Great Gifts From Your Own Garden
The garden can be a great source of gifts and decorations this festive season. In the run-up to Christmas itβs easy to neglect the garden. There are more urgent jobs on your agenda like ordering the turkey, arranging who is visiting who for the big day, writing and sending off the cards and buying the presents, so who has any time to do the gardening?
Perhaps, though, the garden can be a help at Christmas, by yielding things that are suitable as presents and Christmas decorations.
Pot-grown hollies can be bought in garden centres and instead of cutting it from the countryside or buying holly branches from the greengrocer, why not grow some in a heavy pot or tub. Standing by the front door they look wonderfully festive at this time of year, especially when they are full of red berries, while in summer they can be trimmed into topiary shapes like pyramids and spheres.
You can find cones on fir trees that can be decorated as mini Christmas trees,
…and bare stems of red dogwood can be decorated with fairy lights to make a change from a usual pine Christmas tree, or smaller versions can stand in vases on a mantelpiece or windowsill.
If you are running out of ideas for Christmas present ideas, lots of people would be happy to receive a bowl of fragrant hyacinths, a poinsettia or a lovely Christmas azalea.
You could give an early present of a potted Christmas tree that can be planted in the garden on Twelfth Night, ready to bring in again next year.
If you are completely at a loss, garden centre gift vouchers make a great gift, available in all denominations, that can be spent at garden centres all over the country β similar to book tokens.
The garden can be a wonderful resource in the Christmas season and can do much to add to the glow of the festivities. Happy Christmas!!
