I’ve learnt a thing or two over the years, and one of the things I’ve learnt is that I’m better at forgetting than remembering. I’m a very good starter, I’m constantly starting again, but I quite often find that what I am starting is something I have started before.

The thing about making a garden is that once it is started it has a tendency to continue. The plants, especially the trees and shrubs, grow with a minimum of care. I so appreciate their input, their quiet effort, their transformation.

The garden so far: visitors welcome!

One of the things I am asking of myself this year is to be a more efficient gardener and record keeper. So during this cold weather I have been trying to update my website – where you are reading this blog – and also looking at an Airtable database which contains quite a lot of information about the plants in the garden and at the allotment, and the seeds I have ready to grow this year. In this regard I have greatly appreciated help from Louise. I was all set to scrap everything I had already done and start again. Louise at my shoulder was saying no, no, no! Thank goodness. I discovered that I had a more or less complete list of the plants in the garden, with pictures and information about each one. I am trying to work out how to share this with a link somewhere here. It should be possible! Watch this space.

https://airtable.com/apptc76sp1uNzphTt/tblQzPxgJpNn05H2m/viwrrReFsYswKtrRb

Try the link above. You may have to jump through a hoop or two! Let me know if it works.

When I asked Louise to help me with all this she asked me what I wanted to say. Good question, but not particularly easy to answer. Many of us have gardens, spaces around our houses where plants grow. What I want to communicate is that it is possible to grow food in that space. And then, instead of discussing with our neighbours the best type of lawnmower to buy we could be discussing how to preserve a glut of plums.

So these blogs, as well as being about life, the universe and everything, are a record of what I am doing in the garden, and how I am doing it, to create a forest garden. Sometimes it will be quite practical, sometimes esoteric. Gardening, this contact with the natural world that gardening is, allows us to practice a mindfulness and a letting go that we so desire, a slowing down and a presence, an escape from a mad world that so often threatens to engulf us.

Gardening is good for you, and if you plant the right things you get delicious food from it too. If you would like more information, please contact me. I am happy to advise by email, and if you are local to Newbury, in person.