EIE FLUD - toiletries, perfumes & life on the farm

Its posts like this one that really really deserves a photo.

I am at once blessed and cursed with what can only be termed an enormous garden - we live on a very small ’small holding’ that is largely turned over to garden rather than livestock.

I have two small paddocks - the winter paddock which this year is out of favour with the livestock I do have - Harry and Ho my sheep and their hardy leader - Pickle the Shetland Pony. What Pickle lacks in stature he more than makes up for in girth - and his extremely fat backside was put to efficient use in battering down the fence of the winter paddock - so they could hatch their escape plan back to the summer paddock which is their favourite.

At great expense to ourselves we had a lovely field shelter errected in the winter paddock to fend off the north wind chill - but no, they like to see unlikely but welcome visitors to the fence which can only be had in the summer paddock - where the brook runs - where if you have stumbled across the website - will know is where my spring water runs if its not being collected to make our soap. Which has a habit of flooding during winter months - so I need some rubber bootees for the escapees I believe.

However, I digress - because the rest of the land around the back, houses my herbal stock - again for the toiletries (the bees incidently just for greater clarity are housed opposite the winter paddock) - and right in the centre is a formal rose bed - designed and stocked by us.

Roses to my mind are quite the most charming flower - I love many, infact probably all flowers - I’m not a vegetable gardener - although in my winter years this is something I would like the time to cultivate. But flowers have always been something of a joy to behold for me. I am in love with every little non descript bit of greenery- and I think this harkens back to when I was a child with a huge back garden full of weeds I would play amongst them for hours - and I find dandelions even to this day, such a cheeky delight I can’t bare to pull them!!

However, lack of time means that my formal rose bed has been neglected somewhat - looking out from my study window right now I can see the straggly remants of what was a wonderful show this year - because I never got around to pruning them down and tidying it all up. I feel gutted actually.

However, I’m obviously in a mellow mood today - I ramble here.

The point to this post is that the rose bed (which I can hear myself promising will be better next year!!!Ummm we’ll see) - is not just visually stunning - because we have planted old species roses, is a simple joy to sit in with eyes closed, listening to the birds and just smelling the air. It is gorgeous.

I want that bottled.

I want a perfume - a rose perfume - just rose. Now in practice this will need some thought - and I haven’t had any thoughts other than the one - to capture a lightness, a roundness with a cooling English summer breeze floating through it - that reminds me of my rose garden in June.

There is something so moving about it that it can almost bring you to tears - imagine making a perfume that did that?

There is my quest for the year to come - I know it is something that may be unobtainable - but I want to try.

As a final note - I do like my garden to be useful - even the fat and stubborn Harry and Ho have a purpose (I like to spin their wool) - and I found that I could put the rose petals to some use - lots of them - to make Rose Petal Beads.

I collect them early in a morning - taking the heads of full blown roses just before they’ go over’ - and make these pretty little pinkish beads that I string with pearls and rose buds to make a keepsake. So Roses collected in 2005 have been bought by people for this years weddings, new arrivals and anniversaries - special occasions to be marked by an everlasting Rose.

It is things like this that make my business such a joy.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 15th, 2005 at 11:44 am and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.