Treading lightly, one step at a time.
My name is Maria. Many of my earliest memories are to do with nature and plants. I remember travelling along a road through a forest in the middle of winter in Sweden and every time the moon glimpsed through the trees I would shout out in wonder “Look at the moon”. This annoyed my big … Read more About the author.
Over the last few years we have extended our old cottage, built a conservatory and are now in the process of renovating and improving our shed to use as a workshop and storage facility. Our aim is for our buildings to have as little negative impact as possible on the environment. We have used reclaimed … Read more Building our sustainable home.
Even before we bought our cottage and piece of land four year ago, we were planning our forest garden. Forest gardens exist all over the world and their history goes back for thousands of years. It is a way of growing mostly perennial vegetables, shrubs, trees, vines and other useful plants in a way that … Read more Gardening in harmony.
It has been unusually warm here in the West of Ireland and one day last week we found ourselves close to the shores of Lough Key. We remembered a magical day a few years back when all six of us rented two rowing boats for a couple of hours and went for a picnic on a very special island, so we decided to recapture some of the magic of that day.
It has been a very busy month here at the Greener dream. We managed to finally get the window into the shed wall and now we are blessed with light in a space that has been completely dark since we moved in five years ago. All we have to do now is go through all the boxes of stuff that have accumulated in there and then we will have a nice work and storage space. We are planning to put in a new door as well with glass panels and one more window, so that even more light can flood into the space.
May is always a very busy month on the land. There are many seeds to sow, seedlings to transplant and plants that have a wish for world domination to keep in check. So a day away from the plot can be very uplifting and inspiring. But we would not wish to be too far from the natural world so spending such a day in a friend’s garden is a wonderful treat. We arrived for the first Open Garden Day this year at Carrick Gardens, Carrick Callow, County Mayo, armed with chocolate cake and comfortable shoes.
Usually we write about our collective endeavours here on the Greener Dream but recently I decided to do something just for myself. So what follows is an account of a solo adventure that proves it is not always necessary to travel far to behold the world from a different perspective.
Looking back at April, we find that spring is about two weeks later than usual here on the land. It took until the end of the month for most plants to start to flower, but by now the bees are making up for any time lost and if you walk out amongst the berry shrubs you are surrounded by a loud chorus of buzzing insects. It looks like it will be a very large berry and fruit crop this year, judging by the amount of blossom.
Because of our involvement with the Community Garden in Ballaghaderreen, we got invited to take part in the national Master Composter training course. It is developed by the EPA, Ireland’s Environmental Protection Agency, as part of the National Waste Prevention Programme. You can find lots of information on how to stop food waste and make you own compost on their excellent website; stopfoodwaste.ie.
Sometimes things just work out. We have a good friend who is a blacksmith and he has taken the youngest member of our family under his wing. We are delighted that Finley can spend time with him, learning the trade and enjoying the company of a truly great craftsman.
