Christmas is well and truly over and our tree has been undressed of all his decorations, and after a few days in a cool place has gone outside again; he will spend the rest of the year in the garden until just before next Christmas when he will come back in and be decked.
Our tree is a living tree, and when he grows too big for our house, he will be planted in the garden and spend his life outside. I’m not exactly sure what type of conifer he is, he has a ‘rich blue green’ colour’ – exactly as John Clare describes it:
FIRWOOD
The fir trees taper into twigs and wear
The rich blue green of summer all the year,
Softening the roughest tempest almost calm
And offering shelter ever still and warm
To the small path that towels underneath,
Where loudest winds–almost as summer’s breath–
Scarce fan the weed that lingers green below
When others out of doors are lost in frost and snow.
And sweet the music trembles on the ear
As the wind suthers through each tiny spear,
Makeshifts for leaves; and yet, so rich they show,
Winter is almost summer where they grow.
John Clare
Lois Elsden 