Rajal was born in Kenya and lived there until she was 14. She was a teacher but then after the birth of her son she suffered from severe Post Natal Depression. This happened as the family moved from a small London flat to a home with a blank-canvas walled garden in Norwich, Norfolk. She got a teaching job in Norwich but suffered panic attacks and became very ill. Her refuge was her garden and she started to become interested in finding things to grow to suit the various spots in the garden. This interest grew so she did garden courses at two agricultural colleges to become a professional garden designer and a Royal Horticultural Society course to extend her knowledge of plants. She said that they had to learn the Latin names of 10 new plants every week!
She also has a blog, which started when she began gardening (https://www.thesmallgardener.co.uk).
She had some lovely photos of the plants in her garden and the designs she has done for clients. She prefers to draw and paint her designs rather than to use computer designing. One of her clients loved her painting of the garden design so much that they had it framed to hang in the house.
Cakes and coffee of course and I was presented with my prize for the marble cake, the WI entry at the Bacton Fayre. Very handy loaf tin liners and cup cake cases. Good job I've not given up baking!
The people who entered the WI flower arranging class won prizes of flower arranging accessories - also useful.
In the business part of the meeting we are discussing ideas for 2019 which is the 100th anniversary of Bacton WI and also the centenary of The Suffolk East Federation of WI's - lots of events to get involved with next year.
Back Tomorrow
Sue
What appropriate prizes! I love those tin liners and always use them. It saves a month of trouble!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link. I will look up the garden blog, it sounds my sort of thing.
xx
I shall have to start making loaf shaped cakes - shouldn't be difficult!
DeleteThose liners are brilliant. I push them out to fit my round tins if I'm baking 'in the round' or flatten them completely to put on my baking tray 🙂
DeleteIt's better than having all different shapes in my drawer.
Super organisation the WI. I was in it for many years but came out when I married the farmer as I wanted to participate as much as I could in the running of the farm and this meant that evening meetings coincided with milking and bedding the calves down for the night. As all our members aged and died off that branch of the WI folded a few years ago. A new, much younger WI has now formed in the town.
ReplyDeleteThere are new WI's all over now. One in Ipswich has a waiting list to join.
DeleteI would have found it difficult to belong to a WI when we were at the smallholding because of goat milking and organising children
I've been reading our Rural (the affectionate name for the SWRI, but they've now removed the R for rural) as part of my family history - my granny was a stalwart. A fascinating snapshot of the times. competitions included a polished shoe, skinny tatties and a well turned ankle - my granny got third place for that lol
ReplyDeleteA well turned ankle sounds better than a knobbly knee competition that Colin won once at a fete!
DeleteI feel for your friend we had thirty latin names to learn per week and that took some doing.
ReplyDeleteGoodness that's hard work
DeleteIt takes guts to stand up and speak to an audience for the first time - even if you know everyone there. Well done on your prizes for the marble cake. Was this your own recipe Sue, or did everyone have to use the same recipe?
ReplyDeleteEveryone had the same recipe but there were only 3 entries and they all looked different!
DeleteI love those liners, so much easier than faffing about trying to line tins yourself.
ReplyDeleteSaw your reply from yesterday :O) yes, back soon. I wanted to start afresh so a new blog has been created and will open later this month/start of Sept. It's my final attempt at getting my blogging mojo back, if it fails then I'm off for good! ha! xx
Never say never - I shall look forward to your return
DeleteI was trying to work out why you needed to make a bone shaped cake 😂 think i need more sleep! X
ReplyDeleteHa! Hope your small person soon sleeps through so you can too!
Deletecongrats on the prize! Is "fayre" old English?
ReplyDeleteYes an old fashioned word but I've no idea why events use Fayre rather than Fair.
DeleteI can remember when I had to learn some Latin...don't think I have enough brain cells left for that task anymore. Now I just do a french lesson on the computer each morning to keep the brain synapses connected. Much more likely to use French than Latin. Bravo to the gardener providing the talk. And bravo for your winning entry and (appropriate) prizes.
ReplyDeleteHaving and working in a garden is good for mind and body. Your speaker sounds like a very interesting lady and I hope she improves her skills as she gets more experience speaking to an audience.
ReplyDeleteI used to know the Latin names of plants, now I am grateful when I remember them in English.
I have never seen these tin liners before. Time to go shopping!
ReplyDeleteThe lady speaker did a great job getting these degrees after having had such an awful time.
https://ruraltownliving.blogspot.com
I love those tin liners. The only place I have found them here is in a liquidation center and they came from Japan!! Your speaker sounds very interesting, will have to check out her blog. I remember the first time I went to a small hamlet to teach traditional decoupage it was a little daunting to have 25 sets of eyes looking at me. There was one woman that was very aggressive and questioned everything I said. In about the third week she announced that she didn't think much of my method and she had finished her project because she had varnished and then put it in her gas oven to dry, OMG!!!!
ReplyDeleteWhat an interesting life the speaker has had. Well done on your cake and what useful prizes xx
ReplyDeleteYour speaker has had a lot of challenges and it's heartening to see how she worked to heal herself and accomplished a lot all the while. Those loaf pan liners are neat, I've never seen those. ((hugs)), Teresa :-)
ReplyDeleteA true bussmans' prize then! x
ReplyDelete