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  • The meaning behind flowers, and why I didn’t go down the traditional red rose route for my Valentine’s day bouquet

    For those of you who have followed me on Instagram and via my blogs, you will have gathered that I have a thing for flowers, both in my garden and my home. My garden is taking a bit of a back seat this week as I focus on everything to do with Valentine’s day – one of the things COVID cannot touch nor cancel is LOVE. This year I wanted to use my Valentine’s bouquet to…

    January 28, 2021
    How To Create A Cutting Garden

Latest Posts

  • Don’t forget to ‘cut’ your cut flowers!
  • Celeriac, Salmon and Potato Dauphinoise
  • This week in my garden – Adding to my Borders
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I appear to have invited the sunshine to tea! Well this is actually perfect. I will be strict: no tea or scones until you promise to be warmer. Nil by ray until you swear to scare off the arctic freeze and warm our poor heat deprived bodies, plants and ground. This really is the limit, we have spent months shivering and being brave, we have blanketed our legs, slippered our feet and spent a fortune in heating oil, logs and cushions (everyone knows cushions keep you warm) oh and wine, that has helped. But enough is enough! You need to stand up for yourself, stop pooling on the table like a drippy rain cloud, get up! Heat up and burn some sky!!!!! Now may I suggest you avoid the butter but can I pass you the jam? Come on sunshine!!! Buck up!!! Pull up your big girl pants and GET HOT. If you are braving the garden this weekend for @gardendayuk on Sunday, head over to my website to read @flowersandlifestylebymargot latest blog on actually cutting the flowers that you have grown! When to cut them, the best method and how to care for them in the vase. (Linkinbio). Happy Floral Friday x #kitchendesign #kitchendecor #flowersfromthegarden #cottagekitchen #farmhousekitchen #farmhousekitchendecor #cottage #farmhouse #farmhousedecor #farmhousedecorating #vintage #shabbychic #nestandthrive #countrystyle #cottagefurniture


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Du pain, du vin, du...tablecloth!!!! Yes, I have retreated to Provence, it is far too cold in England so I am summoning the powers of one of the most beautiful places in the world to shine down upon this small corner and bring sunshine and warmth. How can this genius plan fail? The sunniest, happiest tablecloth from the gorgeous Bonprovence has filled my garden with joyous sunshine - we are half way there, we just need actual WARMTH!!!! Come on weather, you can do this, we know you worked very hard last year, but you have certainly had an excellently long sabbatical, now is the time to return, refreshed and ready to warm the earth...and me...please me...I want to actually sit here with real life people and not just force my family to enjoy this feast whilst shivering wildly. My son even suggested a game of badminton after supper yesterday but two thirds of his way into the baguette he realised that his teeth were chattering more quickly than he could consume the slightly hardened bread (it took me a while to get a glorious sunny shot of this heavenly happy filled with French gorgeousness tablecloth, the pain was a little photoshoot tired). Pop over to this gorgeous company @bonprovence for some much needed sunshine and joy, cover your table with warmth if not your actual being. Happy throw sunshine onto your table Thursday X Ps, if you need something a little more warming than bread and cheese, head over to my website to read @lucyhoylecooks fantastic recipe for Laxpudding - a Swedish dish of Celeriac, Salmon and Potato Dauphinoise - utterly delicious xxx Ad/PR product #mycountryhome #outdoordining #tablecloth #countrytable #countryliving #myenglishhome #shabbydecor #oldhouselove #oldhousecharm #mellowyellow #englishcountrystyle #cottagestyle #cottage #cottagecharm #cottagechic #cottagefarmhouse #countrycottagestyle #tablescapes


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Sunshine!!!!!! Get outside, save the seedlings!!! It’s freezing!!! Get back in, sorry seedlings!! How am I continually fooled by this evil genius weather??? I can see the garden chairs and my “ahh looks like I forgot to tidy up again after another potting session” debris all over the garden. The BBQ cover is almost in the lane, cardboard boxes are being pressed up against the “not long for this world” rose trellis and yet still, STILL I see the sunshine, grab my gardening clogs and run full pelt into the icy, cutting bullying wind. My husband says that it’s not that I forget things, it’s just that I don’t like the answer that I receive so I keep asking until it’s a yes - we will buy a wrought iron rose arbour to replace the not long for this world trellis; yes - we should buy more plants for the garden even though you insist on murdering them; yes- I can make you a wooden framed greenhouse that will withstand the furious winds at the bottom of the garden where not even cow parsley grows. I personally just think that it is a positive mentality “of course the greenhouse will survive the deeper darkest recesses of the arctic bottom of the garden, of course the plants will live this time with no need for watering or care, of course the wind will have dropped and I will be able to sunbath...look after all the seedlings and new plants. Oh well, better just sit inside and gaze at @emma.perring latest work that I have purloined until it sells. One rose that I actually can’t kill! Happy wildly windy Wednesday. X #mycountryhome #myhouseandhome #myhomesanctuary #englishdecor #rose #roselover #shabbystyle #shabbyhome #countryhome #cottage


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Oh hi! You surprised me! Just here wafting inflagrante, you caught me mid act! This is just how I roll most days, clad in @cabbages_and_roses heavenly finery, smiling in sunshine and wringing every second of beauty out of this poor little cherry tree, hoping that I can harness the bloom. Ok, it took 57 attempts to capture this natural surprised look but I gather that my excellent wafting is currently gracing the pages of 25 Beautiful Homes Magazine (she utters airily as if magazine articles happen every day to such tablecloth wafters- Hereford Advertiser, Folkestone Advertiser, Dorset Living AND the Dorking and Leatherhead Advertiser - all in the last month... is there simply no end to my cottage core dreams?? I felt it was time to actually put up a real life this is me photo. I definitely look like this all the time. Every day. Even after too much Rose wine the night before (bank holiday boo boo). Yes, the sun is absolutely definitely shining today as well. No wind or rain here. Nuh.Uhh. I am off to waft to the Co-op now, hoping that they will have a copy of my wafting in full glossy glory. Thank you gorgeous heavenly designs of dreams Cabbages and Roses for the most stunning dress, it actually made me twirl as soon as I slid it on. You create the most romantic clothes that make you feel like a heroine of romance and flowers (there are still some left in the sale if you are quick but don’t whatever you do look at their spring clothes, you will fall in love with every single piece and won’t rest until you have the entire collection of floral bliss). Happy Twirly Tuesday xxx Ad/PR Brigitte dress in Bloom Floral from Cabbages and Roses #cabbagesandroses #slowfashion #floralfantasies #cottagecore #cottagecorestyle #cottagecoreaesthetic #cherishandrelish #ofwhimsicalmoments #blossomseason #flowerpowered #springstyle


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It was only a small amount of blossom carnage. Just a few tiny bottles of petals. I left the star of the show still glorying in her pinked splendour. I think that I shall spend this extra bonus day in bank holiday pinked splendour. Ordinarily our school hosts a fun run - in 8 years of running/ organising and serving teas I have never found it ‘fun’ but it does raise much needed funds and I invariably return home with tired children, shed loads of cake and a pink nose (sunshine or sneaky wine I don’t know but it is always pink). I shall honour this annual run with a ruddy good sit down, a cheeky read and a bottle of rose...all for a good cause...and reading is educational so I still have the school in my heart..just not my tired feet and achey brain. Woohoo! Happy more cake Monday xxx #library #windowseat #libraries #cozyreads #windowseats #cozyreading #homelibrary #readinggoals #librarylove #bookslovers #bookfeatures #readingtime #bibliophiles #booksofig #bookshelves


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It’s another ooh and ahh in your mind missing blossom shot. Today’s missing blossom is creamy white pear blossom overhanging the table. I think it might be an actual skill to photograph glorious blossom yet manage not to actually capture it in the photograph. Perhaps I feel upstaged by the blossom? Perhaps in my deepest darkest psyche I know that I will never achieve this fresh bloom again (I think I managed a couple of days in 2004) and I am determined to suppress such fresh beauty like Snow White’s wicked Stepmother - oh lawks! I always pictured myself as Snow White with all the tiny birds fluttering to my dreamy singing voice, fawns gambolling to the back door (the muntjac has to stand in) and rabbits thumping their feet in joy (hares pooing all over the lawn is as close as we get) but now I realise that I am not the ingenue but the wicked stepmother. Argh!!!!! I hate blossom. I’m off to bitterly murder some cute animals. Happy no more Snow White Sunday x Ps no cottage blog today, I am having the weekend off..to wreck revenge on youthful pretty things. Goodbye. #spring #alfresco #peartree #mygarden #blossom #country #countryliving #myenglishhome #shabbydecor #oldhouselove #oldhousecharm #tablestyling #tablefortwo #cottagestyle #cottage


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Ohhh look at the glory and the majesty of the blossom tree....you can’t see it? LOOK HARDER! OK?!!! I tried extremely very hard to create my “ooooh I can capture the fulsome pink blossom shining like a beacon of spring hope in the garden with a tiny taster of the precious petals in the dug up treasure medicine bottles”. 32 photos later and I fell to the floor in the depths of despair (actually I fell onto the boxes that still remained discarded and lobbed in the corner from my joyous “tidy” kitchen capture a couple of days ago. Thankfully they broke my fall and helped me to step away from the window. Let’s think of it as a flash of ankle rather than a full frontal!!! Happy less sauce Saturday x #charminghomes #homeiswheretheheartis #happyplace #kitchenwindow #kitchenwindowview #gardenview #simplethingsmadebeautiful #countryliving #periodhome



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