Garden Progress

Over the last week we have finally had some warm weather which has meant we were at last able to get outdoors and do some work in the garden. Our garden is very much a work in progress but it is starting to come together and it is exciting seeing everything coming back to life now. We have been buying lots of stuff from our local market and from car boot sales to plant up, including an apple tree. Here they are all lined up waiting to be planted. I took this photo a few days ago and we have since planted all of this lot...

The cat has also been enjoying the sun as you can see!

Kettle's Yard

Last week we went to look round the house at Kettle's Yard in Cambridge. I absolutely love this place, which describes itself as neither a gallery nor a museum but a place where people can feel at home and enjoy art in a relaxed atmosphere... 

Kettle's Yard is the former home of Jim and Helen Ede. Jim was a curator at The Tate in the 1920's and was friends with many artists of the period, as a result he acquired quite a remarkable art collection. At Kettle's Yard the couple displayed their art collection alongside  their furniture and plants and other objects, they opened their home every afternoon for students to come in and view the art and though the house is now maintained by Cambridge University it remains the same as it was then. It is an incredible place to look round, and pretty much my ideal home.

Read more about it here.

A History of Everyday Things in England

Here is a book I am currently reading, it is called 'A History of Everyday Things in England - Done in 4 parts of which this is the 4th, The Age of Production.' It was in equal parts the long-winded title of the book and the nice cover that attracted me to it.

It has some lovely illustrations and covers all manner of topics like furniture making, tapestry, clothes, baking and glass blowing as you can see below...

It is a very lovely vintage book, I only wish I had the other 3 from the series! I am going to be listing lots of vintage books in my Etsy shop very soon so if that is your thing watch this space...

Listening to...

I've been listening to the new Caitlin Rose album 'The Stand In' all this week, it's ace. This is my favourite song from it.

That's all. Have a great weekend. 

Gratuitous Cat Post

Our cat Tinker has been with us nearly 5 months now and despite the fact that my phone is COMPLETELY FULL of pictures of him going about his day to day antics, I realised recently that I have not shared many of them on here. So here is a post dedicated to him that should remedy that...If you don't like cats, look away now!

We haven't had him long really but we couldn't imagine the house without him now. As I mentioned in this post he was a rescue cat and he has had a few issues in the past. He was badly injured when he was brought into the rescue centre and the most likely thing is that he was hit by a car. As a result he has some permanent damage to his hind legs which means he can't jump onto anything higher than a bed or sofa (actually not a bad thing for us as he can't get on the kitchen counter etc!) and he falls over a lot. He is basically a bit disabled, but I don't think he knows it as it doesn't hold him back or stop him trying to climb trees..!

He loves boxes, string and people's laps. He hates the hoover, it is his nemesis, when it is on he runs and hides from it but when it is off he sneaks up to it and hits it. He also hates bin bags and fizzy water bottles (I think it is because the sound they make when you open them sounds a bit like a hiss, he only has to see a fizzy water bottle and he runs and hides). 

He has turned us into soppy idiots!

Garden Plannning

I am super excited about our garden this year. We moved into our house in the summer of 2011 and that year we did nothing to the garden as the house itself needed all of our time and attention.

Last year we did make a lot of progress in the garden but a lot of that was un-doing stuff rather than doing it. By that I mean we did things like knocking down a leaky shed that had been put up right outside the back window so that it blocked all the light. We also filled in oddly shaped beds in the middle of the lawn with grass seed, and cut back overgrown laurels revealing a whole new bit of garden we didn't know we had. We dug out beds, weeded areas that had been abandoned for years, replaced and painted broken fences etc etc. 

But there was so much to un-do that I don't feel we really made our mark on the garden last year. This year however we have grand plans. After all of our work last year we now have a blank canvas with a lot of potential which is incredibly exciting...  

The only progress that has been made so far this year has involved getting loads of garden design books out of our local library and planning...

We also had a bonfire on a dry bright day a couple of weeks ago and burnt lots of the old fence we replaced last year (there is still lots to go!)

Our incinerator is made out of an old washing machine drum, I would recommend it if you have a broken washing machine to hand (we did!) it is effective and thrifty.

So hopefully we are going to be very busy in the garden this year, watch this space.

For more garden inspiration check out my pinterest board here

Shop Update

Just a quick heads up, I have added lots of new items to my Etsy shop this week, check it out here

P.S. Don't forget you can like Goodnight Prudence Vintage on facebook here