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Listen to the first podcast from the gardens at Bealtaine Cottage…birdsong is free!
Thankfully it rained for most of the night! 
The water barrels have filled and the well is finally sending more than a trickle to the cottage! 
If it was possible to bottle the Earth Scents outside in the gardens, then I’d be a millionaire and could buy lots more land to plant trees on! 
There is another Earth Sense though…one we all need to tune into…one that ensures a sense of well-being. 
A sense of belonging to the environment around us. 
Living in a small cottage ensures much time spend outdoors during the day, something that was common place for many people until fairly recent times. 
The advent of TV ensured more and more people lived indoors and not out. 
I recall as a child spending much of the day outdoors, as there just wasn’t room in the house to play! 
Walking outdoors can add to a sense of well-being, even in the rain.
The healing aspects of Nature are being continually distilled into medication by the pharmaceutical corporations, yet remains inherent all around us. 
Nature massages the soul!
Being outside with plants, trees, wildlife, Nature, animals and birdsong, is unbeatably good for ones’ mental health! 
Nature is real and alive, strong but gentle and always there for us despite the abuse we fling at her. 
It is something that cannot be put into a pill and certainly not for sale in a bottle!Bealtaine Cottage is also on YouTube…with over 102 videos about Permaculture, planting, growing and living.
Over 800 blogs from Bealtaine Cottage in the archives here.
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Some advance notice is welcome, as life on 3 acres on one’s own can get pretty full on at times. 
Last evening I was called by a friend, who wanted to know if she could bring a neighbour of hers to visit Bealtaine. 
Her neighbour referred to me as “the woman who plants the trees!” 
It’s an odd thing to do really, plant trees…so far over 900 planted! 
Odd, in so far as so few people get this obsessed! Trees change every aspect of one’s life. 
As I sit here typing this blog, the birdsong is magical and very loud! 
My childhood was impoverished as far as trees were concerned. 
I grew up in a tiny terraced house with no garden, just row upon row of slate roofs and grey walls. 
My first encounter with trees was at school. 
Entering the gates of the Convent school grounds, greenery enveloped me.
My childhood was transformed by the gardens of Loreto Convent.
I recently returned and collected seed from the convent grounds in Omagh, to grow on here at Bealtaine Cottage. 
Visitors bring me trees. 
Subscribers to this blog send me tree seeds, from all over the world. 
I dream about trees. 
I have left instructions to be buried in a woodland…let a tree rise from me!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OTiyT1TSbaU&list=UUHkXJ9wsrdPEpzb-KMgmt-A&index=1&feature=plcp
Gunnera Manicata in the garden today is beginning to unfurl it’s leaves from under the cover of last year’s leaves which have protected the crown of the plant over the cold, winter months.
There is a complex eco-system at work here, under the decaying leaves of last summer
The eco-system is a complex web linking plants, animals humans and every other life form in what we call the “biosphere.”
Many aspects of this early Spring call to mind my trip to Romania in 2002.
I spent ten weeks in that beautiful country and it was there that I made up my mind to return to Ireland and a simpler life in the country!
Romania is a stunningly, beautiful country and it’s people are wonderful.
I stayed with the Pancs family in Arad and travelled to Borsa in the north of the country as well as many towns and villages in between.
At this time of the year in the west of Ireland, I recall the advent of Spring as I drove from the far north of Romania, near the Ukraine border, down into the south and Arad, near the border with Hungary…very fond memories indeed!
Daffodils continue to open at Bealtaine…
The daffodils have bloomed all over Bealtaine this year, starting way back in January!
The very mild winter has had a positive effect on all the plants and trees here, with many coming into bloom very early indeed!
As I type this there is a plethora of birdsong outside the cottage.
This is a variety of Willow that I am unsure of in terms of name…it has red stems as you can see. Any enlightenment would be good!
Sweet, little, wild Primroses, chancing their luck by growing in the centre of the driveway! Each Spring their number increases as Bealtaine Cottage remains chemical and pollutant free!
Photinia, or Red Robin is at it’s best right now as the new leaves make a show of themselves!
And so the beginning of another week at Bealtaine Cottage…it promises dry weather and lots of tasks to be completed before the time passes on into summer…for that may be just around the corner!
The evening approaches…
Taking Jack out for a walk was pleasant as the air was still and warm.
One of the first real signs of Spring is birdsong…excessive birdsong…morning, noon and evening!
The gardens here at Bealtaine are taking on some extraordinary colours as the spring proceeds.
White, cream, shades of pink and amber…all these colours represent the life force awakening!
Jack is driven mad with scents…of the badger, hare, frog, all traversing the ground as the earth awakens!
Buds are beginning to appear on one of the Pear trees near the cottage.
The young Lilac tree has a thickening of green buds.
Moss that has spent the winter covering the ground, is beginning to loosen and rise in clumps, as the grass beneath it pushes upwards, towards the light.
Catkins hang majestically from the Hazel trees.
The leaves of the Blackcurrant are opening.
Spring…
