A Cottage in a Country Garden...

The tractor is pointing in the right direction. Finally the long awaited Apothecary Garden is beginning to take shape. My vision for a Shakespeare-style garden with a center fountain, lavender planted in circles, spokes of box wood hedges overflowing with calendula, Echinacea, lemon balm, rosemary and peppermint has been thwarted by three-peas-in-a-pod otherwise known as our three grand-daughters. First it was the playhouse Arleigh trucked in before we even had a plan for the house we would eventually live in, planting it right where I saw the fountain! I knew I wasn’t going to win this one so I conceded with “Well, it must be painted!”

So three-peas-in-a-pod arrived last week and started the re-creation. While painting the outside they were making other plans too. I suggested they use whatever tables and chairs they found in the old barn, paint them whatever colors they like. Well that suited them just fine but then they started planning the garden too! A little something here for privacy, a table, a pot filled with flowers there, a picket fence. A PICKET FENCE? How Tuscan is that?? So it seems to me that our Apothecary Garden is going to be a cross between Primrose Lane and a country garden. Oh, and the playhouse is no longer called the playhouse. They have re-named it “The Cottage”. The girls let Grandpa do the finishing touches. Some guys just never grow up!

All this hard work and planning called for a celebration so armed with a cottage living magazine off we went to Cozas Tuscan Grill for fresh salad greens with crispy parmesan cheese, chicken and pesto pasta and the most delicious orange bloody cheese cake and chocolate fudge cake on the planet.