way. It’s good for me, and I love writing it more than anything else. As always do feel free to mail me…I love getting your mail. And also if you like it then do hit LIKE..or even share? 😏
I began this week with such a long list…only to be struck down with flu (yes, doctor says it’s INFLUENZA) and all my dreams scuppered. Added to which, I didn’t get to go on my celebratory publication day lunch, or to the Garden Press Event, so I am a bit cross to put it mildly. I might have felt able to do a bit of gardening on Thursday, if it hadn’t rained so hard. So why am I doing a newsletter when I’ve only managed ten minutes in the garden this week? Well I thought I’d put my daily WOULD’VE dones here for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, perhaps to inspire anyone here thinking they want to get out in the garden and ‘do’ something, but are not sure where to start.
So here goes:
Monday:
I find myself in the local garden centre. I just ENDED UP there, swear, and wind up buying two clematis on a complete whim. It’s rather unlike me to do this for permanent plants; I prefer to decide exactly what I want and then order it, but having finally gotten around to the business of tying in my extremely rebellious and lazy climbing hydrangeas (which are supposed to be covering the whole length of the back wall of my garden but have decided not to self-cling) I just want to add something in between that will provide colour for a while. There is a balance to be struck here, because the hydrangea are the plants I really want, and I certainly don’t want the clematis to steal space or nutrients from them, but my instinct tells me there is enough space, even though I may well have to remove the clematis at some point in the future. So I pick two specimens that look gorgeous and don’t think too much about it. Both are mid-season flowering, which means they need pruning in late spring or early summer. One is called ‘Nelly Moser’ which reminds me of my mother, because she gave me one that I grew on my balcony for years, and the other is called ‘Daniel Deronda’ which I simply couldn’t resist because GWENDOLEN HARLETH. So in they both go, immediately, without too much thought. The one thing about five minute gardening that has helped me the most is to do away with the thinking. Plant immediately. Don’t think.
I remove all the stakes and tie each plant in gently to the trellis. I almost want to kiss them goodnight.
Tuesday
The results of much five minute weeding and chopping last week has meant a larger-than-normal pile of green waste to dispose of. I usually get rid of waste as I go, either putting it at the back of flowerbeds or putting it into my compost bin, chopped up. This amount of stuff though, needs a trip to the municipal compost heap and I am feeling distinctly unwell, so I admit defeat and bag it up for the dustmen. There is much guilt here, and it’s something that really needs addressing in this borough - the fact that there’s no green waste collection (my gardening friends and I are working on it). The fact is your average compost bin won’t be able to take all your prunings and there is only so much you can do with thorny sticks, or large bits of wood. We need a better way. I grab a child’s chair and a hori hori knife, and set about removing some of the weeds from between the cracks in my bricked terrace. I left the bricks un-mortared on purpose, so that this could be a habitat for self-seeders, but I’m not down with dandelions thank you very much. Erigeron is absolutely welcome, as is moss, so a bit of editing is required every now and then. By the time I’ve done five minutes I realise that I have a proper headache, and the rest of the day is endured rather than lived. Four ten year old girls and two small people in the car after netball training is more than I can bear and I beg them, BEG them to be quiet. They ignore me but luckily I have headphones in my bag and I’m not afraid to use them.
Wednesday
I am in bed all day with a temperature. Constant rain. Today would have been the perfect sowing day - cosily at home, sprinkling seeds. I’m pretty conservative when it comes to sowing anything this early, but things like tomatoes, chillies and alpine strawberries, which can be started off in my kitchen are definitely on the menu. This year I need more alpine strawberries which I use for edging my flowerbeds (and eating of course). They are remarkably easy to raise from seed and I’ve done a post on how to do it here. They don’t last forever no, but they do self-seed rather charmingly in small cracks, so they are absolutely worth the effort of growing. My neighbour’s au pair has taken the children. I think I could actually marry her until I realise that the person I am married to is also absolutely indispensable and that we would need to be a THROUPLE (google it friends). This strange train of thought confirms that I have a high fever and I lie in bed shivering, listening to a brilliant thing by Malcolm Gladwell called ‘Talking to Strangers’. Sick-bed life is not altogether unpleasant. All I need is for someone to bring me marmite toast. Marmite toast is the only thing I can eat when I’m unwell. It cures everything. With tea.
Thursday
Today I would have gone out and bought a bag of peat-free compost, and spent five minutes (probably more) sieving it through my gardening sieve into a bucket, ready for any seeds I want to sow. This is called being your future friend, and is best achieved with a very good podcast and a cup of tea. What actually happened today? Well, it is my publication day for The Five Minute Garden! I’m not actually sure what ‘publication day’ means, as the shops presumably get the stock before this date, but anyway, I lie in bed blushing feverishly at all the kind things that other people are saying about the book, and I hope it’s not a great disappointment etc etc. I also write a blog on how to sow alpine strawberries, as I am now in a good enough state to deal with looking at a computer without feeling sick. I am definitely getting better, but all this virus stuff has me thinking wildly about what would happen if I died, like, suddenly (surely all parents have these thoughts?) and I realise I need to TIDY UP more, so that nobody is left with hellish death cleaning to do, and I also know that there are certain things I don’t want anyone to discover…like my old diaries, which are full of so much navel-gazing…I don’t know why I’ve kept them - perhaps I thought that I would soften towards my younger self as I aged, but it hasn’t happened yet…I still get a bit sick in my mouth when I think about those diaries. I will forever and always be grateful that social media didn’t exist during those years. They need to go.
Friday
A break in the rain! And had I not been unwell I would absolutely have taken this opportunity to mow my lawn, which is unbelievably shaggy due to the wet and relatively warm weather we’ve been having. I’ve been fantasising about mowing it for a couple of weeks now, and today would have been the day. I have a cordless mower, which has changed my life, especially since I put three trees in the middle of my lawn. The terrible dance involved with keeping the cable away from the mower and pulling it around the trees is one I’m extremely glad I don’t have to do. A cordless lawnmower has turned a complete chore into one of my favourite gardening jobs. I don’t do stripes (I love them in other people’s gardens, but not my own) but I do have a favourite ‘way’ round. Mow around the edges first and then continue in ever decreasing circles. It’s contemplative and calming. All my grass clippings get chucked directly at the base of my shrubs, but in the late spring and summer, when I’m mowing more regularly, I don’t bother collecting them, letting the clippings fall down into the lawn to ‘feed’ it.
I haul my sorry arse out of bed and make broth (because that’s what you DO right?) and a banana cake and I speak to a friend for over an hour…I do miss phone conversations? What happened to them? I suppose whatsapp has taken over. I do enjoy whatsapp with friends, especially the stream-of-consciousness conversations that leave you with seventy five new messages when all you did was go to the loo. I love it when people send me links to brilliant things that help me learn new stuff. I suppose we are all turning into our grandmothers who used to send us newspaper clippings in the post. I have missed the children this week - I won’t let them kiss me or hug me very much, but I’m a bag of nerves about them catching anything and yes I KNOW they’re far worse vectors than I will ever be.
x Laetitia
Other things you could do this coming week in your garden:
Remember to water your houseplants
Start to make weeding a daily thing
Pick any early bulbs that have come up to enjoy by your bedside
Prune your hydrangeas
Re-pot any container plants that need it
Source and put up a bee hotel
Sow a few tomatoes or chillies, or cobaea scandens (cup and saucer vine)
xx Laetitia
ps you might have missed:
Thinning out your seedlings - the why and the how
Oh I love this blog and its associated posts! My gardening Guru has always been Vita Sackville West but now she’ll have to move over for this wonderful, informative and encouraging blog.