The start of an edible forest and conkers (non-edible)

I really do worry about teenagers these days. Especially the girls. This one in particular is prone to the odd bout of 'crazy teenage' behaviour, being an ex-cellist, often, I hear they are the worst. So I tottle (given my new age, tottling is definitely in order, I'm very old, I'm assured) downstairs last week after my 'birthday lie in' and come across a veritable forest in my living room on the stove (the stove obviously is off, otherwise this is not a good place for a veritable forest to start really is it?) but fear not she's a sensible sort. The mystery deepens with a note, whilst these are famed for ransoms, this note appears to be more of a confession of apparent teenage debauchery and skullduggery. Then again this particular teenager is known for leaving ransom notes, often on ransom banana's. 

So as you can imagine, I'm more than a bit cautious when I see a note on anything here.

And, dear reader I'm in no confusion, this note is clearly for me. No other 'Mum's' habit these here lands.

So, the first word is 'fecking tree' not any expletives other than those used in that famous Irish TV show where Mrs Doyle frequently proffers cups of tea to unsuspecting clergy.  She continues -  'Do you know how hard it is to hide a tree?'  The sub-text here is 'in my TINY bedroom'. 

The cellist being of a slim and willowy stature has a slim and willowy compact bedroom to suit. Hiding a veritable forest in there by means of a horse chestnut and a forest of raspberries is no mean feat. And she continued to tell me the joys of moving such beasts home on the bus, seemingly not fun. Ah, teenagers, you see they are still borne of resilient stock I'd say, trees on public transport - that's quite a feat in itself, never mind playing a game of hide and seek with them once home.

If you're ever in doubt, you hide them behind the door as folks often don't come in to your room they just stick their head around the door. Clever girl eh? Just in case you're of a mind to hide a couple trees for a while. A nice thoughtful present I'd say. Mind you I am wondering what else is BEHIND the door now and probably has been for years unnoticed.

I'm going to be creating a 'productive' garden when we flit (flitting is moving house) - so the bounty there is welcomed.

I did however query the horse chestnut tree (Aesculus hippocastanum) - we like a good conker in this house, and the kids have played many a conker game. In fact for a while they both had a 2 ltr ice cream box of 'feral conkers' which happily travelled back and forth to 'dads' until they accidentally fell down the stairs a time to many and the 'pet conkers' were sadly set free in their fathers garden. Sad times, but packing boxes of conkers in childrens 'overnight' bags for a trip to dads was a lot of fun we all thought. I do fear however, their dear father never really found it such a joy, being conker-under-footed-often-on-the-stairs-often. Sadly limited sense of humour over in those lands.

Back to the veritable almost-edible forest then, the rasps are now wrapped up and both these and the chestnut sits nobly waiting to flit with the rest of the stuff. Its 'edible' remit I was unsure of, so I asked the dear ex-cellist, her thoughts on the subject. I know you like eating chestnuts she said, she's clever like that, she notices the ample scoffing I do in this house. However, horse chestnuts of which conkers are, are inedible to both humans and horses. And, in fact make you a bit poorly. Conkers are supposed to ward away spiders although there's a lot of chat and not a lot of science to back that up. They also attract mice, so depending on how you feel if you keep conkers in your drawers to ward away spiders, best put the kettle on for the mice who'll gladly join in too.

Dear reader, I am beside myself with glee at my newly emerging forest and its components. With regard to Monsieur Conker, I'm going to be planting him it at the back of our new garden as it reaches a goodly lovely height and hope that its prolific and grows into a noble tree and perhaps in my lifetime produces conkers. 

So I think I'll stick to playing conkers in the future, perhaps with the ex-cellist and her offspring, one day eh? Roast (inedible) horse chestnuts doesn't really appeal as much as a decent game of conkers.

Which reminds me, the largest and most beautiful conker tree on the island, in Kirkwall, is in full leaf now and about to flower - I must pop by and get a photo or two of it. Whilst it doesn't reach the heady heights of those 'doon sooth' its a corker (or conker?) and beautiful in flower. And, truth be told its quite nice to eyegoggle and stalk a tree in these lands which isn't the noble Sycamore. I like a good sycamore, don't get me wrong, but its nice to have a change.

Why don't you head off and find one to goggle yourself? The flowers are magnificent and the tree itself quite statuesque. In my best Mrs Doyle voice, I beseech you - Go'an, go'an, go'an, you know you want to, go find a tree and have a wee neb at its awesomeness. Then mind it on for autumn and get conkering. Nothing quite bruises the knuckles in quite the same way.

Frugal wedding malarkay - 1

Now this isn't the kind of post that will appeal to many people but some folks have asked specifics of what we're doing with 'Wellyfest 2013' to try and have a wedding celebration 'our way'.  So whilst its unlikely to be helpful - in the manner of reflection I'll lob a few wee snippets on here. Hmm well its ages til we do the 'I do' bit in beautiful forests - well at LEAST a week.

SO what on earth can I tell you about the experience so far? Before we went crazy with the planning we decided who we wanted along. Having debated long and hard about exactly who/where/why we wanted to celebrate our wedding. Then came the budget we could have done it little and spent a few hundred pounds - we wanted our closest chums and family so we bit the bullet and decided to go for it - we want to have a holiday at Xmas (as usual, this year we'll also call this a honeymoon) and hopefully look at buying a house next year - so we've considered £3k to be the region we'd be comfortable spending. (If you can ever be comfortable spending that kind of money on something as decadent as a party). We know we'll have to say - no we can't afford x/y/z but that's OK, we need to prioritise, and that's fair.

 

The main facts really are that we're attempting to have a wedding in a forest in Scotland, with c100 fab guests and a very fun party for a budget of £3000. We want it to be as paper free as possible, as waste free as possible and as home made as possible.

I had utterly no clue where to start, so I found a book. Well the dearest ex-cellist found a book, in the library. It was called  'Your wedding Your way.'  And thus the games began. And the book was free, good start. N'er a wedding magazine has graced this house, borrowed or otherwise. There are oodles of books in the library on wedding planning, who knew. I normally head straight for the cook book section. The one thing I would say about this process is if you want something a bit different stick your elbows out, give them a sharpen and stick to your guns. Its worth YOU and your DEARLY BELOVED making a list of what you DON'T want and what you do want and remembering to reflect on it often. The book helped me see that. It's so easy to get sucked into the frenzy. Yes, even I found myself fondling favours and telling myself how pretty they were. Step away my lovely, they're NOT on the list. Nice as they are you don't want them - remember? STICK TO YOUR GUNS.

 

So back to this list then, we decided what was important to us and what wasn't. Lots of the non-essentials were ditched, not to say that they'd not be lovely but they weren't as important to us as other things. So after deciding we'd like to have a moderately sizable celebration, along came some of the things we really care about.....and I've lobbed in some costs, these might be actual, estimated or totally unrealistic, but lets see how we do. There is a wee contingency, I think most people call the that kids uni funds but lets not kibble over which ISA it comes out of.

So current allocated spends are -

 

Outdoor wedding in a forest of our choice - cost £402

We 'could' have found a free venue - we chose to spend some of our money on an NTS venue which we both love - and that had a cost. Our choice, its a special place and after much wrangling with the poor warden I am ASSURED all the money raised in that venue is SPENT in that venue - good enough for me. We chose the autumn - forests look fantastic in this season, its my favourite season (aside the other three) so why not. And in a very frugal manner - you instantly have a very easy to bring into the venue theme. So our 'rustic' autumnal theme was borne of both love and frugality. Cunning huh.

 

A Humanist Ceremony - cost £350

We chose a Humanist ceremony as it suited our philosophy of life. So a standard ceremony would have been a less costly choice, but it wasn't for us. We've been to few Humanist gathering and find them to be deeply moving and very lovely. There is an additional legal cost on top of this, which I'll varies where you live.

 

A community venue - cost c£400 + all additional costs like corkage etc for the evening TBC

We wanted a community hall/venue to host our 'home made' knees up. Community venues around the country and often offer a unique space to have an event it. Feels nice to be using our chosen community's facilities and acknowledging their role in every village/town/city. Its often the heart of a community and we wanted to celebrate our event in such a place. The one thing I would say is shop around. Community halls often offer a really good money for value service whilst other establishments we've found quote very differently if you ring them for a 'wedding for X amount of folks' or email them about a 'conference for the same amount of folks'.........just saying. The W word seems to add a goodly amount to a cost in some establishments.

 

Grub - c£500- excluding toasts/wine

Well any frugal lass would smart at the cost of a 'shop bought buffet' and when feeding the combined McFlowers rabble a buffet is generally the best way to do it. They are prone to food fights. So having thought it all though before we started down this process I said to Mr McF to be - 'I think we should do the grub' - a firm nod from himself, 'Of course, best phone Aunty C then and see if she's free to take on the head wedding chef's job'. And she did. We'll go in to this bit a lot further in another post - grub and the making of a feast for a frugal amount, is a the subject of much head scratching and a post all of its own.

So before we've got dressed we're sitting on chairs wondering how on earth spends are already in the region of £1652.......

So far as of today's date the approximate allocated spends are around £2900/£3000 and we've got a couple of weeks to go. And, yes I know the above doesn't take count of all that money - a girl can't spill the beans on where all the money's allocated, in just one post now can she.

I'm away to put a flannel on my head and lie down - that's a lot of money isn't it and we're not even dressed yet.

A wedding in PJ's perhaps?

This isn't perfect - I'm sure we'll make a whole heap of mistakes but what's ever perfect about a marriage. Might as well start as we mean to go on, with good intentions and a canny eye on the budget. And we're having a lot of help with many aspects of it all - friends and family are being amazing, and for me that sense of love and friendship embodies who we are. Whilst its hard to sometimes ask for help of such a magnitude - I'd sure as hell do the same for anyone I loved too.