Today is good.

Today is good. I have been a very blessed little lady of late and today was a reminder of that. When you're exhausted from driving between your cottage in the mountains and the big smoke, tired of living out of your car boot and nearly in tears because it's too wet to rotavate and it needs to happen yesterday; it's easy to forget. This week, for the first time since I decided to work on developing The Urban Flower Farm, I thought "Why am I doing this to myself? I should just give up." It was just a brief thought, it didn't last long but it happened. Then the good old family determination (or stubbornness, it's all in the way you look at it) kicked in. I will make this work! And who really needs it all to happen yesterday, my dear? The flowers? Or maybe it's you ...?

Ahh.

Tou-shay, LB, tou-shay.

However, today, things happened.

New friends came to the urban plot. We drank tea and ate cake, we mixed poo and soil. We planted out all the lil seedlings and then, all of a sudden, it was possible; it was happening. In celebration, we tested all of the home-made spirits :-)

The funny thing is, earlier in the day I had nearly called a rain-check on it. The judgement imps were raising their pointy little heads and their raucous voices. "The place is in a mess."

"I haven't had time to bake." "My little project is at a standstill." "They're going to think I'm a lost cause" "It looks unprofessional..." "They're going to realise that I am not Superwoman, I'm not perfect and then they might tell the rest of the world and ... etc. etc."

I sat it out, I busied my itching fingers as they kept stretching for the phone and I'm so glad that I did; what a wonderful afternoon I would have missed out on! How silly those little imps look now.

Listening to this with a warm belly and a smile on my face.

Small steps

Small steps... I'm just not very good at them. Maybe I should have been a writer because my imagination whisks me away on a daily basis. I have an amazing talent to form a teeny tiny concept within this mind of mine and within a matter of hours convert it into an entire, life encompassing, minutely detailed reality that must happen; and happen now!

I suppose that I should be glad that I am a big picture person but at the same time, this means that I am not so good at seeing the wood for the trees as it were.

I am getting better, though. I just have to keep pulling myself up and saying "Hey, slow down a minute, breathe, now, one thing at a time." But man, it's hard.

Cos I want it and I want it now :-)

I want to have an amazingly overflowing, beauteous and bountiful organic garden. I want to make bouquets from it everyday. I want to work in the sun, surrounded by flowers. I want to share it all with my wonderful boyfriend and fantastic friends. I want to keep my great day job at the florist and live in the country at the same time. I want to create, to cook, to sew and to sing. To get this little business off the ground and rocking. And I believe (maybe somewhat misguidedly) that I can do it all; chronic pain condition included.

Hmmmm ?

So, I suppose, if it's going to happen; I'd better practice my small steps and get a bit better on the patience thing!

Oh and one more thing... why can't I grow chocolate cosmos from seed if I want to, dammit?

Facing Up







... to Reality?  I'm getting better, much better. 
... to People?  I'm working on it, trust me.

This last week or two has seen a number more upheavals in my little world. The Universe's way of saying, step out of your bubble and look at the big picture? Probably!
The short story is, I'm moving out of my house.
But it's gorgeous! But you love it there! But you've done all that work! But you planted things in the ground! And you've got big plans for those things! etc. etc.
It's hard letting go, it really is but the frustrations of renting and holding together a share house have taken their toll and it's time for a little break.
Besides, I'd be a pretty silly little business lady if I didn't have an escape plan for my garden at my rental property, wouldn't I? It just means that moving house for me also means moving a garden. Totally do-able ... right?

I'm not even going to brief y'all on the new plan because the way this year is turning out, I bet you it's changed 3 times by next week. 2012 really is a lesson on taking a deep breath, trying to stay centered and keeping your eye on the big picture and when all else fails throw your hands in the air and laugh hysterically.

What I do know is that I want to do this, I want to grow stuff, I want to share it with people. I am going to do this. So in the face of all the recent upheaval, I went to Facebook :-) That is, I launched "The Urban Flower Farm" on the book of faces, here and you may have noticed, added a page here. It's happening people, it's really happening.

Guerrilla Florista #1

Guerrilla floristry: it's just a word for something that many of us do without thinking, but I kinda like it. So here you go, a nice little example of what you can do - without buying a thing. Glorious parrot tulips are the show stopper, granted, they were a gift, a mother's day bonus; if you like :-) 

The rest? Lavender from the garden, olive branches from the footpath where someone had been pruning, privet berry and abutilon (or chinese lanterns) from a lane-way somewhere near me.

The first clods are turned

Wow, I took this picture less than a week ago and already the bed has expanded and the first batch of bulbs is down! Oh, and the sweet-peas. The whole right hand fence is bordered by them and I'm looking at ways to move those giant planter boxes so that I can plant more. I've gone with two varieties from Eden Seeds, an early flowerer and one that makes super big blooms :-) They're tucked in with some mulch for a blanket and wire netting as a "mosquito net" or in this case rat net. Yep, that's right, the mice and rats love the taste of little sweet pea seeds and shoots. I learning a lot through others' experience - in this case Mel, she lost nearly all her sweet-peas to the little mites last year.

I've also been propagating and transplanting - proper big gardener me! I've got some helleborus babies from Mum's place - she's got fields of them the lucky thing. But I am also waiting to receive a few pretties from Diggers at the end of the month.

Gosh, here I am babbling plants at you and I haven't given you the other update. What did I say about life changing at super high speed??? Two weeks ago, I was talking two urban plots - mine and the boyfriend's. That's changed, we're down to one now - ours. That is, he's probably going to move in here. Which is awesome, but I had already kinda ordered a bucket load of seeds and baby plants.

So this has pushed me to try out an idea that I have had many times before. Create a network of people locally, who have space in their yards to "foster" plants. I provide the plants, the organic fertilizer and any other practical support and in return, I have "picking rights" to the plants when they flower. The idea is not to demolish these plants but to harvest sustainably and teach others how to do the same. I haven't approached anybody just yet but I am hoping it just might work. My brain is bursting with many more possibilities but I'll hold back until after Mother's Day to look into any of it.

I keep getting way ahead of myself and I just keep having to remind myself, it's one step at a time. Right now, the next step is head down, bum up - get through Mother's Day.