On Mothers and Flowers
Snacks, an essential part of my early gardening experiences
I wouldn’t be flowering without my lovely mum. She planted the seed long ago when I was small with mud pie making and perfume brewing play in the garden. First entrusting me with a tiny flower bed between two apple trees, holding my hand as I sprinkled seeds of candytuft. Later bringing me daffodil bulbs to plant in the yard of my grotty student house share. Mum has always shown me how to invite flowers in to my life so it felt fitting that the first proper harvest from The Byes Blooms cutting garden filled her home with flowers three years ago, and trips to see her now always involve me trying to squeeze a bunch of flowers into the overladen car.
My own daughter with a posy of primroses from the garden
My favourite flowering day is soon approaching. Mother’s Day, Mothers’ Day, Mothering Sunday, whatever you choose to call it, is a day of pure floral joy. When I get to help you to show appreciation to your lovely mums and mother figures in flower form. From harvesting and selecting the sweetest spring blooms to writing out your heartfelt messages, I love everything about my busiest delivery day of the year. A handtied bouquet of British grown spring flowers is, to my mind, the best way to honour the spirt of the Mothering Sunday tradition. When on the fourth Sunday of Lent, those who had moved away from their place of birth to work returned to visit their ‘Mother Church’ and own Mothers too. Gathering posies of spring flowers from the hedgerows in the lanes on the walk home.
If you are not be able to travel to Sidmouth for Mothers’ Day this year bearing flowers then I’m so happy to help you send flowers from afar with a personal touch.
As the timing of Mothers’ Day moves around each year, it sometimes falls right at the cusp of the British flower season and sometimes comfortably within it. This year it is early meaning that although my own cutting garden will be providing some scented delicate narcissi and blossoming shrubs it is not quite up to providing all the variety needed for an abundant bouquet. I am delighted to be relying on some on specialist British growers to ensure each bouquet is a feast of colour, scent and movement. Ruffly double tulips will be coming from fifth generation specialist growers based in Lincolnshire with some showstopping anenomes arriving from Norfolk. Alongside some Devon grown foliage from my local flower grower friends. All will be picked with careful hands, thoughtfully arranged, delicately wrapped and delivered to your mum with a smile.