Adam Frost

Well, it’s still dark, gloomy and cold but I have seen the signs that spring is on its way – my hammamelis is out, so too are the snowdrops and my kids are on half term.

It seems a while since I have put pen to paper (or finger to the key, if that’s how you put it) and I’ve now been sitting here for nearly 15 minutes just moving bits of paper around my desk and listening to Snow Patrol replaying the song ‘Chasing Cars’ just because I love the line ‘show me a garden that’s bursting into life…’ (Is that normal?).

 Talking of what’s normal, a couple of weeks ago I went to a bit of a ‘do’ with Thinkingardens (see www.thinkingardens.co.uk) which went a bit like this:

12-14 people sitting around a table and discussing ‘Gardens: are they an untapped creative reserve?’ I know! If I’m honest, even at the end of a very enjoyable evening with a jolly nice group of people, I still wasn’t sure if there was or even meant to be an outcome. I will try to paint the picture, here goes! You know when you have a dinner party which, if anything like ours involves slightly too much wine, and the conversation turns to a subject that half the room have no understanding of but, driven by their chosen fuel, all have an opinion by the end of the evening. Well, this is where the Thinkingardens suppers start from. To be honest, the evening was slightly strange but great fun. However, after all the talking I have concluded my love of doing rather than thinking won’t be changing any time soon, but everyone to their own.

Since that evening it has occured to me more than once, that perhaps a more suitable group for me would be Drinkingardens! If anyone out there is interested, let me know…..

Next in the diary was the association of professions landscapers’ annual awards lunch where I was on duty as chair (I know, how did I get there?) at the Sketchley Grange Hotel in Leicestershire (haven’t a clue why it was there but there you go….) but it was a good afternoon. There were some great examples of work on display and it was nice to see yet more new faces picking up awards. Have a look at the website www.landscaper.org.uk for more details. Added to that a good feed, a very good if slightly random speaker in the form of James Alexander Sinclair, who was on top form. Have a look at his blog http://web.me.com/blackpittsgarden/Site_2/Blog/Blog.html it’s probably one of the best ones around. Not bad for a poncie posh designer or should I say Mister Whippy? (Sorry James, couldn’t help myself - no doubt I will pay for that at some point!).