It was a good plan

I should not be here. I am supposed to be in town. Ah well…

It was the whole four hours thing. Just could not face it. I shall go tomorrow, when I have to spend less time dragging my trolley around.

However, as I am cooking for four on Saturday (yes – “entertaining” !), I really could have done with having Friday free at home. I shall pay the price for today’s laziness, you may be certain of that.

There may be bugs on the Windswept Acre. I feel slightly under par, with aching joints and great weariness… despite the fact that I slept right through the night for the first time in what may be years, I really cannot remember.

But you don’t want to know about that, you’re looking for a Thursday Thrill – and all that I have to offer is my own personal thrill at discovering that I can now spin Merino pencil roving with minimal difficulty. There is no way that I can project to you  the depth of this thrill and you will have to rest assured that I am simply delighted and that I even begin to think that the madcap idea of spinning two yarns and knitting them by the end of July is actually achievable.

Yesterday’s spinning group was excellent. Jean came to join us for the first time in a very long time and she brought with her the hand made wheel that she had made in Shetland. Imagine our delight to find that it is 100% recycled and reclaimed. Every last part of the wheel is salvaged from a wide variety of sources. It looks wonderfully rustic and has a unique character. A smashing wee wheel.

During the session I fixed up a trip to town with Jennifer. This one will be far more pleasurable than my normal “under sufferance only” shopping trips as we are going in her Land Rover and we are visiting the garden centre. I am making myself a little spinning garden outside, by the conservatory. The weeds are already cleared and I have topped the bare soil off with roofing tiles (!) I shall be planting a few things into the ground but mainly I shall be planting in pots and troughs. I have no idea what I shall end up buying but Mr L has given me carte blanche with the debit card (!) and suggested that I should feel no guilt at spending. What a brave man!

My vision for my garden is of green and white. It’s East-facing and is sheltered on the other three sides – most parts  get some sun in the summer weeks but I think we are damp enough to get a good show from some hostas, ferns and ivy. I am desperately keen to get some Anemone “Wild Swan” when it becomes available in April next year. It was the RHS plant of the year at Chelsea this year and is simply exquisite.

Any ideas what I can plant? Frost is not a big issue for us but plants will  need to be wind and salt tolerant, grow well in a pot, and be white flowering or pale in colour.  Ideally they would be repellant to chooks and bunnies… I am not averse to a little splash of colour but I’d be tempted to keep it to one area of the spectrum – blue/purple perhaps. Or maybe some blue and some pink. I have Pulmonaria

and Comfrey in mind.

and forget-me-nots,  I adore flowers than turn from pink to blue. It is like magic.

and of course we shall have the white myosotis too.

We should have some aquilegia, yes?

If I have pink among my white, I can have some Norah Barlow

and then I could have some pink anemone japonica to set off my Wild Swans

I shall be needing Soloman’s Seal

and Jacob’s Ladder and campanula  and iris sibirica and and and… And what about hanging baskets?

And there must be white narcissus planted for the Spring this Autumn. Paper Whites, Pheasant’s Eye and Jonquil at the least. There had better be some crocus too… Snow Bunting – I love the botanical crocus. And Autumn Crocus! How about this stunner?

and on the subject of Autumn flowering bulbs – every garden needs some Nerine bowdenii. Dolly Mixture pink wouldn’t work in my little minds- eye plot, but Stephanie (no dis-a-ssemble, Steph-a-neeeee!) would work very well indeed.

Oh, and we shall be needing perfume if we are to sit and spin out there. Lily of the Valley, mayhap

Would it be too weird if I grew some wild garlic (ramsons)?

They look good, smell divine, and I can cook with them. Actually… I want to get as many herbs as I can into this little garden.

I have no knowledge which of these will grow here, but I shall try all my favourites out.

Suggestions please! Write me a shopping list for next Thursday.

Just one thing: absolutely NO roses! (except for ground covering miniatures with no thorns, (or soft non-damaging ones) and a no-prune regime.)

Can you tell that I am thrilled at the prospect of finally having some cultivated space on the Acre? I just have to hope that I shan’t kill anything… and that I can find a garden supplier who will deliver here. I gave up arguing with Thompson & Morgan years ago.