Fire, Flower and Seed

May Field Notes

Before I go on, just a reminder that my paid subscriptions have now reopened! If you like what I do and fancy supporting me with the price of a little coffee each month, you can now upgrade your subscription and gain full access to my library of treats, including essay collections, seasonal celebration guides and downloadable illustrations which can be printed for personal use - including this vase of May birth flowers!

At LAST, the temperature has started creeping up and all the spring wildflowers are in full bloom. My local area is really into No Mow May, which means my daily dog walks are an absolute riot of colour at the moment. Forget-me-nots, honesty, green alkanet, herb robert, stitchwort, bluebells - so much lovely stuff to look at after so many months of rain. This is the season of fertility, marked in the Wheel of the Year by the festival of Beltane over the early May bank holiday weekend. I’ll be in my usual spot this Beltane night, sipping cider and watching a 30ft wickerman burning at Butser Ancient Farm, as I have for the last twenty years or so.

Here at casa del Tiff, the pumpkin seeds have all been sown and the first ones are germinating after a slow start. The conservatory is usually warm enough to get everything going but it’s been so cold recently, I had to bring them all into the kitchen where they are taking up every surface. Olive and I have sown six varieties this year - Jack O’Lantern, Polar Bear, Munchkin, Futsu Black, Blue Kuri and Red Turban. I’ve also joined the Petersfield Pumpkin Club and have a handful of Hundredweight seeds to sow in the hopes of growing a trophy-winning pumpkin in time for the weigh-in in October. I check on all my seedlings every day and it takes every inch of self-discipline not to pick the seed cases off the cotyledon leaves, which are the first two that pop up to kick off photosynthesis. Who needs night outs when you have seedlings, am I right lads?

Olive and I have also been busy making comfrey leaf fertiliser which is brewing in a bucket in the garden, ready for use in a few weeks time. The soil in our garden is pretty crap, mostly full of builder’s sands and rocks, so I’ve been trying to enrich it every year with compost and mulch and chicken poo.

On Sunday night, me and Dave drove down to Brighton to see Blindboy recording a live podcast with Grayson Perry. It was wonderful! (Thanks to my sister Chloë for the tickets 😘) Not only did we have a few childfree hours to relax with a pint in one of our favourite places (thanks Grandma for the babysitting 😘), but the conversation was so funny and inspiring. They spoke about creativity, class and gentrification, and Grayson shared a nugget of wisdom I thought I’d pass along: Be nice to silly ideas. Scribble them all down, make space for them and humour them, because you never know what one silly idea might grow into.

I hope you all have a wonderful Beltane weekend, full of light and fertility in all its forms. It’s a good time to start the thing you’ve been meaning to start for ages, because all the energy is conducive to creativity. I finally stopped procrastinating and wrote the first words of my first novel this week. What would you like to do?

Something I Made - The Butser Wickerman

OK, I didn’t make the actual wickerman, but I did design one! A few years ago, when I still worked at Butser Ancient Farm, I took a turn at designing the wickerman for that year’s Beltain festival. You can read more about the process here, along with a few other creative projects I enjoyed during my time there.

Can you tell I’m rubbish at feet?

Something I Like - Coming Home by Bobby Lamont

If you’re looking for a delicious, uplifting bop that gets stuck in your head for days, I present this new tune by my lovely friend Bobby Lamont. So warm, so soulful - and he is literally the nicest guy you’ll ever meet. Available on YouTube, Spotify and all the platforms.

Recipe of the Month - Pomegranate Salad With Spinach & Halloumi

Spring is here, salad’s near! This is a great one for easing into the warmer weather, with crunchy pecans, salty halloumi and a lovely balsamic dressing. The recipe calls for dissecting a fresh pomegranate but I don’t know who has time for that, so I just used a tub of fresh seeds from Tesco, and added a few extra pumpkin and sunflower seeds for good measure.