Carrots and Kids

{gardening with glue}

The weather has been grim. I'm pretty sure it's been horrid throughout the whole of the UK. And strange. After the hardest rain I've seen in a long time there was blue sky.

But I'm not complaining. After all I wasn't out in it. But I am hoping this is not a sign of things to come, weather-wise, in 2012. Please.

Still, it did mean that I could get on with doing a rather favourite form of gardening. That of gardening with glue. While I like reading gardening books, it's pictures that help form my ideas and get me inspired.

So in lieu of seed catalogues which are winging their way to me, I cut up some old magazines which was a form of decluttering and Fantasy Gardening.

I'm not setting myself up for a fall, I'm fully aware that I have neither the skill or the money to transform my garden but I do need to do something with both the front and back and this scrapbook will help.

{gardening goals}

 

I'm not normally a fan of the new year but after the December I've had I am greeting 2012 like an old friend, and smothering it in kisses.

And because this blog shouldn't be a depository for all my moaning I won't go on about the car that cost £1,700 to fix, the boiler that broke down or a lurgy picked up at school that saw all seven of us ill with three on antibiotics.

All in the two weeks before Christmas.

But no, I'm not dwelling on that or the utter exhaustion that has shrouded these holidays. To say I am looking forward to a bit of peace tomorrow is probably understating it somewhat.

I'm also looking forward to getting a few things achieved this year. I know resolutions are sticks we use to beat ourselves over the head, but it's hard to resist filling the blank pages of a new year with hopes and dreams.

But I'm calling mine goals. I figure they sound more achievable that way and less angst-making if they fail to leave the pages of my notebook.

In fact, there are so many things I want to get a handle on this year I am, yet again, feeling paralysed by feelings of overwhelm.

So I've made extensive lists, including a section entitled Gardening Goals. These are, in no particular order:

• Visit the allotment every week. Prioritise it
• Order three David Austin roses (I have until March to get the bare rooted ones in) to grow through the picket fence
• Paint the picket fence before the roses grow
• Organise and paint the potting shed - I feel this will feature in a few posts
• Plan and plant the Lotion and Potion patch
• Turn the unused bit of front garden into a cutting garden
• Transform the side bit of the house into a shady-loving plant haven
• Buy and fit a wooden gate so the above haven is a private one
• Get back to enjoying gardening.

The last one is probably the most important one. Thanks to the internet I do feel pangs of gardening inadequacy but I need to ignore what everyone else is doing. Really.

Have you any gardening goals?

{Reclaiming}

I'm not sure I can string a coherent post together. Exhaustion, online fatigue (I really, really must take a break from reading blogs and Twitter) and thoughts that flit out of my brain just as quickly as they flit in means I'm finding this tricky.

Oh I have lots to say, but I'm not entirely sure they're not all variations of the same thing. Plus, every time I write a post I get at least one person unsubscribe (I get very helpful emails informing me). Which is fine, I'd just rather not know about it. I don't know how many subcribers I've got (probably around two now?) but it's a bit...off-putting.

If I write about gardening people leave and if I write about something else people leave. So what I'm trying to say is - I'm reclaiming my blog. It's all for me. If you like it enough to comment or link to me that's lovely but if you dislike it enough to unsub, well...*shrugs*.

I'm not going to write about the riots. We know it's so awfully shocking and heartbreaking. I've tried not to watch any news with little people about but have talked about it with my teens. I've also listened to some interesting debates on Radio 4 and it's given me, in my little sheltered world, much to think about.

As I type this in my dressing gown it's pitch black outside but I can still hear the combines harvesting. That's quite comforting. I know I've been terribly guilty about taking where we live for granted but it's something I deeply appreciate now. Silly me.

So here's a list of things I'm thinking about that may (wahey!) make it into a blog post or two one day:

1. My plans for September: they are mounting up
2. A new blog? Can I be arsed? Should I just change the focus of this one? There's so much else I want to say, other than about gardening
3. My new "cafe area" in the garden, no less
4. Self-reliance
5. My role as a full-time mum
6. My would-be potting shed
7. Our back garden
8. Choices we've made
9. The blogs I love (am thinking of writing some blogging love letters via email)
10. The summer holidays.

Oooh, my brain feels like it's just been decluttered.

Simple Life Projects

Just lately I've been streamlining my life. Simplifying it. Not for any particular reason but I just feel compelled to, which is slightly odd but I'm going with it.

This simplifying has taken on many forms, but it all boils down to the same thing: shedding. So I've shed excess weight (34.5lbs so far!), possessions and commitments.

The latter includes things that are coming to a natural end (like the gardening club) and endings that I've initiated. I've discovered that I don't want to spend vast tracts of my life and time online (you may have noticed...).

This freeing up of my time and space means that I can concentrate on getting to grips with a few projects such as:

• Planning and eventually transforming one of my raised veggie beds at home into a herb bed. I've never had one this big before so the possibilities are quite exciting
• Creating and making my own potions and lotions using the herbs
• Major decluttering and organising in the home (this sounds boring but it'll be transformative, I tell ya)
• Learning to make my own clothes. Sewing machines frustrate me no end but I'm determined not to be beaten!
• Baking bread - regularly
• Becoming more proficient at knitting. I'm still ploughing on with my little project and will update soon
• Learn to crochet
• Photographing with vintage cameras and film.

Of course, life will still have it's stressful moments and days (she says wearily) but I'm hoping my responses will be different. I'm hoping that my "work" will give me solace and some grounding instead of the little things, like taking photos, being blotted out by the dark clouds of anxiety.

I'm always on the look out for future project ideas - do you have any you're planning or doing right now?

A Weekly To Do List

Now this may seem utterly boring, but I am always so nosy that peeking at others' to do lists is not a chore. This is, of course, no ordinary one but my gardening list. Now that I am waking up a bit I need to Get Myself Sorted.

Of course, I could merely write it in a notebook but those have a habit of going missing or remaining unopened so if you do find it all tedious it's probably best to look away now...

• Take part in the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch this weekend. It's only for an hour and I'm not overly hopeful about seeing much (particularly if our neighbour keeps up with his pneumatic drill) but still
• Start chitting my seed potatoes. As of writing I haven't bought any but am planning to nip to the garden centre to remedy this. As we all know, all work and no play is very boring
• Make some bird cakes
• Order my tomato seeds. Yes, I know I am horribly lax
• Sort out my greenhouse. You seriously do not want to see it as it is but I may post a picture of the result. After all, there's no point in all of us being depressed
• Have a bonfire. I have waited months, months I tell you, for The Husband to transport some very large cuttings from the front garden as promised. Now I'm taking matters into my own hands
• Finally, finally sort out a plan for the front. Quite frankly, I'm so fed up with it that I would happily restore it to its former "glory" of two small flower beds under the windows and lawn. Although don't hold me to that....

At my current work rate I reckon I should get one of the above crossed off. And that may well be the one involving me staring at birds from the comfort of a kitchen chair.

My Gardening Resolutions

I'm not usually one for resolutions; there are enough things I can and do feel guilty about on a regular basis without drawing up a list of others. I much prefer adopting a Word of the Year which, strangely, I haven't done yet.

For me, September also feels like a new year. But I obviously cannot escape the fact that time is spinning ever faster and now we're in 2011. I've never before made Gardening Resolutions but, let's face it, while I do not want to become all Serious and Stressed about it, I do indeed need to Prioritise Gardening a little more.

Otherwise, I'm not gardening. I might as well hang up my trowel and rename this blog Couch Potato and Kids.

So, really in an effort to focus my mind during this year, here are my Gardening Resolutions:

• Organisation: I need to divide my time a bit more evenly between the three raised beds at home (which shall be known as the Home Patch) and the allotment. At the moment it's either/or. While one has lots of love, time and attention lavished on it (and it could be either of them) the other takes on a neglected air. It's a bit like being caught between two lovers (I would imagine)

• Labelling: This, as you may know, is a bit of a grey area for me. Grey as in I'm not very good at it and when anyone asks me the name of the dahlia or flower I'm in raptures about I inwardly cringe and confess I don't know. So a priority I think

• Finish The Front Garden: Oh goodness, I feel a bit stressed just thinking about this. But really, it needs to be finished. Although there are so many other things the money should be spent on. I suppose I could try and do it on a budget. But then again, I will still have to buy some plants. See? I'm even driving myself crazy

• Sort Out The Greenhouse: This is looking a bit sorry for itself. Some of the panels have popped out thanks to the snow. My "potting table" is a mess of....er....stuff. Last year I envisaged happy hours spent in the spring listening to Radio 7, drinking coffee and gardening inside it. For reasons that escape me that never really happened. Well, not for any decent length of time. This year it will though

• To Enjoy It. Really, despite what some people say, it is just gardening. And by that I mean, for me, it is and should be hugely enjoyable. It doesn't really matter what others are doing. Or if they have more knowledge. Hopefully I'll be still doing this when I'm 70 and still learning. And enjoying it. I'm looking forward to that.

I hope you all had a great Christmas and a wonderful New Year. Have you made any gardening resolutions?

Things I Am Thinking...

• Thanks to everyone for your seed catalogue suggestions. I am planning on ordering Seeds of Italy, Suttons, Pennard Plants, Jungle Seeds and the Organic Gardening Catalogue

• I have done nothing with the front garden so I really need to set aside some money (what money?) and get cracking. Even if it is winter

• I am going to revamp the blog a little. Add some bits on the side ->  Improve things a tad

• Set up a new blog. Yes, I know, I need another one like a hole in the head. That one would purely be for pictures, so I can tinker really

• Remember to plant my garlic and broad beans at home. Now!

• Organise and sort out the greenhouse. It has been sorely neglected plus, it has no heating so is cold. But with my new wristwarmers, a steaming mug of coffee and Radio 7 keeping me company I shan't notice the cold

• Finish knitting the wristwarmers (can you spot anything here?!).

What's on your mind?

November is a great month to....

• Grow some sprouting seeds on your kitchen windowsill (more to come on this)

• Drink lots of hot chocolate

• Make your Christmas pudding on Stir Up Sunday, November 21 (actually we might make our Christmas cake but it will invoke the season of giving and involve stirring). There are lots of Christmas pudding recipes

• Dig up your veggie beds so the frosts can break up the clods

• Make some wrist warmers (I seem to remember this appearing on October's list....)

• Plant your garlic

• Go for a walk. In the wind, rain, drizzle, gloom. Whatever the weather (really should take my own advice more....)

• Embrace stodge. Dumplings? Crumbles? Jacket pots? Eat 'em and love 'em

• Order seed catalogues

• Aim to have Christmas shopping all wrapped up (literally) by the end of November, leaving December free for foodie/decorating/sniffing at nativity-type things.

So That Was Summer

Can you hear that cracking noise? That's me flexing my fingers as I push my chair up to the computer to begin writing this blog again. Yes, it's about time isn't it?

I won't lie and say I had to blow a layer of dust from the keys, that I forgot my password to many sites, that I'm over Twitter and quite possibly over my internet life.

There will be no fibs about how I spent all my daylight hours in the garden and up the allotment and both are looking so good and the front garden is finished and well, let me at a new project because I have all this energy....

I missed writing this blog. Not because I need validation from comments, or how many people read this, but because I like writing. This here is a creative outlet that is all mine and I love it.

But it seems I'm a little rusty! What should I write? Should I tell you about my summer hols? How I know people are probably fed up with the lack of gardening talk on this blog.

No, I shan't post any of that. If you want to find out the more personal snippets of my ordinary life (and why would you?) Twitter is the place to go. What I will say is I have lots of plans for September. Involving the garden and home, me, my creative life.

I shall save all of that for tomorrow though because life is short and posts should be too.

Thank Goodness For Six Week Summer Holidays

Sometimes I feel as if I've lost my way a bit. That the mother I used to be has been buried under a pile of expectations, a smattering of competitiveness and a bucket load of judgment.

As someone who doesn't work outside the home (I am so fed up with describing myself as Just A Mother but have yet to come up with an alternative) I used to love it when the children broke up for the holidays. Then we slowly became a family of seven and guilt settled in happily next to worry while envy budged up to make room for them both.

Which resulted in me dreading the summer break. What was I going to do with them? Everyone was jetting off or had an action packed summer planned (they weren't and they didn't).

Today though I feel as if I'm getting reacquainted with an old friend, the mother who thought up loads of fun activities (like the unsurprisingly popular Topsy Turvey Day one year on holiday when the children were the "adults").

This weekend, apart from doing the usual ferrying around, I shall be Sorting Out the Family Room and Making a Start on the Hall. It doesn't feel as if the holidays can start properly until things are a bit straighter.

Then I shall sort out the craft cupboard, buy new supplies and write my Big List of Things To Do For Bored Children. Hopefully it will contain something for everyone, things to do alone and stuff that will need my taxi-driving skills.

As well as being with the children I plan on finding a crucial missing piece for my sewing machine and firing it up again, finishing some knitting projects, trying to learn to crochet (again), do some "proper" cooking and wade through the stack of books by my bed. In short I shall potter. It seems to make for a more harmonious family life if I potter rather than be on the computer.

What I don't plan on doing is blogging in the strictest sense during the summer holidays. I think I may still want to post pictures. I've read a couple of blogs (one American) where the mother just posts a picture a day which is appealing. I might not even get around to that, who knows?

What I definitely don't plan on doing is going on Twitter. So much of that frustrates me these days it seems a stupid waste of my time to get annoyed with certain individuals who are always moaning and who twitter so much you wonder if actually they don't have children at all but are the proverbial lone man in a bed-sit.

So I wish you all a wonderful summer filled with dripping ice-cream cones, cloudless skies and enough precious memories to keep you warm throughout winter xx