Three Beautiful Things

1. "Sort of skulking?" "Yes, and picking bits out from between the paving stones." "That's a dunnock ." Another of our home birds identified. 2. My parents' neighbour has four turkeys in a pen in the woods. They are pleased to see us and come to the fence to show off their green-black plumage. One of the males fans out his tail for us. 3. He brings his great dane puppy out to meet us. Its colour makes me think of a batch of biscuits -- pale gold to soft tan. He says its spent the short afternoon testing the boundaries of his garden.

1. I go looking for a writing group -- but it's half term, so they're not meeting. Good -- I can go back to bed. 2. It's such a beautiful day -- and I have plenty to do in the back yard. I plant a few bulbs, and feel pleased at the sight of fresh compost in the pots. I also cut down the tired mint -- it makes the rubbish bag very fresh smelling.   3. A high flock of birds -- each one small as stubble on a man's cheek.

1. The first thing Nick says when I wake up is that when I sleep snuggled up behind him, he can feel Baby Badger moving against his back. I'm amazed to discover that BB can kick that strongly and not wake me up, and pleased to think that the two of them get some time alone together. 2. Katie has put a call out for bulb planting assistance -- so I go round and spend a few hours in her sunny back garden -- in return, I get lunch and two slices of chocolate cake. 3. There is a children's party going on in the hall across the hill. Little voices roar out cheesy pop music -- "Hey-ay-ay baby, will you be my girl?" and laugh at the DJ's jokes. A few brave souls get up to sing: "Twinkle twinkle little star" and from one rebel: "Happy birthday to you, stick your head down the loo..."

1. To spend some time with my mother at the garden centre discussing the relative merits of violas and wallflowers. I love violas for their surprised but neat faces -- I think they are afraid of spoiling their carefully pencilled-in make-up. As soon as the vegetables finish and some pots come free, I'm going back for a couple of boxes. 2. Clients who pay very promptly and electronically. 3. There's been a car alarm yipping and wailing ever since we got into bed. I go to the window muttering that I am really going to give it something to go off about if I can work out which car it is. It falls silent and does not start again.

It's my day at Oxfam Bookfest (in case anyone has forgotten!). I'll be at the Chapel Place Oxfam Bookshop in Tunbridge Wells today from noon to 3pm.  1. My courgette plants have drooped in the full sun. I move them into the shade, and marvel at how quickly the leaves perk up again. 2. Her love is so fierce and absorbing that her attention always turns back to this wailing, difficult baby. If that's how I am going to feel about Baby Badger, I am not afraid of anything. 3. In these hot days, my evening glass of soda water and Angostura bitters (cool with condensation) is very welcome.

1. This morning, I am awake enough to eat my breakfast with my husband and wave him off as he walks out to the station. 2. Among the brown fibres and black crumbs, an oval of green is waking up. 3. The baby's eyes open, just a peep, and then close again.

1. I wake from a nap to find that Nick has polished all the shoes and trimmed the overbearing cupressus tree. 2. On a day when the washing has gone out... and come back in again... and gone out again, to go to the shops with an umbrella which we did not need. 3. Marks and Spencer do an almond chocolate with caramelised salt. It's delicious.

1. The sun in the yard reveals secrets. Midges dancing in the morning. A thread of cobweb drifting skywards. 2. To mix up bright blue plant food in a watering can and glug it on to the pots and troughs (and the former fridge salad drawer) that are giving me so much pleasure. 3. Thick magnolia petals lie in drifts in the courtyard -- and there's more to come.

1. Through the post comes a fat envelope of free seeds from the BBC's Dig In project. At the end of the day, when all my work is done, I start to plant them up. 2. I interview the playwright John Godber because one of his shows, Men of the World is coming to Trinity next month . He has a soft Yorkshire accent that I like very much indeed. When I transcribe my shorthand, I enjoy hearing it all over again in my head. "It's a very human activity, of humans re-enacting history for other humans to watch." His humans are pronounced  yewman. 3. There are two blue tits that share the feeder in the rowan tree. They are small enough to work at it together; or sometimes one sits on a nearby branch and waits patiently for the other to finish. I love the way they share, as well as their bright lime-rind yellows and sky blues.

1. How pleasing to interview a star of stage and screen while wearing pyjamas, and then to lie in the bath with one's husband until after 11am. 2. We look out of the waiting room window and see the police in the yard below -- they are shifting sacks and bundles out of a van. Very suspicious if you ask me. 3. Mint is burgeoning in the pot outside the front door, and I pick some to go with the courgettes.

Happy Frog has made a list of eight positive things from her month. I'm thinking that I might try taking stock like this -- it would be a good cure for that awful feeling that life is passing you by. 1. The new Christmas tree has shed its seed case and is uncurling an alien fistful of green fingers. 2. To spend a morning pulling together my week's work. Doors open for me at a touch. 3. To come into a pub and find my husband waiting with his newspaper and a brandy.

I had some very sad news yesterday -- the gardens and interiors writer Elspeth Thompson has taken her life in a bout of severe depression. She wrote a blog about converting two railway carriages into a home, and her words and pictures gave a lot of pleasure. I own several of her books, and I take them down often for inspiration, or just to enjoy them. Elspeth was incredibly kind and supportive to 3BT -- she mentioned it in her The Wonderful Weekend Book, and I still get messages from people saying they found 3BT there. We never met, although we emailed, and talked blogging on the phone once. I felt incredibly special to think that such an accomplished writer would take notice of me. Our emails from the early part of last summer are full of half-hatched plans to meet, and I so wish we had. This isn't the sort of thing you come here to read, but I know that a few links to 3BT come in from dark places, so I'm going to say it. If you are suffering from depression, please, pl...

1. Waking up to see a bit of daylight prying itself through the gap in the curtains. Morning work feels like a light bath, and it makes me feel like getting things done. 2. Nick's sister Sarah rings to tell me to expect a plant. A couple of hours later, a man comes to the door. "I've got a very large ivy for you." It's a cone, about the height of a child, and it's perfect for the collection of pots along the sunny wall. 3. It's satisfying to pick off and throw away the fat that has floated to the top of a stew taken from the fridge.

Yesterday was a day of lateness and not being able to get my head round things. I put the podcast up yesterday hours after I posted: I forgot what day of the week it is. So if you missed it, please go and have a listen. I now have a revolting cold, and feel very sorry for myself, so perhaps that explains it all. 1. I am chatting on the phone to Louise, and she says: "I've just noticed, that plant you gave me has flowered." That plant is a cutting from a pot plant she gave me. I now have three, but they've never bloomed for me. 2. In the pub, there are three children behind the bar -- they've come to work with mum because of the snow. "That'll be one fifty, love" she says to me. "One fifty, love," whispers the smallest child. They giggle, and she sends them all back upstairs. 3. I was late making the bread, so I have to cut it for supper within minutes of taking it out of the breadmaker. Hot air escapes from the crust and scalds my fi...

Word Imperfect has woken up her blog. She picks a word each day, and the readers invent a definition. 1. A bag of wet-rooted wallflowers for my garden: what a treat for £1.25. 2. Standing on top of Mount Ephraim on a rainy day and watching the wet watercolour on wet paper sky. 3. The cloth hisses dry as I wipe drips of gravy from the bottom of the oven.

Another pair of newses: a. Sarah Salway, writer of marvellous books, is offering free (that's right, free) prompts for writers on her blog . As a keen scribbler, I don't compromise when it comes to prompts -- and neither should you. Roll down a little on the lefthand side to find them. (Can I have my biscuit now, Sarah?) b. Hunter-Gatherer , the man who lives by his bushcraft skills in a home-made treehouse in the woods, announced yesterday in a post (mainly about catching and preparing pigeon) that he has proposed to his girlfriend. They are another Nick and Clare pair, which is a lovely co-incidence. 1. On the first day of rain after a long dry spell (Sunday was the first day I had to fill my watering can from the tap), I like to lift the lid of the rainwater barrel, stand on tiptoes and see that it's full to the brim. 2. Early today, an Amazon parcel arrives addressed to Nick. I assume it's some special interest tome like Biggles on a Train Versus Hitler's Deadli...

1. I pull the dead sunflower from the pot by the front door. The mint plant protests in the only way it can, by rolling clouds of its scent at me. New compost and a watering cheer it up a little -- but it still looks resentful. 2. The vines are finished, and so I root them out, only to find a stunted yellow cucumber has been growing un-noticed and (until now) un-loved. 3. Making up a dish of seasoned flour, coating some lemon sole fillets and frying them in some melted butter until the fish turns from translucent and marble cold to opaque and soft. The coating crisps a little and turns from raw white powder to a red-gold crust. Picture of mint from Stock.xchng

1. The plant stallholder's daughter is looking carefully at the curled shoots of cyclamens. Our eyes meet through the dolly mixture and lipstick pinks, and I tell her: "We used to call them 'Mouse tails'." 2. Ladelling hot lemon curd into sterilised jars. It pours like new honey (our ancient household management book says that this is how you know it's ready; another recipe says that it will coat the back of the spoon). 3. Digging out the spent soil from the lettuce trough, adding new compost, soaking it well and planting up three little violas -- which I hope will cheer up the winter days to come. I wish I could set the trough up on the window sill so that people can look right into the flowers and see the sepia lines radiating out from the centres. Picture of cyclamen from Stock.xchng

1. I pick my first cucumber. When I slice it, a halo of silver dew drops appears around its circumference. 2. A friend calls wondering if I'm still looking for work. I say 'yes' (a bit too quickly) to her offer of a day's proofreading. 3. My mother has bought a feathery fascinator to wear at our wedding, and so pleased with herself that she's refusing to take it off.

This morning, I'm on A Handful of Stones . 1. She is trying to fly a tiny kite, but doesn't know you have to face into the wind. I liked hearing a shout, and seeing that, by chance, she'd got it airborne. 2. Nick is sitting on the doorstep polishing shoes. I like to overhear him talking with our neighbours about the cucumbers I have grown. 3. I send off three tiny stories to a competition, and I feel as if I've achieved something.