Sacred Sunday

 I had a lucky find in a local charity shop . This beautiful picture of a stone circle . It is probably one of our local Cornish circles and I have a feeling I,ve been there ....hmmm..
 Does anyone know where this is ?
 I carried it down to the Town Hall where we enjoy a cup of tea and slice of hot cheese flan ....several people commented on what a beautiful picture it is !  I absolutely love it ! This photo doesn't  really do it justice .  

Lasagne Method Gardening Triumph !

  Well , we had a bumper crop of courgettes , runner beans , french beans  , onions  shallots, the butternuts are climbing up the beanpole frame and that pumpkin is still growing ...in fact I think it is trying to escape !
   I will be doing this  " lasagne method " on all the veg beds for the next season ..it certainly is a good way to replenish the earth .

Making a Lasagne Vegetable Bed

It was about this time last year that a friend on Allotments4All  also from MereBrow Giant Pumpkins.com sent me these free giant pumpkin seeds ... ( .thankyou SO much MereBrow ! ) .... whoo hoo! , and I  began my first real trial of doing a  " lasagne bed " up in my veg garden .
 So I began straight away ... you can start this now !  Remove the weeds as best you can , then lay down newspapers , cardboard , manure , veg peelings , brittle brown branches and sticks and leaves , tea bags ,grass clippings after mowing ....  make it in layers ....like a lasagne  !  Begin now and slowly layer it all up through the winter..and the worms will munch their way through it...if you listen ..you can hear them crunching : )
   Then in the Spring you can just fork through it  and tumble it over abit.....it will look like crumbled Christmas Pudding ..... yummy...... well..for your plants it will be anyway !

...another

Here's a better photo ....it is also known as Soapwort . Yesterdays photo captured our  misty  Cornish atmosphere better , I thought .
                                       Mmmm ....breathe in that fragrance !
Lovely ancient wild flower ... can be found growing above Polurrian Cove here ....and in the hedgerows ... but you really have to look for it .

Saponaria officinalis

A favourite wild flower of mine and rarely seen , grows on my Cornish hedge . It has been used through ancient times , swished with warm water to make a gentle soapy wash .
 On this warm , misty , mizzly day , her soft and heady fragrance is of cloves  .

Topiary at a Snail's Pace

The thing with topiary is that you cant create it over night.....it takes time .   I thought I would begin with this simple snail  ..... I,m happy with his head ... and I ,m happy with his trailing tail ...but still working on the swirl on his shell . Sometimes I,ve taken out too much and then have had to wait till it grows out again ...before I can begin again .
 I love the Cornish hedge he is crawling along , ancient ferns , centranthus ruber , erigeron, wall flowers, rambling roses, old pink moss roses , mesembryanthemums , osteospurnums , wild primroses and joyful pink silene .
So today I will give him a little trim and then I,m going to clear all those messy tomato plants out of my greenhouse .... a waste of money , energy , compost , water ...sickly sticky monsters flopping all over my cactus collection....out ...out .....OUT !

A Schole- House For The Needle

..... and so while I await my gold threads.... I am here doing a little lesson from a delightful facsimile of a book dated 1632 A SCHOLE-HOUSE FOR THE NEEDLE by Richard Shorleyker .

  If you love embroidery or lace making ....then you will love this sweet book .

" Gentle readers I would haue you knowe , that the diverfities of examples , which you fhall find in this Scholole-house for the Needle , are only but Patternes , which ferue but to helpe and inlarge your inventions : but for the difpofing of them into forme and order of workes , that I haue left to your owne skils and vnderftandings ; whofe ingenious , & well practifed wits , will fo readily ,  ( I doubt not ) compofe them into fuch beautifull formes , as will be able to giue content , both to the workers , and wearers of them . "

Thanks to John and Elizabeth Mason who found the original book at a jumble sale in Newport , Shropshire during the 1940's...for a few pence !.....and together with the Victoria and Albert Museum who also have a copy , put together all but the frontispiece and two pages at the end of the book complete book .
  Full of the most delightful patterns and a joy to learn and create small projects from , a joy to work my fingers the very same patterns 17th century fingers have worked !

Little Medieval Owl

Still waiting for the postman to bring me my parcel of goldwork threads , to embellish little medieval owl . So he is being put aside to roost for a little while .