Dearest Garden Friends!
Joyous morning, gaining from a big clean-up of mature oak trees, which are in the process now of being cut up and transported to my house in the medieval quarter 😍🙏
My partner Vittorio did the heavy and dangerous part of motosega chainsaw work. I did the first few wheelbarrows-full and then did picking up of pinecones, and cleaning the leafy parts off of the oak branches which had been cut down.
It was pretty precarious labour, balancing with a noisy petrol-driven saw, and sawdust flying everywhere...
I also helped by stabilising the ladder at various points, and pulling a big branch in the right direction as it fell, so as not to hit the neighbours' corrugated shack! It only hit it a little bit with its outer twigs 😋
Very sweaty job, and the mosquities came out as we disturbed foliage...
There is a beautiful light at the bottom of his garden now, though 🌞😍😊 and you can see out to the south and west really nicely...
Which is fabulous for the undergrowth of flowers, wild herbs and asparagus. They'll also benefit from the loads of foliage mulch which is spread around, protecting the topsoil and keeping moisture in.
And of course i am benefiting ENORMOUSLY from the wood created!! Soooooo looking forward to it being cool enough for the woodstove, to cosying in by it with the younger cats who haven't seen it in action yet, and to roasting veggies and suchlike in the oven 😊😍🥰🐈🐈🐈
Vittorio's house isn't so far from mine, but in the car it's a circuitous route, and after lunch I'll be heading back up the steep marble steps to where I parked in the piazza, with my carello trolley...
It was a beautiful blessing working with V. these few hours, and harvesting the natural abundance; really nice for me both to have physical support of a man to do this heavy work, and also to enjoy working his and his mum's land, which hasn't had much input in recent years... They have some brilliant fruit and nut trees - morena cherry, almond, carob, plum and others - and they need more light and air too, which cutting the oaks helps a lot with 😊🌞🙏
LOve!
Clare.
