Letters from Wetville

The girl is out of sicky danger zone. She is eating and laughing and I'm sure she will come back to full strength tomorrow. While she was ill, we cancelled swimming lessons, ballet rehearsal and martial arts. Not just for her but for everybody. Fionn walked home from school instead of me collecting them both and the zen was wonderful. Today, as Brighid started to eat, I could concentrate on her health, popping aloe vera, vitamin C, probiotics and cod liver oil down her throat. This afternoon she was up for some sunshine and helped me plant daffodils and pansies. She lay on the trampoline soaking up the sun while I went on to sow rocket and violas and plant freesias, perpetual spinach and red poppies. I wore my navy crossover top today. It is lovely and soft to wear. I've been reading up a little and examining the pattern (Simplicity 1945) some more and I see where I made some of my mistakes. Those mistakes led to wonkiness and a strange unflattering cosiness down the bo...

This is not quite how tomatoes look in the magazines. Or in the gardens of sensible people, dare I say 'normal' gardeners. Those people stake their plants properly. I staked mine with sticks which didn't withstand the last big wind and then the prone stakes prevented the plants from recovering upwards. The tomatoes are finally ripening though, and they taste good. This is hardly Home and Garden country either. But it is testament to the enduring prettiness of self seeded borage and calendula in the face of total neglect. I did plant some red onions in this patch, and a tomato plant and a chilli, but they got swamped long ago. Favourite Handyman stacked this. I think it is excellent. More crazy overgrownness. Canna lillies, roses, tansy, lemon balm, red hot poker and a dahlia, twined throughout with convulvulus. I still love my red fence. The next sewing project is the green top above (B) Remember the $4 too-pink jacket ? No longer pink. St Patrick's Day, I am...