Grow some, take some - Todmorden Incredible Edibles

Ms Tagalong, her friend Darling Loggins (from The World from my Window fame) and her Yorkshire resident daughter Ms Would You Rather, threaded their way up the long narrow valleys into Todmorden.

Ms Tagalong could hardly contain herself. After having seen this TED inspirationalvideo via a newsletter from Changing Habits, Changing Lives recently, the chance to see Todmorden and its incredible edibles in all its verdant glory was opportune.

Outside the police station! 

' I thought this was a village,' Ms Tagalong commented as they drove down the grey, rain-slicked road into the town of 14,941 inhabitants. She looked around craning her neck to spot some incredible edibles in the winter weather.

'Better park here,' she said as they pulled up outside the police station, 'ooh, look, beds and veg – it's a fair cob, I mean cop, says this sign!'

So she sprang out of the car, camera at the ready. Ms Would You Rather loaded up the green route on her mobile and off they went.

La Neige Blanche in the window

Admittedly there was a detour. La Neige Blanche, garishly painted, sitting in pride of place in a window display of every possible piece of themed china produced, pulled the trio into the shop where they met Margaret of the chinashop's husband.

'This is a true story,' he kept saying as he regaled them with tales of royalty and near royalty purchasing his wares and of his wife (Margaret) lurking behind a a bin on the offchance that Prince Charles, who he said had visited the Incredible Edible town three weeks earlier, might wander on down from the market to say hello.

Herb picking at the station

'It's a true story,' he repeated taking off his glasses so he couldn't look them in the eye!

Back on track the trio spotted vegetables, vegetables everywhere, to pick and to share. Onions outside the adult education college, herbs outside the train station, beans in the churchyard and an apothecary's garden by the canal.

Grow it, map it and share it!

It's great to have some feedback, so please leave me some comments.

Scarecrows are Us

Especially for those of you who have been enjoying the posts on country life in Dorset I have managed to persuade the lovely Maddie Grigg from The World from my Window to guest blog and this is what she wrote:

Behold the humble scarecrow.

In The Enchanted Village, various weird and wonderful figures come out once a year to compete in our annual scarecrow competition.

We’ve had monks and kings, cartoon characters, clowns and corgis. We’ve had cowboys and Indians, Cavaliers and Roundheads. We’ve had all sorts.

And occasionally, some stay in situ, scaring off the birds and becoming a permanent fixture until they rot away into oblivion. This one was on our allotments for some time.

Our scarecrow competition is a relatively new fixture on the village calendar. However, the keeper of our village history, the late Leonard Studley, who was born in 1909, tells us in his book, My Story, (ISBN 0 9514849 0 7) it’s nothing new:

As soon as the corn was sown in spring (or autumn) my father would construct a ‘mommett’ to keep the rooks off. Mother would have to supply a hat, preferably a straw one, ladies or gents didn’t matter, an old jacket, and if it was to be a posh ‘mommett’ a shirt, and a linen flour bag which would be stuffed with hay or straw to form a head.

The eyes, nose and mouth would be put in using the wet cork of the ink jar. He would then cut two sticks about 6ft long, one would have to be sharpened at the bottom end to enable it to be driven into the ground, the other would be tied across it to form the arms, and the clothes would be draped over the form.

Sometimes his nakedness would be hidden under a pair of trousers, sometimes not.

Leonard Studley says in the ‘earlier days’, boys were employed to scare off the birds and were known as bird starvers. This is the bird-scarers’ song his grandmother told him:

Heigh Ho Old Jack and Jennie Crow,
Let’s lie down and have a rest.
‘Spose my master was to come,
Thee must fly and I must run.

Sow four grains in a row,
One fer the rook, one fer the crow,
One fer to rot and one fer to grow.

It’s lucky for our children the practice has fallen into disuse. Or, if you’re inundated with birds on your patch of ground, maybe it’s something worth reviving…

That’s about it

Love Maddie x