Post Comment Love 31 March - 2 April 2017

Hello and welcome to another Post Comment Love. If you were here last week, thank you and if you're new here this week, welcome - I hope you'll find us to be a friendly bunch. Each week Morgan and I are thrilled with the range of posts you share with us.

This week has been one of catching up and if I'm honest, I'm not there yet. I've recovered from having a week of no wifi, and the shock that brought and I've realised I comforted myself by taking even more photos than normal. I've not started editing the nearly 1,000 photos I took but I expect there'll be plenty of duds in there.

We had a great week in Dorset with trips on the steam train into Swanage, a walk along the coast and back to the cottage on the Ridgeway. There were visits to Kingston Lacy, Max Gate and Hardy's cottage as well as Compton Acre gardens in Poole.  We took the bikes out a couple of days, one of those was very Famous Five style as four cycled to Lulworth Cove. No ginger beer though, a nice cuppa instead!  

So I've plenty of blog content from that trip, and that's without the stop at Mottisfont on the way home.  Today though I'm sharing some photos from the wifi-less-but-beautiful cottage.  My photo though is from much closer to home and from my walk to work. I think the colour of this crimson magnolia is absolutely stunning and I'm looking forward to seeing it blossom.

Blogger Showcase: Kylie from Kyro and Style

This week Morgan is hosting all of Kylie's answers, but before you jump over there let me whet your appetite a little.  Kylie who blogs at Kyro and Style loves to write about fashion and describes herself as an avant garde, persistent and quirky which I can't help but wonder if that shows through in her personal style. You'll have to check out her blog though to find out, and don't forget to head over to Morgan's to find out much more about our Blogger Showcase this week.

Connect with Kylie here:

Bloglovin'  -  Instagram  -  Twitter  

An InLinkz Link-up

Forsythia inspiration

It'll come as no surprise that I'm a fan of the humble yellow forsythia. In fact I think I've had it in almost every garden I've ever had. 

Surprisingly though I've only ever planted one of those bushes, and that's in our current garden. And that was to replace a forsythia bush that had mysteriously given up the ghost one winter.  Ever the optimist I refused to believe that it wasn't going to spring back into life, so left it there hoping for the best. But nothing and by the summer, with its branches still lifeless I had to admit defeat, but not before making a plan to buy a replacement.

It's forsythia time right now. The hedge on my walk to work (below) is just stunning right now, and it never fails to make me smile.

While in Dorset last week, along with the yellow flowering gorse which lined the sides of the roads, we saw plenty of forsythia. That was in the gardens we visited, and in front gardens. We had a great visit to Compton Acres in Poole on the sunniest day of the week, more on that another day, and it was great to see so much colour on display.

FORSYTHIA AT COMPTON ACRES, POOLE

But it was at Max Gate in Dorchester that my Forsythia Inspiration struck. 

MY FORSYTHIA INSPIRATION

I know the picture above doesn't look much, but seeing the forsythia cuttings neatly in a row I knew it'd be something I'd be trying for myself. I mean, I know how easily forsythia roots - and make a point of clearing it all out of the flower beds following a trimming - and with the vibrant hedge just around the corner from home, I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about trying this before.

You see over the winter I've been ogling bare rooted hedging in the plant catalogues to use as a low hedge on the allotment - I know, I really should get out more! I'd been deliberating about how many plants I'd need and the ideal mix of flowering and fruiting shrubbery. Not too much obviously, as I'm nowhere near knowing what I'd need, but I do know a lot of the theory of planting a hedge now!

Seeing those cuttings above, I realised I could make my own hedge (in time) and I've already a couple of cuttings shoved into soil in the greenhouse. MOH, as usual, thinks I'm mad, but I'll be adding to my cutting collection as the flowers start to fade because I can't bear to cut them beforehand.  I know this could be a lengthy business, but won't it be worth it?

The yard and the yurt at River Cottage HQ

It's been a while since my mad day trip to River Cottage HQ in Devon - and yes, it was a long day - I'm not sure why but I haven't shared more of my photos, but I will today. There's still more to show from the garden, but first I want to start with some from the yard and of the yurt. 

We arrived in the yard by tractor, well in the trailer behind the tractor and it was quite a bumpy ride. And quite a descent. The ride back up later that evening after all the delicious food was equally as bumpy, and nowhere near as welcome, although I wasn't so keen on walking back either.

It's fair to say I was quite excited about my trip to River Cottage as I'm quite a big Hugh F-W fan and have several of his cookbooks and approve of his campaigns.  So arriving in the yard was a bit of a thing, but it wasn't quite how I expected it to be.  I'd seen the garden, and the kitchen in the TV shows so was surprised to find myself looking at these:

And I was intrigued. Clearly part of an old building but full of character and for me adding to the charm of the place. The zinc trough caught my eye and I'd quite happily have taken it home with me, maybe the tractor would come in handy after all?! It was planted up with fennel and wallflowers and while it's not a combination I'd have thought of, it's one I can imagine working well as both grow to similar heights.

My visit was in November - I know, where has the time gone? - so the wallflowers had a little more growing to do before they flowered, but I'm curious to know what colours they were. Yellow would echo the fennel flowers, but the reddy browns would be a great contrast. Ah well, I guess I'll never know.

As I explored the yard I did catch a quick glimpse of the garden and I was oh so tempted to sneak off and explore it on my own. But I thought that would be slightly rude and so for now, it was just this peek.

I rejoined the others back in the barn, still looking wistfully over at the garden. The lights momentarily caught my eye, and then there was the food demonstration, and only after that was I set free into the garden and able to wander around the farmhouse. 

The garden was everything I hoped it would be, but I'm teasing you now as I've still some more photos of the yard, and of the yurt to show you. There was evidence all around that it's very much a working farm, not just the axe and pile of logs, but also the chefs who were hurriedly rushing around cooking my dinner!  All produce, if not grown at River Cottage, is sourced locally as you'd expect.

I'm saying nothing, but there's no guarantee that the photo above and the one below aren't related.

Despite that innocent face, and cheeky tongue. And yes, it's a one-eyed cat.

Elsewhere on the farm, and on the other side of the barn was the yurt, which was totally unexpected and lovely and warm. The fire in the centre of the tent saw to that.

With straw bales around the edge it was a great place to sit down and chat to the other bloggers there that day. Some of whom I knew from online, some I'd met in real life before and others that were friends in the making.

Bunting decorated the edges, and I was reminded then and am again now, that I'm seriously lacking in the bunting department.

I keep promising myself that I'll make some - I have one string, which, sssh!, I bought and don't put up often enough - and with our party in the garden getting ever closer, then I really should move them up my sewing to do list.

There was nothing at River Cottage HQ that changed my view of the whole set-up, the only thing that would have made it better would have been for Hugh himself to be in attendance. And you can bet that if that had happened, you'd have already known about it!

One last photo before I go, and it's another teasing shot of the garden. This time from the farmhouse kitchen window, and it looks just as it does on the TV. That's all the teasing I'm doing for now, I'll share photos from the garden in a future post, and I promise it'll be soon.

But in the meantime, let me know if you're a Hugh fan, and if you've a favourite recipe - or campaign - that you're a fan of.

* With thanks to River Cottage and Flea Enterprises for the invitation and arrangements for my visit.