Latest News from Kirkstead Old Mill Cottage B&B Woodhall Spa

We're getting even "GREENER"

Many of you will know that we care very much about our environment, so you will understand my feelings of pleasure today when I saw two great piles of chippings up on the disused railway track.  They were created from a huge heap of Budleja and Lonicer (honeysuckle) prunings, mainly harvested from the access track side and the pergola up near the gate.

No doubt, it would have been cheaper to have a bonfire, but I know that our chippings will form the surface of some of our footpaths in the wild garden, and they will also be used in the formation of our own organic compost.

The two helpful workers also ground out the remaining stumps that inhibited the passage of the mower throughout the Woodland Garden.

DEVELOPMENTS on the WILD SIDE

My son Mark suggested a few days ago that I had not added anything to my blog for a month, and tonight I see that he is correct.  Somehow we have to get life back into proportion, but it is not that easy to be wise when the proverbial rug is about to pulled from under you.

Anyway, late this afternoon I made a start; a step in the right direction, and I was rewarded with a truly fantastic show of daffodils alongside the "middle way" in the Wild Garden.  It brought me nearly to tears - the beauty of it, and my heart was full of happy memories of my mum who told me just before she died how much she loved daffodils.  That was a good thirty years ago!

Tony and I are planning a new Buddleja walk, just beyond the pylon that is surrounded by overgrown brambles.  The sun will shine here all day, which should help make up for the poor soil conditions, and therefore help the Buddlejas provide nectar late into the year.

AVASTIN

Hello again - at last!

I'm so sorry not to have had the energy over the past three weeks to keep this diary up to date but, as you are aware, I tend to write to you just before I go to bed and recently I have often been more exhausted than usual.  Partly due to a throat infection that has now abated, but mainly due to the frustration of being totally unsuccessful in my attempts to get provision of this "miracle drug" for Tony extended into April.