Watering tricks, lawn mowing, sowing rainbow chard and saying goodbye 😢
Hello Friends!
A huge welcome to everyone who found me via India Knight's kind recommendation. I'm not going to be sophisticated about this; she is an inspiration to me, and always has been, so being mentioned in her column feels a bit the same as getting ones first book deal, or being proposed to. Yes, it's THAT LOVELY AND BIG. I hope you enjoy this newsletter as much as I enjoy writing it..thank you for joining this group of gardening friends and I hope you'll feel free to hit reply and ask me anything you like.
Here are the things I got up to in the garden this week:
Monday
It's half term. OOOOH yes, it's half term. Oh GOD it's half term. There is an enormous upside to half term, which is that there is none of this morning rush nonsense. You don't have to give yourself a heart attack trying to feed everyone breakfast, get them dressed, make sure they have their pesky pe kit and get them to school - all by 8.15am. Not gonna lie - it is deeply restful and lovely to chill in ones nightie of a morning, with warm, sleepy children milling about doing not very much, and everything slow and sweet. But this is a momentary pleasure, because you can't do that all day (sadly). My children, SO BORINGLY, need something to DO, which means they won't sit around doing not very much for long,..they start to get all jumpy and annoying. They start to grate on ones nerves. They start DESTROYING things (quite horrid) or being sullen (much worse), so the only way to do half term is to be somewhat 'organised' about it. Luckily we live somewhere that's not short of small businesses who make a tidy sum from desperate parents who are prepared to pay for someone else to do the work of 'doing stuff' with their children while they go home and (in my case) TRY and get some work done before it's time to pick them up. Today I've put the two small people into something called 'Playball' where they run around for three hours and eat a sandwich for lunch. The older one is still at Cub camp (yes, you read that right) and will arrive home tonight, catatonic from next to no sleep and a sweets and crisps diet. She will hopefully, however, know how to tie a knot or two. One can dream. I fill the tin bath that I use for watering and immediately start to feed all my containerised shrubs (my phone told me to do it, so I obey. I have put a schedule of sorts, for feeding my containers, on my phone, so that I don't forget. Feeding your containers, (particularly dear beloved, if they are filled with delicious gaudy bedding like petunias or such stuff) will mean the difference between lovely but okay displays and rambunctious, over-the-top, look-at-me stuff that has everyone thinking you have green fingers. You don't have green fingers, you just put a feeding schedule on your phone. Simples.
Tuesday
I am coming to the uncomfortable conclusion that my builders have decided to move in. They have been working upstairs in my daughters (minuscule) bedroom for close to a week now and I simply cannot fathom what they're doing up there. They seem to spend a large amount of time smoking on my front doorstep, and snaring me into deep conversations about either my ancient hybrid car (he's thinking of buying one) or how awful it is that we all get so tired when we get old (I mean, NOT NEWS, DARLING). I realise how much I am bothered by UN-JOLLY people. Presumably this is because I am cripplingly codependent and need everyone to be happy in their work but HONESTLY, why can't everyone be like my dustman Len, who is ALWAYS happy (even when he's sad)? The whole thing is disturbing, and that's before breakfast, after which I have the saddest ever mission in the history of anything. My darlingest, aged dog is so old and infirm that the vet has decided it's TIME. Darling Mr Pug lives with my mother and father (has done since I had my first child and realised I couldn't cope with those EYES looking at me, asking to be hugged during the five minutes a day I wasn't breastfeeding. He and my father have been inseparable since then, and we go together to say goodbye and we weep and weep and can't stop. It's a funny thing, weeping in a vet surgery, with your dad, over a little black dog; it is not until now that I realise how long it's been since I held my dad, really held him. Puggy dies instantly and painlessly, his head suddenly heavy in my hand. The vet speaks gently and we just weep. Then we get frightfully British over the bill, and go our separate ways in our separate cars, the road wobbling through tears all the way home. I walk straight past the builders and crank up the lawn mower. Mowing the lawn is brainless and better-making. Very soon, I'll start growing the centre of the lawn into a mini-meadow and there won't be nearly as much to cut, but for now I am thankful for the task.
Wednesday
It's nearly June, and that means daily watering of containers. Today has been utterly shattering...I think my downfall is having an extra meal to think about and provide...there just never seems to be ANYTHING to eat. We seem to go through eleventy hundred bananas every day. I am constantly stocking up. Disorganised but also just BAFFLED, and a bit bemused too, that by the end of the day where all I've done is make sure there's enough to eat, there never seems to be anything left for me. Something is wrong here! I can totally understand now how food never had any allure for my mother (who has lived on marmite toast and chocolate biscuits her entire life). I always thought I'd remain passionate about food... I used to enjoy cooking and eating it so much. Now I don't even want to THINK about it. Food has become a boring old albatross of a thing that stops me from doing all the things I want to do. Watering the pots is an evening ritual, and I love it (when I'm not disturbed, that is)... I fill a small tin 'bath' with water, and use it as a dunking station, filling two watering cans at a time so that I can dump at least a can into each container. This way I can monitor how much they are getting and I save lots of time in the process. All my containers bar one are made of terracotta, which makes watering even more vital, as the stuff is porous. If you're going to garden in pots, then you need to be ready for this commitment, and a big dunking bath thing makes it a lot easier. I've looked for one like mine, which I got from Petersham years ago, but can't find them. these ones look good though and would totally do the trick.
Thursday
Daughter's room is finally finished, but I realise the lighting is a health hazard (she is four, and will try to swing on the beautiful wall lights I have installed) so she's going to have to stay in my bed every night until the builders come back and remove them. I'm going to put a picture over the holes and replace them when she's old enough. I feel stupid and wonder why I can't anticipate the things I do wrong BEFORE I do them. When you get to my age, mistakes are expensive. They cost money, and pride, oh, and SLEEP. Anyhow I swallow the rageful sobs and go out to plant some marigolds. They've been languishing in tiny pots for weeks and have started flowering. They need a space. I manage to plant three before a child wants its bottom wiped, and then I go out again and do another three, and then another, and eventually the whole lot go in. When this happens I am never not joyful. It feels like a big up yours to the frustrating things and a big yay for me. I water as a small person tries, amidst peals of hilarity, to pull my pants down. I must seem like a comedy figure to them. I remember when I was a teenager, going to Barbados and meeting Mark Birley, who used regularly to say "Oh you ARE a bore" when he was annoyed and I just thought it was totally endearing and funny. It's only now that I wonder if he ACTUALLY wanted just to be left a bloody lone, like me, when I'm watering my marigolds.
Friday
I've had enough. I am the walking dead. Half term is almost over. In celebration I sow some chard. This will go in all the gaps that are appearing, post forget-me-not party. I usually use nicotiana for this type of job, but this year I want something I can eat, so chard it is. You can find details on how to sow it in this post. Tomorrow we are going to Sussex to see a school, and I am secretly plotting a trip to Standen House on the way home. No more gardening today, except the watering, and standing in the dark twilight dampness of its aftermath, feeling totally battle-worn. Half term is lovely for the first day; after which it can frankly do one.
All the good things to you my friends
x Laetitia