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Isobel Baillie; a red cord out of place; an amusing wedding; a new duck and Jane is “stepping out”.

On February 17th 1954 Gran is suffering from a bad cold but manages to attend a concert in Eastleigh with her friend Mary Harding: [Read more…] about Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 59)

Simple Christmas gifts; valuing our treasures; extinct species; a kindly flower-seller; prayers for the Queen on tour; it snows – and Julian falls in it; communication in the 1950s and a couple of nice books.

Book 40

Late October 1953 and Gran’s thoughts are turning to Christmas.  On the 23rd she gathers material for making presents:

I collected some twigs, acorns, seeds, bark, lichen and such, with which to make Christmas novelties and my invalid [probably her disabled friend in Southampton] assiduously stuck the acorns back into their cups for me… a little Seccotine ensuring that they would not fall out again.  The next step will be to paint them.

And two days later, feeling ill, and the weather stormy, she writes: [Read more…] about Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 58)

A poor fruit crop this year;  12 years’ work at Pinewood Gardens comes to an end; some new Hampshire plants; a muddy situation along Southampton Water and the Dominion Monarch’s  special place in Gran’s heart.

Gran has already mentioned that the blackberry crop is particularly poor this year, 1953, and the same appears to be true of the apple crop.  She writes on September 16th, that she spends time in the Pinewood Gardens apple shed:

…clearing up and laying out the Green Blenheims, a poor crop, covering only half of one shelf with one layer, instead of being heaped right up.  It is a bad apple year here, for there are no Bramley Seedlings or American Mothers, and only a few Russets and Newton Wonders.  One tree of Lemon Pippins is fairly well covered but I have not seen the Christmas Pearmains or the Worcester Pearmains.  There were no Beauty of Bath and no Gladstones.  Three baskets comprised the bulk of the Grenadiers and there are only a few of the Early Victorias at the top of one tree.  I have not searched but I can see no Lanes from the end of the greenhouse, and there is only one Maltster.  I have never known a worse year since I have been working at Pinewood Gardens.  There simply was not the blossom in spring – the frost in May had nothing to do with it. Plums were the same.

[Read more…] about Forty Years in Chandler’s Ford – a Journal (Part 57)