Church flowers and riotous parties

The squash plant has grown up through next door's apple tree. The apples have codling moth damage and the squash is fruiting, so I am letting the squash do what it likes. The apple is an old bramley, and will easily take the weight.

2nd September. I know everyone is talking about the weather, but it's turned. The girls come back from their walks wet up to their shoulders from the heaviness of the dew. Morag catches a rabbit. The pheasant poults are released in the wood and drive the girls to distraction. Andrew Maybury comes to photograph and document the progress of the Sparkes garden. He takes pictures as the sun goes down and the light fades to grey.

3rd September. Deliveries all morning. Bundles and boxes. Reels and spools of velvet ribbon (the colour below is onion skin, a rich gold), cotton rag paper, yet more envelopes, packing boxes, twine, ink, stamps. The preparation for Christmas begins in earnest. The first wholesale orders arrive.

4th September. An uptick in orders now the hardy annual sowing season has arrived. A special bespoke order for Firenza flowers and Moss & Stone workshop. Another for the Cambo autumn workshop at the end of the month. Bundles of grasses and rudbeckia seed, bound in mustard linen twine. Thin silk ribbon the colour of tilled earth. Multiple trips to the post office on South Rd.

5th September. A day off work to prepare for the weekend's family party. Weeding, mowing, setting up the trestle tables. Finding the cake stand. The kitchen garden is replete with chard and sweetcorn. The courgettes have slowed down but everything else is ripening and fat. I stew plums from the orchard.

6th September. The sweet pea tunnel is a golden tangle of seed pods. I let them go to seed early and wasn't expecting any more flowers but there is a last flush of colour. Valerie Harrod is a hot pink. This late in the season, the petals are slightly mottled, but I love them all the more for it.

7th September. My cottage is tiny, but many of the blue lias stones that make it are large. By the fire, the date 1589 is carved, and the name Edward. Maybe the cottage is that old (it is not far off) but maybe the stones were once part of the old church. The cottages are so close that the yew in the graveyard hangs over our gardens, the low slung thatch of the cottages can be seen just outside the window if the congregation look to their right, the track into the flower field hugs three sides of the churchyard. We got married in the church. To the horror of the bell ringers and the church warden, Morag came up the aisle with us. The envelope that arrives annually for the church flowers rota is the only post I have ever received with me addressed by my husband's surname. They let the canine bridesmaid slide, but it never occurred to them I wouldn't change my name. We did that thing of going to church in the run up to the wedding, and haven't been back since. The flowers for a fortnight in the height of dahlia season is the least I can do for a building so entwined with my own.

A set of keys is dropped through the letterbox and I am invited into the intimate spaces. The cupboards and the vestry. The notes left for each other that make sense only to those in the know. The elderly oasis used over and over again until it crumbles. I fill an urn with chicken wire and my muddy and muted collection. Branches of bronze fennel, spots of rudbeckia sahara, softened with stems of creme brulee phlox. The light inside the church is minimal, and it does not make for good photos, but I hope you get the gist. 

(If you are growing phlox in a container, and I hope you are because the stem length is incredible that way, it may need a seaweed feed. Mine is still flowering brilliantly, but it's looking a bit pale.)

Then we had a party...