Hellebores and hydrangeas

Today I'm sharing some more from our visit to the Blickling Estate last Saturday, we went looking for snowdrops and found them, but also discovered plenty of hellebores and my long-term favourite, hydrangeas, which were definitely full of faded beauty. I mean, just look, and you'll see what I mean. The hydrangeas were faded and almost resembled paper than the colourful petals I first think of, and they're hauntingly beautiful, don't you think?

The greenness and lushness of the ferns is set off but the brown, decaying stems around it - and well, you know I'm a fan of ferns, so I'm sure you'll excuse me just another shot.

The pictures above were taken as we wound and wended our way through the garden to the Orangery at the edge of the garden. One day I'll get there and actually go into the Orangery, but once again I've had to make do with peering through the windows. I shared a similar shot - or maybe even the same one, who knows? - in the snowdrop post and I'm still impressed with how well it came out through the glass, and one full of condensation at that. 

I bet it was much warmer in there than I was outside peering in!

The real discovery though was behind the Orangery. As well as the snowdrops, there were plenty of hellebores and they were their usual embarrassed gorgeousness, and unusually there were plenty of yellow ones. I think most often they're pink, the ones in my garden definitely are. In the walled kitchen garden I'd also spotted some dark, almost black hellebores, but clearly I was so enamoured by them I didn't actually photograph them. 

And despite thinking I had plenty of photos of the ones from behind the Orangery, I didn't, but thankfully the shot I do have is pretty special. Behind the Orangery there was also a bit of a white bench theme going on, and I imagine this one will be a glorious place to rest awhile in warmer weather.

The garden it looks out onto was full of early colour, the mahonias with their pink buds and yellow flowers also looked great and I took the opportunity to get up close. And in doing so, spotted another white bench. I told you it was a theme.

Another burst of colour in this part of the garden was coming from the dogwoods and their vibrant red stems. The grey-green of the euphorbia-like plants (I'm pretty sure they're a form of euphorbias) provided the perfect foil to the flaming red, and looked great growing through the dogwoods. Perhaps that's something I could replicate with my own dogwoods, it's definitely something to consider isn't it?

And as if to prove that the euphorbia-like plant was beautiful in its own right - and I think they are, it's MOH who likens our euphorbias to daleks - this one was straining over the path to be noticed.

With the rain, yes rain, sadly not dew, it really did have a point and one it made well, don't you think?

Happy Valentines - and beyond - from HomeSense

When HomeSense got in touch recently and shared details of their faux flowers, I knew that I could hold out no longer. I've seen an increase of Spring blooms in the shops, including some in a snowy Munich and as they say, resistance was futile. So after work on Monday, I headed off to the Homesense in Tunbridge Wells on a mission.

I didn't realise though quite how much of a challenge I'd set myself. I mean, just look at what I was confronted with.

Price-wise the stems ranged from £2.99 to £7.99 and while there was obviously no scent, that was the only difference to real blooms I could see. That and the fact that I'd unlikely to find such a wide array of blooms in a flower shop at this time of year. I was very tempted by the hydrangeas, their colour was good and realistic but they weren't quite what I was looking for.

And then I saw the pink peonies. Immediately I was transported back to our wedding day in 2017, where my surprise bouquet was, yes you've guessed it, pink peonies. I say surprise bouquet as I'd left the choice of my bouquet to our wedding planners (I guess that's a story for another day). They knew I wanted a modern style, I didn't want roses and that my dress wasn't conventional (it was bronze) and I trusted them to come up trumps, which they did. I hadn't realised until then, how much I liked peonies. 

So once I spotted the peonies it was more about how many and what colour, and what else would go alongside them to make the bouquet less wedding-y and less pink. It's not that I don't like pink, I do, but having a solely pink bouquet in the house full time could, I think, get a little wearing and a bit twee. 

But I'd made my choices and I quickly went to pay before I added another armful of these stems to the bouquet, they really are that good.

Back home I piled the armful of flowers onto the table and realised again how realistic they looked. And how unlikely it would be for me to have a bunch of fresh flowers quite this large. And on Valentine's day too. Not that MOH wouldn't buy me flowers, but I disagree with how the prices are inflated at this time of year, so I always say to him another time of year will be fine. It's a bit like going out for a meal around this time of year, set menus come out and that annoys me too.

But back to the flowers and celebrating Valentines. I decided to arrange them in a handheld bouquet, which gives the modern style I like, but also is quite hard to do - or at least I find it hard to do - as I find I need at least three pairs of hands to do it well and tie the ribbon around the stems without them rearranging themselves. 

But I'm pleased with the result.

It's such a large bouquet that as you can see I struggled to get the bouquet and myself into the same shot.

You might have already realised I'm impressed with these blooms, and while they're slightly unseasonal - peonies are usually out in June - it's nice to see such blooms right now. And to know they'll last too, so I'll be enjoying them for many months to come.

What do you think, will you be tempted by faux flowers this year?

*This is a collaborative post with HomeSense, however all views and opinions are my own.

Travelling light, and stylishly so too...

On my visit to the London Graphic Centre in Covent Garden before Christmas I spotted some unusual looking bags, made from recycled tarpaulins, displayed in the shape of a Christmas Tree. My interest was piqued and I decided to look into them further and discovered a fascinating story of how two brothers were looking for a robust and waterproof bag to hold their creative work and hit on the idea to reuse tarpaulins from trucks. 

There are now over forty different models, with each bag unique and incredibly strong. With an overnight trip to Kufstein on the horizon and Christmas ahead of me, my own idea started to form and so during our Christmas shopping we ended up back at the London Graphic Centre. In my mind I thought I'd leave with a yellow or green bag, but it turned out I was wrong. 

We left with this red and blue F251 Kowalski. 

Not yellow. Or green. At all.

In the shop, this was the one that spoke to me.

My biggest concern was if it was practical for a short break.

And having travelled light on my recent trip to Kufstein and Munich, it was. 

It was also much admired, and drew comments on just how light I was travelling. But with careful outfit planning, I had plenty of options.

I packed a pair of trousers, pyjamas, two long sleeved T-shirts, a vest top and cardigan, toiletries, my bag of liquids to get through airport security and a big wooly scarf to help combat the expected negative temperatures. I didn't pack a pair of shoes, because I didn't think I'd need them for two nights away, especially if it was that cold and with the information that heels weren't permitted in the fortress at Kufstein where we were dining.

I didn't realise it but packing our panniers back in the summer was good practice!

It's quite a clever design, apart from the tarpaulin I mean. Pushing the shoulder straps to the side frees the top opening, and then it does look a lot more like a (stylish) cycling pannier. On the Freitag website they say the bag is "automatically weatherproof and closed when on your back" and they're not wrong.

Inside there's a couple of smaller side pockets which came in handy for my passport and smaller items. It's a bit dark in there, but you get the gist.

And it's strong. I pushed it to the limits, adding more papers and paraphernalia for the return journey, like always seems to be the way. But it's tarpaulin, from trucks, it's made for hard work. 

But I bet no one expected them to be recycled into something so stylish in their next life. There's plenty more colourways on the Freitag site, and a short video showing how the design works.

I think this has to be one of my most stylish Christmas presents ever, and over the coming year (and beyond) I'm hoping to put it to good use. 

Gorgeous isn't it?