CathyBynumMaurer

I hope you are keeping well and that winter is behind you. Over here it seems to be dragging on well into spring. It was snowing this morning and more predicted for the weekend with no sight of it warming up, but the daffs are hardy and still pushing up there little heads, so we know spring is upon us. I thought it would be nice to update the home page with the following: Well here I am sitting in my office (bedroom 2) in my apartment, looking out of the window watching it try to snow I can't help remember the fun "stuff" we always did for our birthdays. During the week from March 6 (my birthday) to March 13 (Cathy's birthday) we always planned something fun, or didn't plan anything and had fun.

On the first year that we moved back to England we were living in my house just outside London and already considering selling and finding a bigger place, but all that was put on hold while we played for a few days to celebrate our birthdays. Any way on this occasion we decided to take a driving tour through Kent visiting some out of the way "plant centres". I call them plant centres as the places we were seeking were one woman rarely man establishments, that specialized in growing various rare plants that you could not find in the everyday garden centre. Cathy had been reading about a grower of hellebores and was keen to seek one grower out in particular. Fortunately the grower lived in Kent, so we did not have to go on a trek up north or down to the deepest south west. Any how, we set off at around 10am after the morning traffic had subsided and made our way down to Maidstone via the back roads just stopping wherever we fancied for a look at whatever was there, antiques, potteries, estate agents (realtor) windows whatever... All the time knowing that we were looking for this hellebore place buried deep in the Kent countryside.

Cathy had an idea where it was, but we did not have a detailed enough map to know exactly where, so we stopped for lunch at a small country pub and asked for directions. No one knew what the hell we were talking about except one old guy who said he knew of an old farm that had recently changed hands and was no longer being used as a farm. As it seemed that this was in the right direction we asked him where it was. He showed us on our crude map and we set of in hope. That's when the cross country expedition started and some three hours later it ended with us pulling up in a farm yard that had hundreds if not thousands of plants all scattered around, but neatly organized.

Sure enough a large portion of them were hellebores and my Sweety was in ecstasy. She began inspecting them and following their trail round the back of the farm buildings. I in the meantime tried to find the owner to check if we could do this and if we could buy anything. Sure enough this was the place we were looking for, but where was the owner? Well after walking round to the front door and ringing the bell and not getting an answer I tried a couple of the other buildings with no luck, so I decided to go and find Cathy. When I finally found her she was talking to this well to do looking country lady about the hellebores. As I approached she introduced me to Lady ... and pointed out that this was the owner. The she carried on talking to the lady for another hour or more about this hellebore and that all the time putting pots to one side.

I knew what she was doing and thought what the heck it is her birthday, so let it be. Well when she got finished we toted up the selection and there were over 30 different plants. I said that there was no way we could get all of them in the Honda and Cathy replied that her intention was not to buy them all, but to now pick the best 5 or so specimens to take home. So we spent the next hour debating which one was better than the other and finally came to a conclusion. We ended up buying 10 which I managed to fit on to the back seat of the car and in the trunk just about. So I settled the bill and we started off home thinking that it will take us 2 to 3 hours to get back.

Well once I found my way out of the neverlands I soon realized that we had doubled back on ourselves and so we were just outside the M25 ring road round London, so we were home in less than an hour, happy and content for having such a wonderful day on such a wonderful day. Most of the plants were planted in the garden soon after, but when we moved a few came with us and to this day I have them with me on my balcony still as healthy and vibrant as when my Sweety bought them.
Love to you all,
Eddy

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