Leave it to compost

I had a wonderful English Literature tutor called Mark Loveridge when I studied at Swansea. It was he who decided I could do the undergraduate degree despite my inadequate A-level results,  he who had the sort of brilliant energy and sense of humour  that I'd only ever seen in films. And it was he who, when I felt like submitting a first draft of an essay, told me to, "Leave it to compost for a few weeks," before tackling it again.

Leave it to compost.

For someone like me, who overthinks, overplans, then gets frustrated and disappointed when things don't go to plan, or when I get tired or bored, this piece of advice was invaluable.

So, as much as I've felt guilty about not blogging over the summer, despite being on holiday from my current uni course and technically having more brain space to write, I think it was necessary to have a break. I've never been great at the regular, frequent side of blogging - as you can probably tell, it's more feast or famine with me. But the point of starting this blog was to enjoy it, and there's nothing enjoyable about feeling guilty!

So there are lots of things I could share here, and I will share some of them and let the others sit there. Maybe they'll compost for another four months and it'll feel good to share them at Christmas when it's wintry and gloomy outside, and we need a reminder of sunnier days.

In July, there was a surprise party for a lady who went out and bought herself pink peonies the day before. Luckily I was told before I went to the market! These flowers are a mixture of market flowers (pale pink phlox, snapdragons, white gentian) and home grown ones (red phlox, panicum/fountain grass, nicotiana, jasmine and sweet peas). I was given most of the containers to fill, and it was fun using unfamiliar vases.

Particularly this autumnal one.

And these beautiful, tall bud vases.

My Australian cousin was visiting briefly last week, and asked to go to the flower market. It was wonderful to have someone to help me choose, and to help me carry! As well as the market flowers, there were also buckets of sedum, roses, physocarpus, panicum and herbs from the garden, and foraged berries. It was also nice to use September flower in September.

Last weekend, I used the flowers for several bits, including this bouquet for a beautiful woman who liked the moody colours and chocolate scent of cosmos. This bouquet included one of my rare, homegrown dark sunflowers - which, unlike many of the sunflowers I've grown, has long enough stems to use in bouquets.

And of course, there were leftovers to enjoy. The chocolate cosmos scent fills the room - it's incredible that such a strong fragrance comes from such a dainty flower.

When these flowers die, you know where they'll end up? That's right - on the compost heap.

What's your type?

Romantic? There were so many pink, blousy roses, they were perfect for a romantic, fluffy bouquet, with white scented phlox, pink and white cleome, floaty white ammi, and fairy dust-like panicum.

Old-fashioned? Peach and pink roses, mixed with lavender, borage and orange thyme, made for a old-fashioned, scented posy.

Opposites attract? I love the combination of cerise and lime green. Nicotiana 'Lime Green' has proved to be a brilliant cut flower, and the plants do well indoors too, releasing their gorgeous scent at night. These were leftovers which were used to brighten up the bathroom - a room that I never would have considered decorating with flowers until I read Jane Packer's wonderful book, At Home with Flowers! The other flowers are Cosmos 'Sensation', Zinnia 'Purple Prince', cornflowers and sweet-smelling sweet peas.

Scatty Scarlett? The late Charlotte Coleman played Scarlett in Four Weddings and a Funeral, wearing an outfit that Gareth (Simon Callow) described as "ecclesiastical purple and the pagan orange symbolizing the mystical symbiosis in marriage between the heathen and Christian traditions." Nothing so philosophical was going on here; I just wanted to show Ben "Higgledy Garden" (who provided my borage and nicotiana seeds) that girls like purple and orange flowers too! These were verbena bonariensis and an orange zinnia.

Neighbourly? Pink, purple and blue sit next to each other on the colour wheel, and are one of my favourite colour combinations. Here are pink zinnias from the mixture of 'Early Wonder' colours, purple verbena, and blue borage.

As you've probably gathered, I don't really have a type. Although if I had to choose, I'd go for scented and old-fashioned. I like lots of different combinations of flowers - sometimes I don't know what works and what doesn't until I put them together. 

Pick flowers from the garden, or get bunches from the florist, and try putting them together in different ways. If you don't think you have a good eye for colour, this lopsided colour wheel might help. I had to create it for a floristry assignment when I did my diploma...I'm shuddering at the memory! The true colour or hue is on the outside ring, followed by the tint (hue+white), the shade (hue+black), and the tone (hue+grey).

On suicide, bereavement, and being a good friend

In the work I've been doing recently for a bereavement service, I sometimes have to ground myself to prevent tears rising up. It feels like an honour to sit there with someone as they tell you about the person they loved and still love, the death, and the effect it has had on them. But sometimes it's terribly sad, and I feel there's nothing helpful I can do or say, other than to just hold that sadness (and anger and other feelings) with the person sat in front of me.

Yesterday morning, along with millions of other people, I woke up to the news that Robin Williams had died. It was reported that he had severe depression and had killed himself. And like millions of others who were strangers to him, I couldn't believe it. We didn't know him, had never met him, but his tremendous voice and his energetic presence played in our living rooms time after time. Although many of us admired his darker work like Insomnia and One Hour Photo, and his dramatic roles in Dead Poets Society and Good Will Hunting, it was his (often improvised) comedy that we'd enjoyed so much. Aladdin was the first film I took my sister to see at the cinema. It was the old cinema in Sidcup which is no longer there. I don't know what she understood, but she giggled a lot. I bought the VHS for her and she watched it every day.

It seemed deeply unfair that a person who brought so much kindness and laughter to others could feel so unhappy. As I read the news, I found myself crying. I don't often cry at the news - I think the last time was when I saw the filmed reports when David Cameron visited Sri Lanka. I wasn't sure why I was crying at first yesterday, but then I realised it was probably to do with my friend.

My friend took her life over a decade ago. I don't want to share her name here out of respect for her family and also because I hate the idea of people Googling her name and seeing links to horrible tabloid reports that don't represent the young woman I knew. I found out through my boyfriend at the time - his boss had read the report about my friend in a tabloid, and wondered if I knew her. I remember the phone call from him almost word for word. And I remember the phone call a few hours later, to my friend's boyfriend. I will never forget his kindness to me during that call. At the time of her death, my friend and I weren't speaking. A stupid, childish argument that was never resolved, despite her attempt to reconcile things at one point. But her boyfriend didn't care about that; he said my friend knew I cared about her and she would have wanted me at her funeral. It was the first funeral I went to.

I still think about her. I wonder what sort of woman she would have grown into, whether she would have stayed in the job she was doing or changed careers, whether she and her boyfriend would have got married, or whether she would have met someone new or just been happy on her own. I wondered if she would have had children and what they would have been like; she was one of the most maternal people I knew at that time. And more than anything, I wonder if she would have been unhappy or content.

I'm agnostic, which leaves me in a bit of a no man's land as far as life after death is concerned. If someone asks me, "Do you believe in life after death?" I'll answer, "No." Logically, impulsively - no, I don't. But somewhere, I don't believe in something but I feel something. Memories, I guess. But they don't feel stuck in the past to me. My memories of my friend are as much as a part of my present and future as my past. I don't want to forget her. She deserves to be remembered. So I sometimes think of her. I sometimes have a one-way conversation with her in my head (this is fairly normal bereaved behaviour, by the way!). I've donated to charity on her behalf for her anniversary. I've written her a letter I'll never send.

Once the shock and sadness had subsided, guilt was the overriding feeling after she died. I imagine a lot of suicides leave the bereaved feeling angry or guilty. Or both. I wasn't angry, not at her, and can't ever imagine feeling that towards her. I feel sad that she was so troubled, and guilty that I wasn't there when she needed a friend. I don't believe I could have "stopped her", but...I don't know. Maybe she'd have felt the tiniest bit less alone. I don't know. Maybe it's just selfish of me. I was just someone who was friends with her for a fairly short time. What on earth have her family and boyfriend been going through?

After yesterday's eventful morning, and a slight reprieve photographing the supermoon, I threw myself into my flowers for the day and was so grateful for the peace that they give me. I had to deliver flowers on the train...and found myself crying again. Although I stopped long before I got to the front door. I left a lonely bouquet at the train station - I hope it brightened someone's day.

When I got home, I cut for myself a Genova dahlia, a Galahad delphinium, and made a tiny posy of Cariad David Austin roses, phlox, verbena, mint, and my only red zinnia. Zinnia = I mourn your absence, phlox = our souls are united, verbena = pray for me, mint = warmth.

If you are feeling depressed or have thoughts of ending your life, no matter how small or fleeting the thoughts are, please talk to someone:

In the UK, you can contact the Samaritans on 08457 90 90 90, or Mind (who can provide details of local mental health services), or your GP. The BACP has a list of accredited therapists who you can contact directly.

In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. 

And if you are friends with someone who has depression, please contact them as often as you can and don't ignore them when they reach out to you. People say, "You can ring me anytime", but it's not as simple as that - depression and anxiety can be debilitating and soul-sapping. The idea of phoning someone can be terrifying, and the disappointment when people don't answer the phone or ring back can be huge. You don't have to talk for hours, but a real conversation with a real person can make such a difference.

I'm fortunate to have a lovely friend called Tracey who calls me and chats for hours on end. When I was going through a hard time last year, she sent me a different "How many...does it take to change a lightbulb" joke every single day for a month - by postcard, text message or Facebook. I think Robin Williams would have been proud of her.

A floral photography lesson from Amo La Fotografia

One thing I found difficult last year when I started learning how to use a photographer's camera and lenses (rather than my usual point-and-click or my mobile phone), was how to photograph white and pale flowers, especially when mixed with darker flowers. In this posy, the white roses lost their beautiful definition in my photos and just looked like big balls of white light!

So I was delighted when the lovely Kent-based photographer, Karen Louise of Amo La Fotografia, offered to give me an online lesson in photographing white flowers, along with other tips to improve flower photography indoors and outside. The ISO needs to be a low number (e.g. 100), the F-stop depends on whether you want detail in the background as well as the subject - a lower number for less detail in the background, and a faster shutter speed will result in a less exposed (light) photo. I am used to using the histogram as a guide, not the shutter speed, so this was all new to me. But...it works! It's quite hard to get out of old habits, and I can see that many of my photos could improve if I were a bit braver. As Karen Louise says in her tutorial, it's easier to 'correct' underexposed (darker) photos with an editing tool than it is to correct overexposed (lighter) photos. And incidentally, when you look at her tutorial you'll see her flower arrangements are as gorgeous as her photos!

Here are some photos I took of a couple of "all in the garden" arrangements, after reading the lesson. I'm a bit annoyed by the 'Penny Lane' dahlia sticking out like a sore thumb in the middle of the big arrangement - I actually removed it at the last minute before it was delivered - but never mind. The huge heads of white phlox are what I was worried about photographing, but I love how the detail  is kept by using a faster shutter speed. The tiny white flowers of Moroccan mint (I used lavender, orange, and pineapple varieties too) also kept their detail, and the white and red flowers of the 'Hot Lips' salvia kept more detail than usual. And you can't photograph scent, unfortunately, but both arrangements were highly scented, thanks to the wonderful phlox, mints, lemon balm/Melissa, sage, nicotiana, and sweet peas.

Three thunderstorms and a heatwave

The hot weather has encouraged a lot of flowers to whoosh ahead and open quickly. But the first thunderstorm was a bit of a shock - I don't ever remember a storm being so loud and going on for such a long time. I certainly was not one of the people who went outside to catch a photo of the lightning! Despite the lashing rain and hailstones (hailstones in a heatwave - how does that work?!), my flowers survived.

There were lots of new flowers to enjoy - I started to cut the borage, and before long there was cleome, cosmos and ammi. I used some this weekend - but I'll save that for another post. I planted out some cleome and panicum - they look great together. Both are such explosive, unusual textures.

It's a much better year for my flowers than 2013, when I certainly didn't have enough for orders or gifts, except the occasional small posy. This year, when I cut from the garden, I usually fill several buckets - it's wonderful. Stems have been much longer this year too, which means I can used them for handtieds and big arrangements, not just small posies and short-stemmed funeral work. The phlox and 'Penny Lane' dahlias are a metre tall, the verbena a metre and a half, and the zinnias and cosmos are 85cm!

The spring-sown 'Polka Dot' cornflowers are quite short and soft-stemmed, but that's ok - I know to nurture my autumn-sown ones better in future! And anyway, they still look beautiful.

I've done a few handtieds similar to this one.

It uses borage, Nicotiana 'Lime Green', Panicum 'Frosted Explosion', Zinnia 'Early Wonder', Salvia 'Hot Lips', sweet peas ('Harlequin Mixed', 'Leominster Boy' and 'Dot Com'), hebe, hydrangea, verbena bonariensis, Scabious 'Pink Mist', and a 'Penny Lane' dahlia. That's one of the great things about using a garden or flower farm - you can have fewer stems each of a wider range of flowers and foliage, rather than wraps and boxes of the same species and variety.

I was asked to do casual, colourful flowers for a family gathering - so I did this grouping in Portmeirion Botanic Garden vases and bowls, a Dartington Little Gems vase, a La Mortuacienne bottle, and a tiny green bud vase. I took these photos in a hurry as I heard thunder rumbling in the distance! I quickly took everything indoors and photographed the Portmeirion pieces together.

The roses are back! I used a few to make this red, white and peach posy, and I cut a few 'Jude the Obscure' David Austin roses for their incredible scent. Mixed with flowering Moroccan mint, salvia, phlox and nicotiana, these were two sweet-smelling additions to the group.

Robed in snowy white

As I see it, there are two kinds of successful people: people who climb up a ladder and then ignore the ladder and the people who are still on it, and people who climb up a ladder but turn around and give other people a helping hand. Tobi Hannah is the second kind.

As an innovative wedding dress designer, she provides a haven for brides who want a wonderful and varied selection of shorter wedding dresses. Her latest collection was inspired by the Pink Floyd album, The Wall. I swooned at the lot of them, but I especially like the Hattie dress. There's something about a dress with a collar that makes it smart and pretty.

Her sister company, Lara Hannah, makes stunning and ethereal-looking long dresses, many inspired by Waterhouse paintings. Her latest campaign for her new Magic Circle Collection includes a dreamy photoshoot inspired by the painting of The Lady of Shalott. This is the Infinity dress.

All of Waterhouse's Lady of Shalott paintings are amazing, but the one on the boat is one of my favourite paintings...and after it came first in the Art Everywhere poll, it's clearly many people's favourite! I took this photo of the Art Everywhere poster at Regent's Park station.

And I have to include a photo of some David Austin Lady of Shalott roses, which grace the rose garden in Regent's Park.

Getting back to Tobi. She learns about up and coming people in the wedding industry and supports those whose paths have crossed with hers. I've had some fantastic chats with her over the last year about everything from Coco Chanel's impact on the fashion world (her wedding dress was short!) to the highly underrated film, Elizabethtown.

I dropped in to see her this week and left some flowers for her, her team, and her visiting brides to enjoy: cosmos, phlox, sweet peas, salvia and 'Blue Dress' flax in a pretty Tiptree jar. The sweet peas, salvia and phlox smelt gorgeous!