Bloom 2011

We are on the countdown for Bloom in the Park ,Ireland's biggest garden show which takes place over 5 days of the June Bank holiday week end from thurs 2nd to mon 6th June.
I have been to the previous 2 with my sister Kathleen who is also an avid gardener,she is the flower child while I am the veggie.Its a great day out for all the family especially as children under 16 go free and there is a dedicated children's Zone to keep them occupied for hours!
Its not just about flowers and veggies, it encompasses all to do with them from growing to cooking and all things in between.
The Bord Bia Food village is new this year ,previously there was a food market and a marquee for cookery demos, these are now all centralised in to a village for easy access.
There will be cookery demos each day by celebrity chefs, we need to get the timetables and plan our itinerary.
The artisan food market is second to none and we can graze our way through it!


Kathleen admiring one of the show gardens last year.
There are 27 Show gardens large and small and there has been a competition on TV for the past few months where garden designers vied for the honour of designing the Super garden, they will be on hand to answer questions.
The show gardens are all fabulous and there are always some ideas to take home and apply to a smaller garden.
There is also a craft Garden this year where demos and workshops will take place, all types of ceramics etc will be on display.
The walled garden which is being renovated by the OPW is always worth a visit to see what has changed/improved since last year.I got the idea to cover our carrots last year with enviromesh from there.
Bord Bia who organize the event have the recession in mind and there are various ways of cutting the cost of tickets by buying online and also I see in the Post office if you pay 2 bills through their Billpay you can buy 2 tickets for the price of one.
Woodies, one of our biggest Home & Garden stores has the Garden Expert stage as usual where expert gardeners will be on hand to answer any garden related queries.
We will be travelling up by train as we have done previously and there is a free shuttle bus all day to and from the station to the Phoenix Park where the show is held.
Youtube have lots of videos etc and the Bord Bia website has all the news for this year here
There is also a competition on the website via Facebook with a prize of a 500e voucher to spend at Woodies!

We have had an exciting week as the Queen visited us, which lifted us out of our sense of depression and recession!
HRH asked especially to visit the English market in Cork and the place was on Fete for the occasion,on leaving the market HRH took everyone by surprise and went on a walk about to meet school children who had been picked to line the Grand Parade, our Gemma among them!
Grandson Ben received his First Holy Communion this morning on a wet and windy day,he remarked the Queen got all the nice days and left us with the rain!
Barack Obama is visiting the country next week and I have to fit in some gardening in the midst of all this celebrity watching!