Pottering

an autumn verb

A friend and I were discussing what we were up to and I mentioned the I had been ‘just pottering about’. She delighted in this expression and I delighted in delighting her. At this time of the year I think the idea of pottering away is the perfect expression for how to garden in Autumn. For example, most Saturday mornings we have a set routine. Farmers Market, Butcher (every second weekend), Bakery for morning tea pastries (Big lizard hazelnut chocolate thank you), dog walk, home. The Saturday just passed for various reasons rather than our regular scheduled plans, I found myself in the garden on Saturday morning before 10 am. I think I might have created perhaps a new routine for the coming winter months. I mentally checked the to do list and then promptly abandoned it instead to ‘potter away’ in the garden moving from one task to another as the mood took me. While pottering in the still of early morning I thought how the sounds in the garden have changed. Instead of the hum of bees it is the melody of the bellbird accompanying me, interrupt by the odd ‘look at me’ chirp of a pīwakawaka.

The air is fresh at this time of the morning with the ground squelching under my feet as I trod across the lawn. I head to the bottom of the garden and the singing lawn reminds me I should start clearing the paths so that we use them rather than the lawn. I’m heading to the large concrete trough that sits under the Rhoddies along the fence line. The Solomon seal is fading into shades of bight yellow and acid green, falling apart if you touch them, melting back into the soil until spring. I weed the trough and discover that there are poppy seedlings starting to emerge along with a few ranunculus from last season. I replant an errant corm as I plant my new purchased additions of ranunculus plants. Later I add a random collection of bulbs with very little thought to colour or placement. It will be beautiful regarding less and I look forward to the heaving floral chaos that will emerge in spring, feeling grateful to see signs of new life in the garden already.

Next I turn to the weekly challenge of the filling the green bin and think that the soil is softening so I should dig up the hideous yellow dahlias while I remember where they are located and also the copper boy which I forgot to move last year. The yellows are in the bin, the copper boy in is the bucket waiting to be cleaned. In fact it didn’t take me long before the green bin was filled which always feels like a small victory for the week. Bulbs arrived this week so it has been a dash around the garden to collect pots to plant them in. I am still debating what to do re my dahlias that are still flowering in pots - hopefully an answer comes soon.

Around an old brick BBQ that was made a few years ago and never used as a BBQ are many pots that I clean and tidy, finding a number of foxglove self seeders. I then become enchanted by the idea of foxgloves and spring bulbs so dash inside to find some stored from last year to add to the newly weeded pots. I not sure if it will work - we will see. Come spring the brick BBQ will be one of my favourite things to look at as it becomes a mass of flowering daffodils, a hodge podge of tulips and others bulbs collected over the years. It soon hits mid morning and I stretch my aching back, search around for errant dogs and head inside for the much needed cup of tea and then possibly a dog walk. Hopefully I am still in time for my Hazelnut chocolate pastry.

With much love

Mel