❄️ Garden Planning Resources ❄️
plus garden club recording and a hilarious chicken update
“Plants and animals don’t fight the winter; they don’t pretend it’s not happening and attempt to carry on living the same lives that they lived in the summer. They prepare. They adapt. They perform extraordinary acts of metamorphosis to get them through. Winter is a time of withdrawing from the world, maximising scant resources, carrying out acts of brutal efficiency and vanishing from sight; but that’s where the transformation occurs. Winter is not the death of the life cycle, but it’s crucible.” Wintering: The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times
I’m exhausted, are you exhausted? We’re all exhausted right?? This was the earliest I’ve ever woken up on a New Years Day (I stopped drinking about 6 weeks ago and like all other people who stop drinking I HAVE TO MENTION IT) but still, exhausted.
I had big dreams for kicking off 2024 garden planning with a bang during Dead Week (between Christmas and New Years Eve) but realistically, it’s going to happen sometime in the next 14 days. 📆
I saw a TikTok a few days ago about how setting goals in the dead of winter goes against the Nature Of Things. This is a season for resting, cleaning out, reveling in comfort where we can find it. Goals come with the breath of spring, when the mind is clear and when action can be close behind. I cannot let go of this idea.
To the contrary, here we are, renovating a kitchen, starting construction on a new retail location for Fancy Groceries, learning how to make a chicken paradise, going back to yoga for our aging knees and backs, about to skip town for market week in NYC, and planning more more more. Every year my resolution is to “do less.”
I have not started my winter binge of garden shows yet — I have been deep in renovation shows to get inspired for our interior projects, but I am getting more and more excited for my February trip to Yorkshire School of Garden Design at Harewood House in England for one of their courses. It feels brave, luxurious, and fated.
If you’re ready to go, here’s some help from this time last year…
…and lastly, if you are feeling mega overwhelmed about how to even map out when to plant, here is the visual garden calendar I made that I use year after year. You can see a tiny demo here.
For February 1st’s Garden Club, I will walk you through my garden plan for both vegetables and cut flowers, and show you how I build my calendar as well as plot out where everything is planted.
But, I also have a question….
Lastly, for my garden club members, here are the recordings for both December and January’s garden club! Very different vibes, the both of them. Play them in the background this week while you sit with a hot bevvie and start your garden plans. xo