Almost exactly this time last year I said the same thing to Rich. "Do you think the garden will come back again? I can't really believe it!" Everything is cut to the ground, pinned back, brown. Gone are the rainbow brights in the big border, there's not even a whisper of the wild flowers we scattered through the apple trees and the everlasting Sweet Peas look like they have died a slow death. I feel like I am willing the peony bushes to start sprouting, like standing over them in my slippers on the frosty grass will make them magically appear in front of my eyes!

I know it will all come back, that the boys will be diving in and out of the long grass that grows wildly in May, and by June I'll be pottering in the early summer sunshine at 6pm shouting over to Rich cutting the grass, "I just adore this garden." But it feels like a long wait.

I will admit that I hacked at the garden last year. I snipped and pruned and made a real mess of the beautiful rockery and flower beds that the previous owners tended to so lovingly for 3 decades. I filled the house with flowers from the garden as well as my incredibly talented neighbour at the bottom of the hill who grows to sell at the local Women's Institute market. Her flowers blow me away. For my birthday Rich gave me a weekly subscription service - not that she'd done anything like that before! She has a rustic wooden table outside their 5 bar gates and leaves buckets of the most amazing Dahlias, Delphiniums, you name it she grew it, with an honesty box for passers by to buy them. 

But through the late summer and autumn 2 black florist's bucket would arrive as if by magic on the front door step and my heart would literally burst! I'm hoping for the same for my birthday this year but I am also so determined to tend a little flower patch of my own, so that the garden can stay in all it's glory and I have a dedicated area that is just for cutting. To bring the garden inside. 

We have decided to use the vegetable patch for a mixture of fruit and flowers this year. The raspberry, strawberry, courgette and pumpkin plants are staying, we are going to grow a smaller amount of climbing french beans and use the rest for pretty blooms! It's not a huge area, as flower patches go but it's a perfect start. I don't think I am blessed with green fingers but I really want to learn. And the best way to learn was to listen to the Queen of Flower Farmers, my friend Georgie Newbery. Last Tuesday I went along to her farm to spend the day in their converted barn along with 6 others to understand the basics and give us a foundation of knowledge to start our patches at home. 

Georgie cuts over 250,000 stems at their family flower farm Common Farm Flowers. I visited the farm last year and was in awe of the varieties of tulips tossing their heads around in the wind. The tunnels bursting with sweet peas and the wild poppies. Man o man I couldn't get enough of them! 

The workshop runs from 10am - 3pm with bottomless pots of tea and coffee and homemade biscuits and a break for a Common-Farm-does-a-ploughmans style lunch with local bread and cheeses washed down with a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. 

Georgie is a brilliant teacher. Relaxed, generous with her knowledge, full of tips and tricks (slugs beware - vaseline and salt are good to smear on your wooden edging and baked crushed egg shells make a great deterrent too) and you can't help but feel like you've made a new group of friends by the end of the day. I had no idea about compost tea, simple recipes that make a huge difference to the quality of your soil as part of the preparations for your patch. Georgie recommended several seed producers to buy from to ensure you get the freshest seed possible and speaks with heated passion about her determination to encourage people to grow their own. I was staggered to learn about the empty planes that fly back to Columbia having delivered millions upon millions of roses to the UK market for Valentine's Day. It's horrifying to hear of the commercial wizardry that has to be performed to keep stems alive in transport. It makes you realise that when it comes to flowers, what we may consider is fresh is far from it. 

We came away with scores of notes, handouts, supplier information and things worth investing in and what corners are worth cutting. I can't recommend this course more if you are thinking of starting your own patch in the garden. It doesn't have to be huge. Raised beds work well too. 

If you can't get to a course you can find a copy of Georgie's book the Flower Farmer's Year here which is heaving with every single thing you need to know to get started without feeling overwhelmed. 

Little and often is Georgie's motto.

There are patches of colour appearing, Grape Hyacinth sprouting between the Daffodils and the odd Crocus. Enough for a small posy, picked by a boy! 

I'm going to order some Dahlia bulbs, propagate my seed tray with the varieties we were given at the workshop; Larkspur, Salvia, Cornflower, Ammi Majus and pot 5 sweet pea seeds in a taller plastic pot. Georgie was adamant that you place 5, just 5, seeds in each section of our trays. You need to think less about the vast number in the packet (because how hard would it be logistically for a seed producer to package up 5 at a time?!) and more about the size of the plant when it's growing in the ground.

My Sweet Peas will go outside the back door to harden up to the weather in a couple of weeks time before being planted the following week and Georgie reminded us to make sure we grow them in rows as opposed to a tipi shape structure as you will miss out on all the flowers that grown between the stakes. You are growing to cut remember!

So I am all set to go! I need to keep an eye on my seed tray to make sure they are sitting in too much water, of course my natural reaction would be to water form the top but as Georgie pointed out the pressure and force of streaming water would move your delicate 5 seeds to one end of the tray. Which would mean they all become bunched together! 

This is my to do list for March, I need to tend to the earth to give my bulbs and seeds the best conditions and make my first batch of compost tea! Although we were warned it does pong! There are lots of other little bits to do as well, but nothing that even the busiest of bees can't manage. Georgie's book is going to be my bible this year, a reference and an inspiration. 

Anyone else planning to grow their own flowers this year? I have quite a few seeds left over and though it might be nice to do a swap! Let me know and we can pop each other some in the post. 

Check out the full list of workshops at Common Farm Flowers and see which one would be right for you. 

On Friday I had the pleasure of being invited to the beautiful Nib and Ink book launch (which deserves it's own post!) at the Platform Gallery above Habitat on King's Road in London. I felt like I was amongst Instagram royalty with almost everyone introducing themselves as an Instagrammer when I said hello. 

It was a wonderful but slightly surreal experience to be surrounded by the London elite, firm friends who exchanged big hugs as we cooed over the decor and pretty inks on the table, as well as those who had travelled from a little further afield. People whose galleries I adore.

I was in awe and got a little over excited, barely pausing for breath on several occasions! But the reality is everyone is just the same. Despite followers in 6 figures, no one was elitist. Refreshingly ordinary, normal people with extraordinary followings. Once upon a time suggested users, members of a real community, building and shaping the influence and power of visual social media.

I feel like you can learn something everyday, that you can evolve your gallery, curate your feed any which way you want. That perhaps it's not about being a master of the platform, it's more about being the master of your account. So what works for them might not work for you. You can read the thousands of posts of tips, share your own - be open with what's helped you and help someone else. But the most important thing is that it's yours. 

That still life, as beautiful as it is, quite possibly doesn't interest you. Maybe your gallery is all about you, your face, your family, your clothes, your home as opposed to a feed full of stunning florals, with no hint of the person behind it. 

Whatever it is I just think you need to love it. And your passion will shine out and inspire, engage and resonate with people. 

Whenever I get together with friends I have met through blogging and social media the conversation always turns to Instagram. Why we all love it, what hashtags we all join in with, what new communities people are starting (if you love a good coffee join in with the brand new hashtag from Wild and Grizzly #stylemycoffee) and the mystery of why people follow and unfollow and milestone moments we are all so proud of.

And I couldn't be more proud of #capturingcolour. A 33,300 and growing strong gallery bursting with bright florals, patterned mural walls, delicate pastel houses, magnolia trees starting to blossom and injections of colour into family lives.

No one photo linked up feels the same. For some a love of colour means pops of pastel, neon brights, for others a more muted palette is how they embrace gentle hues in their home. The gallery is bursting with inspiration for interesting compositions, portraits, capturing your children, flat lays and eye catching photographs to give you ideas on your next weekend away or holiday.

I seemed to fill my February feed with lots of feminine colours, blush roses, pink petals and a mix of softer tones amongst my more stronger shades. I realise how much my photos jump around, when I look back at the #capturingcolour gallery. One minute I share something from the house, the next a floral flat lay, boys to westies and there was even a few of me last month! I was discussing with a friend how there isn't a real theme, bar colour. And I guess that's fine by me. I don't want my grids to blur into each other. Our lives are an organised mess of 4 different jobs, boys, school life, friends and family. And I think my feed is exactly the same. An organised mess but hopefully a pretty mess!

Every month when I scroll through the gallery to pick out a grid of favourites I open the gallery on my laptop and randomly bookmark those that ping out at me, and they always seem to flow into each other. I spotted the photo of the tule skirt and it went on from there.

I love the coolness of the violet tones against the warmth of the pinks. February was biting cold in the UK and I love that despite the serenity of these images there's a hint of whimsy, a lightness, almost a hint of spring.

Hop over to Instagram to find these accounts and follow them! So much inspiration for your daily feed.

And this month I want to highlight Britt's account that I discovered a while ago. Her use of texture blows me away. The way she incorporates muted colours is so captivating and her engagement is just incredible. Stunning still life, delicate pinks and a real sense of depth with metallic.

I could get so lost in her gallery. 

I want to dive in and eat everything she bakes! I can't wait to follow her through spring, to see how she shares the brighter colours of the season. Every picture she shares could be a piece of artwork. 

Thank you so much to every single one of you who make this gallery so beautiful. And a huge thank you for following me on Instagram. For me, it's become almost a blog of it's own, a daily journal and it was so interesting to hear that Julia and Hannah only recently started their blogs in the last year or so and that Jess only uses Instagram.

That Instagram had been their sole creative writing and visual sharing platform. That the power of the community online has given them this audience around the globe. And more importantly that there is so much room for everyone. To not get caught up in how many followers someone else might have, not to rush. As tempting as it is to want to post every few hours or even every day, by being more conscious and discerning, you only share your very best. 

I find it hard to only share a few times a day - what about you?! I guess it's all a balance about posting for you, posting for your followers and posting with purpose. Just like a blog. 

Come and join in with #capturingcolour. I share my grid of favourites each month and I hope you find some new wonderful accounts to follow. 

I have blinked and a whole week of March has zoomed by. 

I wore all my hats last week, racing to a joke shop to pick up the only shark costume (Ollie decided he had to be a shark for World Book Day with 24 hours to go. He is such a shy boy that I couldn't not come through for him,  after dashing to Bristol for a development meeting, making paint cakes, and setting up Gromit's in all sorts of mini shoots. We've ended the week with a busy but beautiful weekend. Every Sunday Ollie fills in his weekend diary. He can write or draw or print some photos - anything goes. Then on Monday morning they stand in front of the class and talk about their little lives. 

Yesterday afternoon I felt like we could have written an essay - yet it didn't feel rushed. The weekend was a complete mix of friends and family, feet on the pebbly beach at Clevedon looking for fossils, learning to paint with watercolours with the master that is Harriet De Winton (Thank you Rich for my Mother's Day ticket!) and pottering in one of my absolute favourite boutiques 19 Alexandra Road before we headed home via another best friend who needed spoiling. I dropped a bunch of flowers on her doorstep and we raced home to get in pyjamas and eat a home cooked chilli smothered in sliced avocado with our feet up on the coffee table.

I have all these photos that don't really fit into a specific post - photos that tell a story. So I thought why not put them all together in a jumbled mess?!

Mother's Day for us is about trying to make sure everyone is included, all the mummies know they are loved and appreciated and finding a half way meeting point along the A303, which is harder than you think! It's quite something to see 5 families come together, for everyone to sit around chatting, topping up glasses of Prosecco, endless cheers and Mum even managed a FaceTime with my brother and sister in law in America from the play park after we had eaten!

It felt like a special day, the boys burst in with a hand made menu for breakfast, their presents they'd made from school (top marks for coming up with a paper petal bouquet teachers) and Rich surprised me with the cabbage leaf soup bowl I had lusted after at the end of the watercolour workshop. He'd snuck off whilst my best friend Tanya and I took our three amigos down to the beach to walk the dogs and sneaked it into the car!

On Sunday we all got dressed up, the children were brilliantly behaved, we booked the table early and luckily the family next to us had opted for a late lunch which meant we could take over one area of this quant village pub and empty a box of K'NEX and a bag of colouring pens and paper all over the floor to keep them entertained. 

It wasn't fancy - it was perfect. A hearty roast, ice cream sundaes as big as your face and a race around a playground 2 minutes away. My boys were desperate to go for a bike ride to finish off the day so just before dusk we ploughed down the lanes, feet in the air screaming wooooo hoo to the sheep in the fields that were running along to chase after us. It was the first ever time Ollie has ridden a bike. He's point blankly refused up until now and I kept looking back at him, peddling as fast as he could, a smile as wide as the open dirt track road in front of us, and all I could think was, my heart might burst in a minute. 

We've borrowed a bike from a friend and really it's too small, but it was to give him a chance to get familiar with a bicycle and I am hoping that this new found passion will mean a birthday bike will be on his wish list and we can blast around the village in the summer holidays. 

There was an awe I had on Sunday as we rode as fast as we could then shouted at the top of our voices because only the birds could hear us. Sammy beaming back at me trying to match my (impressive to him) speed down the open road. We rode til our noses went cold and didn't take any photos. In some ways I wish we had, but in others I am so glad I was in the moment. A little moment, a significant to me moment. 

Happy new week everyone. 

ps I couldn't have loved the Modern Botanicals workshop with Harriet more. I almost skipped out of the shop swinging my bag full of pages with new paintings on them and my wooden box of artist materials. A real good for the soul 3 hours with lovely company and endless tea. She is an absolute talent and I want to book on to her next one in early Autumn learning modern calligraphy lettering. At £35 I thought it was incredibly good value and a big thank you to Rich for getting me it as my present.