I might have been forgiven for thinking, before we moved out of London, that the real village show (not to be confused with the village fete of course) was a thing of the past. Trestle tables laden with prize vegetables set out in the village hall, handwritten certificates for the best flowers, sideways glances exchanged […]
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When I think of gardening, I think of my mother first and foremost, but I also think of her parents. I used to love visiting them when I was a little girl. The sun always shone in my grandparents garden and my memories are all of riotous flowerbeds full of colours and a lovely birdbath. […]
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I was delighted to be asked to share our experience of leaving London to move to the country by the wonderful Life after London team, who are well worth a visit if you’re planning your own River Cottage exodus. I chose to try to be brutally honest about how we’ve found it so far, and I’d love […]
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We’re facing a massive project here with our smallholding. We’d eventually like to be self-sufficient in most fruit and vegetables and meat, as well as cut flowers and so at the moment we’ve got a lot of big “one-off” tasks. Planting the orchard with our 32 trees was obviously one of them, and creating a […]
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In my 34 years on this planet I’ve lived in 17 different houses, but not one of them has ever affected me like this one. I’m sitting in an empty, echoing kitchen on a camping chair as I type this and in a few hours men in a big truck will come and pick up […]
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