Shortest Day has long gone. Christmas decorations are back in the loft. The nation returns to work; January is a melancholy time for me. Buts despite my grey mood, conversely, January is also a time that carries plenty of promise of better things to come. It’s in January that I notice the lighter evenings creeping in and a time where I find myself saying “good morning” to the wintry sun.

Why?

Because I know what’s to come. I know that spring, with all its promise of warmer, lighter, prettier and full of promise; and during these COVID times, less restrictive, I hope!

With more vintage thoughts in mind, at any time of the year, I have a weakness buying for glass jars & vases of all shapes and colours. Most of the year, they clog up the shelf in the utility room & I wonder why I do it. I buy them because I like them, but their perfect use doesn’t spring to mind immediately, there’s no “vision”. “…… Then the summer comes; I don’t have a huge amount of beautiful plants in my garden, but I do have a Philadelphus or Mock Orange.

Apart from the truly wonderful smell, I am hooked on the elegant simplicity of this plant. In June each year, I get to remind myself that the garden shrub – planted “because I love it” and the glass jars & vases – bought “because I love them” are a match made in decorative heaven.

Simple yet elegant – A cutting from the garden, placed in a glass vase or jar is sometimes just the simplicity that’s needed.