It’s been a slow start for me this year, but bits and bats completed!
Well, this year has been a little bit challenging, and I am behind with seed sowing, bed preparation, planning etc etc. as we’ve taken on a cafe 3 days a week (Tuesday, Saturday and Sunday) and been somewhat distracted by that (it is on the Main Street in Sedbergh and is a great place to display my dried flowers as there is plenty of wall space).The cold weather hasn’t encouraged me either!!. I have however got some teeny tiny sweet peas and larkspur that I have germinated in a dark cupboard (in a takeaway box on wet kitchen roll) that are now pricked out and in compost in my unheated greenhouse. This week I will start the process of organising the seeds I have, ordering more if there are holes in my offering and sowing. The field will have to wait for a week or 2 frustratingly - minor ankle op this week and the weather is fab. The perennials in the field shouldn’t take any harm and it will be helpful for me to know what is where when things start to grow. On the ‘to do list’ is to map my field and note what perennials are where. Labels get misplace and my memory isn’t good enough to remeber the details!
What we have managed to do this year is plant the start of my very mini perennial food forest. This currently consists of lime trees for salad leaves and bladder nuts for seeds in a single row. Next we need to plant perennials such as Good king Henry underneath - something else on my to do list! I have also planted a few silver birch trees in my cutting foliage patch. Hopefully these will do better than the Eucalyptus trees I planted at the back end of last year many of which look decididy poorly if not dead.
Why not come and have a coffee, made with organic milk, and take a look at my dried flower heart wreaths, amongst other things and a flowery chat. Mothering Sunday, or Mother’s Day, is creeping up on me fast, and both dried flowers will be available offering with seasonal fresh flowers bought in from other British flower growers whose flowers are ahead of mine as they are either grown in a protected environment, further south or both!!