EDIT: Giveaway is complete.
Would you like to win a beautiful book?!
Well, if you live in Australia you just might be able to win this very one.
Selina Lake makes lovely books that combine vintage snazz with contemporary style. They’re heavy on the ‘things that are meaningful to you’ and light on the ‘follow this trend’. What a relief.
Botanical Style is a lovely example of this heart-home approach. There are lots of ace ideas on bringing the outdoors in and greening up your place, no matter what your personal or decorating style is. There are fancy/formal suggestions and more informal, breezy gems too. And there are pretty blooms galore.
Here’s a little peek inside (below) – but you can find out EVEN more about ‘Botanical Style’ over on Holly’s blog, or head straight to Selina’s corner of the world.
To enter:
Comment below and let me know your favourite plant related story – or your favourite plant!
Details:
Competition closes on 18th August at midnight, Melbourne time.
Winner chosen and contacted via email on 19th August.
I can post this book within Australia only – so make sure you have an Australian mailing address.
NOTE: Your comment might not show up straight away – as all comments must be approved – but it WILL show up once I have time to approve it. Never fear!
Thanks to Hardie Grant Books – Selina’s Australian distributor – for sending me this lovely book to give away! It is beautiful and I can see how much work has gone into making it that way…
Other good stuff on my blog:
Pip’s School For Slumpy Creatives : Lesson One
My I Spy: Something Beginning With ‘A’
How To Make Choc Chip Brioche Buns
24 Non-Crap Things To Say To The Sad Person In Your Life
Make My Very Best Chicken Soup
67 Comments
Cleaning out my childhood room a few months ago I found an old diary from when I was around 8 years old, apparently the saddest day ever was the day my mum decided it was time to get rid of the dragon tree that had been around for as long as I could remember. No matter that it was huge and pretty dead looking, and the only place we had room for it made it pretty tricky to get down the stairs without being poked by leaves. Apparently I’ve always been a plant fan!
I love geraniums, so colourful and cheerful. I love bringing them inside to brighting the dining table/experience. Also adore daphne, something to look forward to during winter and it has the most heavenly scent.
I would have to say the rose for its delicate beauty and fragrance – it is unmatched and loved the world over by almost everyone. To prove my dedication, one daughter’s middle name is Rose, which means “pure”. The other daughter’s middle name is another botanical name “Eden” which means delight. So, they could be summed up as “pure delight” (most of the time!)
Pelargoniums. They’re humble and not considered very noteworthy, in fact lots of people get them mixed up with geraniums. But pelargoniums are tough and will survive anywhere. The scented varieties also smell amazing. When I moved out of my family home in the Blue Mountains, I took a cutting of one of the pelargoniums that grew in my parents’ big backyard, brought it to Sydney and grew it in a pot on my balcony. Today it still flourishes in its terracotta pot, producing small pink flowers and reminding me of home.
I adore so many fragrant plants, such as daphne, hyacinths, honeysuckle, roses of all kinds, especially Othello….and the list goes on. I have an enduring memory of gifting flowers to our teacher, in primary school. It was such excitement and anticipation! Mum would let us take the scissors outside, you have to be up early, and the blooms would be wrapped with care, in wet newspaper, to be nursed with care on the school bus.
PS; Also, forgot to mention, the delight of imagining the fairies living down inside the yabbie holes, in the garden. And thinking that forget me nots were the perfect size to fit in a fairy’s vase.
Daphne…Mum had the largest bush of Daphne growing at the back gate. So fragrant and my best childhood memories are triggered by its scent.
Mulberry tree in a pot. Last year I purchased a Mulberry tree and planted in a medium size pot hoping it would survive………well it has and is now laden with cute little whiskery green fruit. I’m so excited, I can’t wait for them to ripen.
I love sunflowers whether in a large field with rows and rows of bright large yellow heads or artfully arranged in a vase, they are a standout in colour and size and flower happiness.
My favourite plant of all time is the bearded iris. I love the look, the colours (the dark purple with the yellow). On my first date with my now husband, he turned up with 4 of these irises and we were only 16. He had rung my mum and asked her what my favourite flower was. Thank goodness they were in season.
I attended a basketry course last weekend and came home with a cute little organic basket I made myself. Some of the materials I used for weaving were the dried leaves of Chasmantha and would you believe it, I have it growing in my garden. Free botanical crafting material! Now I can bring the garden into my home via baskets, in keeping with the lovely ideas in Selina’s book.
Plants are everywhere in my memory. All the plants we have grown together as a family or seen in people’s gardens are so central to how I remember growing up. I find myself now looking out for jasmin, mint, camellias and roses, gum flowers and delighted by the sight of a snowbell or a violet peaking out from those lovely heart shaped leaves. There is nothing more wonderful then an hour spent pruning in the garden and a series of bud vases stuffed with treasures and sweet smelling posies to show for it.
I love flowers, but I can only buy back home. Because I don’t have the garden with my busy work can not take care of them. But I will try to grow them
I really love the pothole gardener, via https://thepotholegardener.com/, his name is Steve Wheen and I love his concept and what he has created, as he explains in this talk, worth a look,
https://thepotholegardener.com/talks/.
The basic concept is to stop look and think and smile.
I adore lavender, and absolutely everything about it brings pleasures and healing – the colours, scents, textures, flavours … it is magical.
Thank you for this lovely give-away! xx
Plants that have a scent re my favourites.
I live with PTSD, Depression and Anxiety and I spend time during the day as the seasons change just siting watching my plants and breathing in their scents. Different herbs like Rosemary and Basil that I rub with my fingers and sit them in a plate to spread the scent through the room.
My roses are wonderful, My favourite rose is Mr Lincoln. I love to cut the blooms and have them in vases in different rooms and then when their life has passed I dry them along with other rose petals and enjoy the scent through the drying process, Then I throw back to the 1990’s and turn them into containers of Pot Purri.
The comfort that this activity brings is immeasurable.
I just recently decided on my favourite plant/tree, and by recently I mean just over the weekend. I brought home a Fiddle Leaf Fig tree in memory of my puppy who passed away last week and it’s a really gorgeous tree, full of character.
I absolutely adore hydrangeas. Even when they were uncool and not at all popular I still grew them. Both my grannies had them in their gardens and they just remind me of happy childhood times. And I love the different colours depending on the acidity of the soil they are planted. I’ve just started painting them because they bring me so much joy and happy memories.
Love love love freesias… their fragrance is so sweet, they are delicate and beautifully colored, they make a fabulous cut flower but most importantly they brighten up my garden in the cooler months.
Here is a gardening story for you. We were recently cleaning out my deceased greandfather-in-law’s house and came across some fertilizer in the shed. My husband took it home and liberally applied it to our lawn. Turns out it wasn’t fertilizer, we now have giant dead patches in our lawn!
What a gorgeous book! I love how plants can be a direct connection to family and friends from years gone by.
Over 20 years ago my grandma gave me a cutting of mint from her home in Lake Tyres, which she had grown from a cutting taken from her mums (my nana) home in Beechworth, years before. I grew this mint in my last house and have brought a cutting with me to my new home…So all these years later I still get to enjoy the same delicious mint my nana and grandma grew. My grandma also gave my aunty either a tomato or some tomato seeds from her fave tomato plant (that she used for her tomato sauce) a long time ago (my Grandma’s been gone for 10 years so it’s been quite some years), anyway my aunty grows these tomatoes and keeps some seed from them every year to continue growing the same variety as my grandma did, and she offered some seeds to me so I’ll be to grow grandmas fave tomatoes here too.
They are my favourite plant stories…. I think they make plants more than just plants, some are a precious links to loved ones no longer with us. x
As a child of the 70’s my parents had cultivated an amazing backyard cacti and succulent garden. I learnt a valuable lesson from this garden, one day my little friend and I were chasing each other through the botanical backyard garden, when he caught me we managed to avoid falling in the pond by instead falling on top of a large cactus. This cactus left our butt cheeks full of long spikes which we spent the rest of the afternoon over my mum’s knee having them pulled out. Lesson learned – cactus spikes are sharp!
I remember my Dad and Mum taking us to the botanical gardens at Kings Park in Perth every year to see the native plants. Dad had a big garden of natives, and I always loved the grevilleas and the kangaroo paws, and the yellow-flowering gums with the big red gumnut caps. When I spent some time living in California, I was astonished to see that Bottlebrushes were used as plants along the verges and sidewalks and even turned in hedges!!
Thinking of my favourite plant story instantly brings back memories of my childhood fairytale favourite, Thumbelina and her like sized flower fairy prince. A tale that represents magic and romance instilled in me a love of flowers and plants.
Some of my earliest memories are of exploring my nanna’s back garden. My favourite plant back then was the common sensitive plant which Baby Amie rendered as the “sensible plant” – because a plant closing up its leaves when you touch it is eminently sensible as far as I was concerned.
Lavender. Reminds me of my childhood home and it always does me good to smell a lavender bush when I need a pick me up.
Dahlias. For me it’s always been dahlias x
I have always loved Iceland poppies. As a child, I imagined that fairies wore upside down Iceland poppies as their ball dresses, their jewel toned skirts soft and fluttery. As the poppies began to bloom, I would collect the fuzzy caps which fell off the buds, fill them with drops of water and leave them out for the fairies to drink.
A few years ago we moved into a rental that we currently call home. The gardens were bare and boring and being on a budget …and too much of a scrooge to spend money on a rental garden…there was little chance of the gardens ever getting much attention. Until one day I noticed there was a succulent poking through the fence from the neighbours property. I plucked off a few leaves and popped them randomly into the garden. They grew!! Repeat…repeat and 3 years later I have a garden full of glossy green money tree succulents. Some produce a covering of little white and pink flowers and I love the way they grow quickly into miniature trees. Some now live inside and when we move house soon I’ll be taking a few with me ready to transform the next garden.
I love everything botanical and have many lovely botanical moments in various gardens, the hills in the tropics, my Dads beautiful orchids but one of my favourite moments was when I was living with my mother in law and walking out the back door and being met with the incredible fragrance of the pretty little flowers from the Daphne plant. Wow! Have you ever caught the scent of a Daphne?
Hi Pip! I don’t really have one plant-related story per se, it’s more the fact that gardening in general reminds me of my grandpa. He loves all kinds of plants, but is especially proud of his roses and, whenever I call past to visit, insists on giving me a few to take home and brighten up my room. The peachy-coloured roses are my favourite and make me daydream about a day of Nanna-inspired baking, cups of tea, and pootling around in the garden…the perfect day, really – and all from a flower!
As I walk to the letter box my neighbour’s beautiful Daphne bush permeates the air making me happy to collect the bills.
When we got married 19 and a half years ago my mother, a plant lover and single parent, gave us an indoor plant with gorgeous leaves. This was a way of leaving her heart with me as I had moved to Australia to marry my Australian love, far away from my native South Africa. As we head towards our 20th anniversary, when I water this plant I continue to think of my mother and her love of me. How hard it must have been to let me go. But the plant continues to grow green and strong like my marriage and my love for my first family.
I’ve always had a soft spot for cactus and succulents. They are beautiful, sculptural living pieces of art, have lovely flowers and are very forgiving of neglect from a not so talented gardener such as myself!
Oh gosh, this is a toughie! I have a couple of gorgeous parlour palms that I’m obsessed with with but I’m also drawn to succulents for their plump, unusual leaves!
Roses uplift me. Essential oils, body care products, perfumes; I always choose Rose
I used to live in a house with a big back yard and I had a wondeful vegetable garden. But due to health reasons I now live in an apartment with a fantastic balcony. I still grow some vegetables, but I have re-discovered indoor gardening and the pleasure of growing flowers. I am lusting after a fiddle leaf fig to add to my expanding indoor plant collection!
Favourite plant related story would be Wendy Whitely on Australian Story! And anything on the planthunter. My favourite plant is correa because it’s the only plant that survives extreme heat and frost and is a native!
I love flowers. I love their colours and the brightness that they bring. But the only plants that grow for me are succulents. Anything else runs away when they see me coming!
Daphne , every time I smell it I automatically think of my mum .
My favourite plant is the grevillea. When I was a kid we had big bushes of them in our front garden, they smelled amazing and brought all the native birds to hangout in our front garden. They remind me of that house, my childhood and brought me my love of birds.
Lavender is my favourite flower! It reminds me of home, when I was younger living with my parents. If I was ever sad, anxious or couldn’t sleep Mum would pick some lavender and put it under my pillow. I now do that for my kids too and it’s a familiar smell that makes us all feel safe.
Lemongrass. Delicious in tea and delicious in cooking.
My favourite plant related story is how recently we just moved from Melbs to QLD, with our life and toddler all crammed in the car and my amazing husband let me take ALL of my plants.. Which was a lot (one of which was a 2 metre monstera!?) The backseat was a jungle of Devils ivy, succulents, and monstera, and our almost 2 year old! I may love my house plants a little to much…. ????
There is something about celosias that I love. I was drawn to their fluffy flowers and they just bring me so much joy!
I just bought an unusual succulent, the Aztec Tube Jade. Just like it sounds, it has tubes coming out all over it, very unique, I love it! Thanks for the opportunity!
I used to love hearing my mum tell the story of feeding snap dragons sugar with a little spoon when she was a girl. She would open the ‘mouth’ of the petals and pour the sugar inside.
I love hydrangea and have three different varieties in my garden grown from cuttings from my mother’s garden. She in turn grew them from cuttings from friends’ gardens. I look forward to them flowering in summer.
I had an accidental botanical theme when trying to choose a name for my first daughter. My top three names were Ivy, Olive, and Fern! We chose Ivy because it represents strength, resilience and loyalty, all beautiful qualities of the plant and the person. Ivy is now a sweet, quirky seven year old who would think this book is beautiful, as do I x
I like black-eyed susans. Hardy little suckers with cute flowers.
How can I have a favourite plant when there are so many gorgeous plants? I love ALL flowers and flowering bushes, and most vegetable plants and nearly ALL trees. Sadly though I am not very good with plants – living ones that is. I can arrange a very nice posy or vase of flowers, and I can put together a good display of veggies or sprigs from native bushes. However, I must confess, with great sadness, that I don’t seem to be able to keep my plants – both potted and free-range in the garden – alive. I have tried. Kind friends have issued hints and family have attempted to help. It has even been suggested that I limit myself to the fake kind . However, I have decided to pursue my love of plants through letting others do the tending to them. For me is the joy of seeing, smelling, and decorating with these lovely parts of creation.
Daphne is one of my faves! It’s perfume is soooo good. I like to pop it in vases all through the house so that you get wafts of it when you walk past. I also love the jasmine that is flowering like crazy right now- I like to wear it in my hair, even though I’m probably too old. I walk past a stunning Japonica bush on my way to the train in the morning and it makes me swoon. Every season there is something that I blooming love! Xx
My daughter is a bit different to other ten year olds – dislikes pop music, likes 90s rock, watches Gilmore Girls (Team Jess) and doesn’t watch tv. As I said – different. Shy. Earlier this year she started at an after school club called ‘Nature Club’. She realised she loves gardening. She has created her own little subgroup in the club where she teaches other students how to re-pot succulents (she has a ‘thing’ for the succulents). It has increased her social confidence now end – so now I love succulents for what they have done to help my daughter find her way (sentences I never thought I’d type #256).
We are moving into a new house and for the first time in her life, she will have her own room. Hello! Your blog comp! This is the perfect combo, non? Plus (no joke) it is her 11th birthday on the 17th of August. How can you go past this delicious story of botanical sweetness? 🙂
I’m loving the peas my hubbie is growing in the garden at the moment. So yummy eaten straight from the pod! It’s the only way my eldest daughter will eat peas!
Simple jonquils from the farmers market ??
I love honeysuckle. As a child we used to pick the flowers to suck the honey like nectar. Not only were they pretty to look at and sweet to taste but they smelled divine!
I love how evocative flowers are and can take you back to a time and place in memory.
-Like seeing the colours of the “yesterday today and tomorrow” reminds me of my childhood home or
-a whiff of jasmine transports me to my home where I was a teenager and warm summer night
– or Agapanthus (“Aggies panties” as my friend call them!) and my mom deciding to take some of the seeds home from the beautiful ones growing on the side of the road as my sister and I hid in the back seat!
????
Violet memories. Little posies circled by voluptuous violet leaves xxx
Love you mum xx
I’m a Naturopath and use plants as medicine so it is nigh on impossible for me to name my favourite, but let me try my best to name a few contenders:
– Aloe vera, for its never-say-die tenacity to grow ANYWHERE, even in the gardens owned by those of us with the blackest of thumbs. Also super handy for cuts and scrapes and burns and bites to soothe the heck out of everything.
– Peppermint, again will grow all over the place, and with it around you’re never more than 3 minutes away from tummy taming herbal tea
– Camellia and Daphne, because when we’re all in the Winter time no-flower funk, these two beauties pop up and say hello with their beautiful petal-faces.
Thanks for the chance to win this book Pip, it looks amazing! (Even if I don’t win it is officially on the shopping list!) xx
Oh, being a rather introverted, don’t-look-at-me sort of person, I have a soft spot for unpretentious little flowers that grow in by-the-wayside kind of places. I was in Sweden years ago and there were little blue forget-me-nots growing along the side of the country roads, which appealed to me (and since reading CS Lewis’s biography Surprised by Joy, where he talks of himself as a “votary of the blue flower”, after the old German poet Novalis, which refers to a kind of longing which is in itself desirable, I am extra fond of blue flowers too – and forget-me-nots are on the Royal Albert Flower-of-the-Month teacup for July, which is my birth month, and who doesn’t like a fine floral tea cup!). But if I was to be Australian about it I also love our paper daisies or everlasting daisies – the ones that grow wild about the place with the pink buds that turn into white and yellow flowers (Rhodanthe anthemoides) – and I love native bluebells also, which grew in the lawn of my childhood home, but I had better stop!
Oh gosh. Those sneaky botanicals grow on you don’t they?! I had a long stemmed rose growing in the garden in my last rental, then I started growing edible blooms and decorating my food with them, now I have a growing potted garden and they have started creeping up my doorstep in the form of succulents and into the house! Hello fiddleleaf! Long story short- I don’t have a favourite plant but them invading my house might be my favourite botanical story! ????????????????
Ok so emoji’s translate as question marks…. Good to know…. :/
Cacti are one of my favourites, but I also adore lavender and keep staying fascinated with gum trees and jacarandas… The book looks amazing!
An enormous Morton Bay Fig tree was my best friend when I first started working. I would take my lunch break on one of its exposed roots under sprawling branches and cooling foliage.
Hi Pip,
Xanthorrhoea’s (Zan-thor-ria) is my fav, the aussie grass tree. They were previously known as ‘black boys’ however this is rather racist ! and they are now Grass Trees, but sound is so booorring … Xanthorrhea sounds exotic, mysterous and unknown. They grow a centimetre a year ! They can sustain themselves through fires, birds feed on their flower spike, they are drought hardy, and prefect for our nutrient poor soils… They take ages to grow, but why not get a small one, whack it in a sunny well drained spot, and watch it grow over time …
The Nightingale and the Rose by Del Kathryn Barton for her spectacular colourful swoon worthy illustrations.
Succulents! Because of their name.