It's been a while since I've written anything here but its about time I did.  So I'm not going to go over past ground I shall just kick off with recent activities.

I've just had the pleasure of working with Shoscombe and Wellow Schools.  Day one working with Shoscombe school was spent inside, thankfully.  All the children made the lovely spiral bird feeders.  Some of them made fish, which is a new addition to the selection.  Using my beautiful coloured willow recently bought from Dick Willows near Bath, they created some colourful works of art!

The next day was outside making a 14 metre living willow fedge to border their forest school area.  6 hours later, lots of rain, loads of mud we finished and every child in the school had some kind of input, even if it had just been to help each other push a withy into the ground.  They loved it so much they've asked me to go back and do a dome after half term!

The following week was a similar programme at Wellow school.  Interestingly the weaving workshops were run using a different format as Shoscombe School.  Both worked well and both had pros and cons.  On the second day we built a 3 metre dome and there I had a small group of pupils to help, which actually was easier and they really got a lot out of being so involved.  We even encountered some snow that morning but with some hot chocolate and biscuits waiting for us at half time we soldiered on!

The workshops had been funded by the Comenius Project where together with schools from across Europe they are looking at and sharing idea around the very broad theme of 100! I was asked to incorporate '100' somehow into my workshops.  I give a short talk about willow before a workshop so thought I could incorporate it into that somehow.  However nothing was particularly forthcoming when I looked online.  Then a friend turned up with a beautiful book she had found in a charity shop called 'Willow'.  The author is an artist called Kate Lynch who whilst painting people at their work, mainly willow weavers and workers she had recorded their conversations and some of these have been used alongside her paintings to create a wonderful fabric of history and experiences in the withy beds of the Somerset Levels.  One of these conversations had been about willows uses in the First World War.  This information had been perfect to pass onto the pupils, they were fascinated by the fact that huge wicker baskets had been used to drop supplies down to the troops, they'd bend out of shape but not break, ammunition was carried in baskets also the carrier pigeons that played such a major role in the war were carried around in wicker baskets.  It was so important that if you were a willow grower you may have been lucky enough to not even have to go to war!

On Tuesday 6th November I had been invited to visit the Wells WI to give a short talk about what I do, and to actually make something with them all.  After some previous discussion with their President, Lucy we decided that the wrapped willow star would be the most sensible as there may be up to 75 ladies.....and there was! 

I had never spoken in front of that many people before and was pretty nervous.  I think that the ladies of the Wells WI were probably a very good starting point for my initiation into public speaking!  Not that I plan to do a lot of it I might add!  My demonstration went without a hitch, thank goodness, as willow can have a mind of it's own at the most inopportune moment!  I think every single lady had a go and I hope that everyone ended up taking something home with them.  So thank you to them all and I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did after my initial nerves!

I look forward to doing something similar with the Frome WI in the New Year and if anyone else would like to discuss a visit to their local group please get in touch.

Not quite sure where the summer went or if we even had one!  However I think we had it for one day at the Walled Garden at Mells in July!  We had the most glorious weather for a full day workshop with four lovely people!  The wonderful long terrace out the back of the garden lends itself perfectly to making the plant teepees and it was so hot that at one point in the afternoon we had to seek shade for a coffee break.  However the noisy chatter of the cafe area soon had us returning to the peace and tranquility of our beautiful terrace to finish off our flowers and dragonflies!  I love to see each persons individuality come through with what they make and that is very much the beauty of working with willow.  So once again great company, great creations and what a beautiful setting to be able to work from.

This weekends courses have had a certain celebratory theme with someone at each venue enjoying their birthday treat!  We were lucky to be able to enjoy being outside in the morning to make some beautiful plant teepees with the added benefit of being able to warm up inside with the decidedly autumnal chilliness of the afternoon.

Due to further interest in these courses I have decided to run them for another weekend in October before the festive courses in November.  If you are interested in one of these, this will be the last chance until next spring, please book here. 

Mary x

My first willow course at Brokerswood this afternoon was a great success and the sun even shone for a while!  We used the activity centre to avoid the mud but were able to enjoy being out under the trees when we stopped for a well deserved coffee break!  Everyone went home with some lovely creations and a few achy fingers!  I'm really looking forward to running some festive courses there in the autumn, further dates to be confirmed.  I'm taking off most of August to have time with my boys but will be contactable if anyone wants to book courses or find out more information. Mary x

I thoroughly enjoyed my weekend of 'Eclectic Horticulture' at the Paul Street Pop up Shop, Frome organised by Marina Swinburne.  Running alongside the Frome Artisan Market and Frome Flea we were pretty busy today with a quieter but steady day yesterday.  As always with these events I chatted to lots of lovely interesting people, swopped ideas and hopefully made some more exciting future contacts.  The shop looked fab thanks to Marina's hard work setting it all up and i think we all complemented each other very well.

Spent the afternoon yesterday at the beautiful Walled Garden at Mells running a half day workshop, great company and great creations!  We were lucky with the weather, the sun even shone momentarily. 

These courses are going to be a good learning curve for me.  Balancing the time it takes people to make things, who are of mixed ability, with offering value for money is quite tricky, hopefully we didn't do too badly on Saturday.  Everyone seemed happy with what they were taking home even if it was an hour later than planned!  My youngest participant was 9 yrs old which was a good exercise for me to see how well she coped as I'm in the process of piloting a schools willow workshop.  Thanks to Imogen i can see that although a challenge for her she was able to take home as much as all the others