Seasons Greetings! Although I have moved mostly to Instagram and Facebook, I did want to stop by and wish a happiest of holiday seasons to anyone whom this may reach. Although our holiday party fell partially victim to the fickle Maine December weather and we were only able to welcome a small number of people into our home, I invite you in now for a little post Christmas wander. May you all find peace, love, and comfort now and throughout the year ahead!
As always, please feel free to join me at At Briar and Bramble Journal on Instagram and Facebook.
Hello Friends! It’s been a while since we gathered on the porch for “chin wag” (as the Scots like to call a good chat…). I can’t count the number of blog posts I’ve started in my head, or the number of photos I’ve taken of projects in various stages, recipes we’ve tried, beautiful moments when the sun hit the Meadow just right. But I just never seem to have the time to sit down and put it all in the form of an actual blog. The technical aspects of this make it more of a slog than a blog! So- In an effort to reconnect with you all, and perhaps meet a few new folks along the way, I’m going to concentrate on the public “A Briar and Bramble Journal” site on Facebook and begin an Instagram page for the Journal as well. I can do these much more quickly and frequently…and maybe not ramble on *too* much! It may not look as fancy as the blog did, but I’ll keep this site as well so that I may come over here when I can. In the meantime, please come join me over on Facebook and Instagram at “A Briar and Bramble Journal” (if you aren’t already)!
In the meantime, here are just a few images of the summer here on our little homestead on the coast of Maine. See you on the porch!
“There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember. And there is pansies, that’s for thoughts. . .”
I would like to dedicate this brief post to the memory of my Aunt.
She left us two weeks ago, after a battle (with cancer) hard fought. I’m still trying to comprehend the loss. I’m in my forties…a time in life when the harshness of human frailty begins to come into focus. it’s the time in our lives when we realize that wolves circle just beyond the comforting fire that our family and friends are seated around. But understanding and reconciliation are two different things. There are so few people in this world whom we share life’s experiences with…and even fewer who love us for who we are.
My Aunt’s home had an open door. And everyone who passed through it was family in her eyes. She loved them all unconditionally. Many of them were friends who passed through my cousins’ lives briefly, but no matter. While they meant something to her children, they were treated as family. She was a presence in my life at every step…every holiday, every birthday, every graduation…as proud of her niece as she was of her own children. And though we saw each other only infrequently as I became an adult, I always knew that she was there, with her door open.
And so this is my little posey of rosemary and pansies…memories and thoughts…I’ll remember her love of gardening and crafts, her eye for repurposing things others considered too worn out to value, her Christmas babka, and the afghan she made that still lies at the foot of our bed, the penchant she seemed to have for dogs almost the same size as she was.
Our families are like candles…they burn forever bright at one end and, with time, grow shorter at the other. But the memory of all those who gave it light will continue to guide…
Hello Friends…finally settling in to put up a few blog posts…I apologize for my lack of updates. I had unrealistic expectations this summer! I had hoped to be posting weekly- keeping up with the changes in the gardens, updating the project reports, and sharing recipes and decorating ideas as we hosted friends and family. This is honestly the first day in a month and a half that we have sat quietly. And that’s only because of a steady rain. We need it though…my husband and I (and even our pup) have been navigating a restless sea this summer. Each little wave crashing over us has been it’s own summer swell.
Some have been lovely…we have been able to open the door of Briar and Bramble to guests finally…and family and friends have filled the house with laughter and love. Some of our visitors came looking for quiet calm and a moment of peace in their hectic lives. Some came looking for adventure along the midcoast. Friendships and familial bonds were reaffirmed, and new friendships forged (Bramley bonded with all his visitors…both two and four legged!).
The gardens, porch, and patio have been constant comforts. They have hosted lobster dinners and cakes by candlelight, lazy breakfasts and board games, and they became the place to watch bumblebees, birds, chipmunks, and meteor showers. The phoebes fledged from their nest in the porch eaves, and for two weeks straight, we listened to the juvenile barred owls screech to each other in the night once we turned off the string lights and doused the lanterns.
I have found joy and solace in my gardens…coaxing then to grow, delighting in each new bloom, obsessively fiddling about in evenings ‘til dark…weeding, watering, deadheading, trimming, harvesting…I find it calms me after constant stressful days at work. My summer routine has been to come home, reflect on the day with my husband, cuddle Bramley, and then throw on my wellies and head out into the garden or the meadow.
Ah…the meadow. Many of you may be familiar with the struggle of the meadow project. It has slowly evolved from a jumble of felled timber, to overgrown brush, to stump field, to parched and barren dirt and weeds…to a wildflower meadow. But…that’s a story for another post.
So there has been much happiness this summer at Briar and Bramble. We are so thankful to have this sanctuary to call home and to share with those we hold dear. But I have a confession to make as well.
I’m tired.
I am blessed to be able to live in a beautiful home and to create my version of a life pulled from the pages of a magazine. But I will be honest…it is work. I wanted to give my guests (and myself and my husband) an experience…a perfect, peaceful, old fashioned New England summer vacation. (I sound frightfully like Clark Griswold…just wait til we hit Christmas season!) Hopefully, that’s what they had. But I have been a bit like that proverbial duck who looks placid on the surface while paddling furiously below the water line! I love being the hostess and custodian of our home (with my husband, of course!), but I tend to put a lot of pressure on myself to try to make everything beautiful. And our list of projects only gets longer, despite finishing many of the tasks we had set for ourselves. Add to this the daily stresses of the outside world, work, schedules, and unforeseen events such as a loss in the family, and well…I’m tired. So many of us come into the blogosphere to present a perfect picture. I can tell you that creating that and living it is wonderful and rewarding and one of my most treasured achievements, but it’s work! The rain, then, is a welcome respite and reason to sit and recharge.
And there is no place that I would rather be.
(I’ll follow this by a few additional brief posts showing some of our recent projects, the meadow, and a few final thoughts from recent days. Thanks for stopping by…)
Wishing you all a very happy June! It’s been very busy here…any time at home is spent working on projects or planting. There’s a new landscaped lawn we have been working on and a new potting bench area. My to-do list constantly gets longer rather than shorter, and even the extra hours of sunlight each day are not enough. But, I did want to start a (hopefully) regular posting of what is “Blooming at Briar and Bramble”. I hope that you enjoy the gardens as much as I do!
Wishing you a good Sunday morning here from the porch of Briar and Bramble! There is birdsong in the air (and the distant traffic), the leaves are that almost fluorescent shade of yellow-green, and the clouds are thickening over the Bay and turning a shade of blue that mirrors the surface of the water. I have started my summer tradition of a lazy Sunday breakfast on the porch this morning, and thought it was about time that I give an update.
I’ve had several blog posts started in my mind…I just haven’t had time to actually compose them! Early spring is a busy time here…the weekends are spent working on the big projects that we have envisioned for the house and the property. Although we have several acres, when we first moved here in 2019, the cleared areas consisted of a tiny bit of front lawn, a patch of weeds and stony dirt behind the house, a front “field” of tree stumps, and a vast sea of poison ivy and Virginia Creeper. The house had been recently renovated when we found it, but had not been consistently lived in for years. So nature had taken over again. Or really, poison ivy had claimed it in a hostile land grab….
So, we seem to have started a yearly April and May tradition of pulling up vines and attempting to reclaim land. It’s not fun, but it’s absolutely worth it. (Despite the perpetual itchy rashes…we have tried multiple poison ivy relief products too. I don’t have any advertising deals on the blog site, so I can tell you in an unbiased manner that basically nothing works. My best advice is: try not to scratch. 🤷♀️
Anyway- this year, we had some professional help. We had the stumps removed and buried and the front field cleared. It was a massive relief to get this done. Last summer, we watched the stumps try to regrow, and a tangle of scrub brush seemed to come from thin air. It was disheartening to know that we couldn’t keep up with it ourselves. So….my dreams of a meadow are much closer to reality now….roughly an acre has been cleared, and we spread wildflower seed and Blue Seal Equigraze grass seed. There are patches of green just starting to emerge from the expanse of brown. We desperately need rain though. Our hose and best intentions can’t keep it watered.
A few other projects are also either completed, or are at the “hurry up and grow” phase- the front yard has been extended and planted with grass seed and lupine, a partially shaded culvert in the backyard has been cleaned of underbrush and planed with a partial shade wildflower seed mix, several more lilac bushes have been put in (thanks to a friend who needed to thin hers out), and we now have a wisteria arbor. (We foraged our woodlot for sturdy winter blow downs and built a rustic frame). Finally, the patio that we created last summer got a new burst of color…I repainted the chairs in a cheery sea foam green and our DIY screen door was put up. (The screen door will get its own post at some point. It was a discarded frame that we found along the side of the road. We had a lot of laughs…and a few groans…transforming it into a useable piece!)
This past week, I have spent every free moment visiting my favorite garden centers and planting the gardens. I’ve been impatiently monitoring the weather and the temperatures for weeks now- watching the perennial beds slowly come to life, and coaxing seed trays in the guest bedroom. (That’s another separate post…it will be all about good intentions and glossy internet articles vs what happens in real life…)
Writing this reminds me that I have new yard project to begin, a car to wash, weeds to pull, flowers to water, and a cake that needs decorating…life at Briar and Bramble can be as busy as a bee’s….but we still take Sunday mornings to enjoy it!
(Sorry for the unintended blogging break…thanks for reading…I’ll be posting more often in the summer as garden blooms unfurl, patio and porch lights twinkle in the evenings, and the sailboats dot the bay…🌸)
This year, we added a new ritual and celebration to our holiday season at Briar and Bramble…we wassailed the apple trees.
This wasn’t exactly the Christmas carol interpretation of wassailing…or what people would describe as wassailing. To most (Americans, anyway), that vaguely means drinking a type of spiked punch that eventually loosens the tongue to drunken, off key caroling at holiday parties. Originating from the Anglo Saxon period, the term “wassailing” comes from the toast “Waes Hael”…a wish for good health. It became a common practice to visit neighbors and family, toasting their health and prosperity, in the holiday season. Caroling, gatherings, and celebrations followed with time, and the song “Here We Come, A-Wassailing (Caroling)” entered our holiday lexicon.
Apple (or orchard) wassailing is an ancient custom that was once most prevalent in the southern regions of England, such as Somerset and Devon. As with many old rituals, there is question surrounding its origins, age, interpretation, and even actual date. There appear to be two dates, depending on which tradition and calendar you prefer to favor- Twelfth Night/Day (January 6th), or “Old New Years” (January 17th). On either of those dates, tradition holds that revelers fill their mugs and glasses with apple wassail, grab their lanterns and torches, and proceed to find the oldest tree in the orchard. They offer the Apple Tree Man (the spirit of the orchard) a wassailing song, place a piece of bread soaked in cider at the base of the tree or in the branches, and pour cider onto the roots- ensuring the health of the trees and a good crop of fruit in the coming season.
I was intrigued by this, not only as a history buff and Anglophile, but also because we have taken the very tentative first steps into starting an orchard. I have always loved apple orchards and longed to have one of my own. There is just something about apple trees…their gnarled, wizened shape, the appealing and odd names of the heirloom varieties, the beauty of their flowers, the smell of the windfalls, the continuity of their growth with the history of the land…they have always just seemed magical to me. It may be that they feel like a tangible connection to history. I love the heirloom varieties and the thought that there are some trees (or grafts of trees) on old New England farmsteads whose origins date back as early as the 1700s.
We were thrilled to find a mature wild apple tree growing just outside the back of the house when we moved in. It has produced a fair amount of very small, yet surprisingly tasty fruits. We took a few specimens to the Maine Organic Farmers and Growers Association (MOFGA) Apple Day, hoping to hear that it is a previously unknown example of a rare heirloom variety. We were told that it’s a wild tree, and thus a unique variety of its own. My husband and I think that it’s lovely that Briar and Bramble has its very own unique apple, but we still wanted to have some historical varieties.
So we’ve added four young saplings…the beginnings of our own little orchard. Each tree is a different variety, and most are heirloom- Northern Spy, Black Oxford, Liberty, and Hurlbut. We are learning as we go, with the help of resources such as MOFGA, family wisdom, and books. Judging by the nibbling that has occurred on the branch tips despite netting and caging, I think we probably need to focus more on exorcising the deer rather than appealing to tree spirits. However, since we are committed to a mostly organic and natural garden, and have essentially declared Briar and Bramble to be a wildlife refuge, we are left with the option of pouring cider on the roots of our trees by lantern light on a cold January night!
The Northern Spy on the porch before planting
Although there was a lot to occupy our attention on January 6th, we did manage to take a few minutes to turn to the past and continue the tradition of apple wassailing. We filled a bowl with cider and a slice of bread, topped our mugs with hard cider (a necessity for proper wassailing!), bundled into coats and boots, and tromped through the snow into the backyard to visit our old wild tree. I recited the wassail song and we toasted our trees and one another, wishing and hoping, like so many generations before us, for health, prosperity, and a bountiful crop in the year ahead.
Waes Hael!
One of many variations of the traditional apple wassailing songs from the 18th and 19th centuries, this particular song is from the Somerset region of England:
Apple tree, apple tree, we all come to wassail thee, Bear this year and next year to bloom and to blow, Hat fulls, cap fulls, three cornered sack fills, Hip, Hip, Hip, hurrah, Holler biys, holler hurrah.
As holiday break draws to a close, we received one last gift…snowfall. A quiet, contemplative snow…the type that makes the likes of Robert Frost pause in the wood to contemplate the passage of time and distance.
It’s the type of snow day unique and rare, especially in our modern times. One that you can pull around your shoulders, a blanket of white, and peek out from under…knowing that the day’s only request is that you look about the landscape it has created with a sense of wonder. There were no plans today…no need to be present in a particular place, but rather a chance to be present in this moment in time. No obligations to fulfill, no need to feel the frustration, disappointment, or fear that typically accompanies a snow day for the modern adult. No frantic thoughts of road conditions, grocery supplies, appointments postponed, or late arrivals. A rare chance to watch how delicately and slowly the flakes fall…capture the brief flashes of sunlight play on the tree branches…curl up next to a fire with a book…enjoy the holiday decorations before they are trundled away into boxes once again.
We decide to spend some time in the Parlor, my husband with a book, and I with a sleeping dog draped over my feet. It’s one of our favorite rooms in the house…it just feels old. We’ve encouraged that by making it our “antique” room, though it should really be called the “tag sale” room if we’re honest. It’s a mish-mash of chairs and trunks from neighboring attics, a collection of well worn and slightly mildewy books on Maine history and horses, a bouquet of dried flowers from our wedding, and prints on all the walls. Some of these are old (the hunt scene and landscape from a shop on Edinburgh’s Royal Mile), some slightly old (the Currier and Ives reprint of a racing yacht and the life sized fox scampering across the far wall), and the not-so-old reproductions of an elegant chap on horseback, and copy of the pre-Civil War map of own town. The room is still dressed for Christmas with greens on the mantle and a tree in the corner. The Parlor is the place that we come to when we want to escape our time.
It seems an especially fitting setting this afternoon as the snow filled day slides into a muffled dusk. It’s not lost on me how fortunate we are to be in Briar and Bramble in 2021 on a Saturday off from work. The inhabitants of 1823 likely also sat in this room on a snowy January afternoon, but without the warmth and comforts we are enjoying. It would have been brutally cold. The fireplace in this room, though beautiful, is also very small. We are not dependent on its heat, as our counterparts would have been. We have learned, however, how much work it is to heat an old home.
I’ve always been frugal on heating, as any of my friends will vocally and vociferously attest to. So is my husband. But even we were unpleasantly surprised last winter when the cold first settled in. That was the weekend we learned how to insulate. We wriggled into the back of one of the closets, through the cubby hole that revealed the attic space in the dormers. There was some insulation, but it was old and ratty. (Likely literally ratty, at some point.) We set to work, laying down what looked like layers of toxic cotton candy. My husband earned his handyman stripes that weekend. It helped, but it was still a long winter of wood stove feeding, blankets, and gallons of tea and coffee. This autumn, we called in the professionals…and I now understand the benefits of blown-in insulation.
I think often of what life was like here in 1823. The woodpile would be higher, the fire burning brighter and longer in the hearth, and woolen blankets thicker. I know that I am blessed to be able to just stop today and contemplate the beauty of the snow, safe in the knowledge that though the storm may continue outside, I will be in warmth and comfort inside. Though they would have had no place to go, our counterparts would have doubtlessly experienced anxiety and fear in the winter months. Many would be the miles (and chores) before they could sleep. Did they stop though, and look out over the frigid bay or at the wooded hill behind them, and feel the wonder of the white landscape? Did they share a sense of the delicate beauty of snow? I like to think so.
Welcome to Briar and Bramble! This is meant to be a journal, or diary, of my and my husband’s life in an 1823 farmhouse cottage on the coast of Maine. Although we had both lived in Maine for over a decade, in the summer of 2019 we purchased our first property of our own, and have slowly begun to transform a house and land into a beloved home. Won’t you pull a chair beside the wood stove, wrap your hands around a warm cup of tea, and join us?
Let me introduce our little family and this place we call home. This is the story of my husband, our little dog, and myself. My husband and I have arrived in this place at this point of middle age somewhat “late” and rather bewildered. My husband, and I, two working professionals, had spent our younger years lost in books and wandering the same historic sites and trails…just never at quite the same time. So while our friends had all established careers, found partners, purchased homes, and learned to repair toilets and spackle walls- we were still eating dinners in front of the TVs of our rentals, wondering whether third wheels are truly only appreciated on tricycles! Finally, in 2015, we stumbled into each other. We married in 2018, and began searching for a home in spring of 2019. My husband would have preferred to spend some time recovering from the constant whirlwind of wedding planning that I had subjected him to the year before, but I was eager to begin the ultimate project- creating a nest!
Even before Covid, winter in Maine was a long, quiet period of hibernation. Unless you ski or snowmobile…which we do not. We do something on cross country skis…Anyway, winter becomes spring in name only, with mud being the only differentiating characteristic. There wasn’t much going on that spring…I was mostly out of commission after injuring my arm falling off a horse. So it seemed like a good time to spend weekends driving around looking at real estate. Or at least I thought so. Besides, I assured my husband, we were just looking. So we could understand the process better. When we decided to become serious about it. In the future.
A few short weeks and multiple house showings later, we found ourselves bumping along a steep, winding, rutted drive to see a listing that had caught my husband’s eye. By now, we had almost accidentally enlisted the aid of a lovely (and incredibly patient) real estate agent and had become frequent fliers on realtor.com. I’ll be honest. I needed some convincing as we approached the door that first time. The driveway was straight out of a backwoods nightmare, the front “field” was a mess of newly felled trees piled onto each other like pick-up sticks, and the house itself- perched on the hillside- was drab and almost a little creepy. There was a bit of a yard, though that was a small island with waves of poison ivy and Virginia creeper lapping along its edges. However, as we stepped onto the long porch and turned around, we both stifled gasps. For without the thicket of previously standing trees, the house could gaze out over the sea. The Bay and rolling hills were spread out before us on the long line of the horizon. Our agent, who had not seen this listing before, came up behind us, stopped, and just said “Oh. Wow…”
The surprises didn’t end there. Although the house hadn’t been lived in for almost 10 years, the current owner had been slowly renovating while still maintaining the historical details. There was a newer addition that included a Great Room with a huge stone hearth and wood stove, as well as an expansive master bedroom above. This flowed into the old farmhouse cottage with its exposed beams, original mantelpiece and wainscoting, old latches and French doors, small cubby hole closets, slightly uneven floors, and plaster walls. And yet the kitchen and bathrooms were newly renovated and sparkling. There had to be something horribly wrong with this place, we thought. Was it structurally unsound?
Beautiful old homes in Maine are notorious for frightening basements. Many potential home buyers have a story of the Dream Home they fell for, only to have their hopes dashed when they descended into the cellar to find that the foundation is a pile of crumbling stone and earth, and the house is precariously perched on a wobbly network of jacks. So it was not without trepidation that we opened the basement door. What we found, however, was a combination of modern concrete and the original, massive brick arch. This was a house that had been cared for over the years and had (thus far) withstood the test of time.
We finished the tour and got back into the car where we sat in stunned silence. Our budget was fairly modest. Never in our wildest dreams (or even my most ambitious wish list) did we think that something like this would be within our reach. Like a polished piece of sea glass, easily overlooked, but shining and beautiful when seen in the light, we had found something precious along this shore.
That was a little over a year ago. Since then, we have started to make this our home. This is where we are meant to stay. Our plans and small changes are always with an eye to the future- How will this garden grow over the next five years? Will the apple tree saplings block the view in ten years? Will those roof beams last another fifty years? We have been learning all about home care and repair (thanks in large part to my Father), and laugh that we are coming at this about twenty years later than most couples. But we couldn’t be happier.
And so, Reader, though we do everything on a budget, and do not profess in any way to be interior designers, professional landscapers, or experts in historic preservation, everything that we do on the house, we do with love- and I hope that shows. The purpose of this blog, then, is not to tell you how to decorate your own home, or grow your garden. It’s certainly not to show off our skills in home repair, crafting, cooking, or life in general. We are fumbling at best in most of these things! No, the purpose is more just to share the things that make us happy about this place that we have come to love. If you happen to see a plant that you’d like to add to your garden, or realize how easy it is to refinish a porch rocker and decide to do it yourself, or even just see a picture here that makes you smile…well, then the blog has been a success!
Finally, before I open the door and invite you in- a note on the name of the house. We had a few reasons to choose the name Briar and Bramble, but most significantly, it refers to a song from one of our favorite programs-
“Will you search through the lonely earth for me? Climb through the briar and bramble? I will be your treasure…” (lyrics by Johnny Flynn)
A Briar and Bramble Journal 