September began with an enjoyable morning’s work at the Burial Ground, and the gardening group preparing for the Open Day. Ben and his assistants also cleared the wildflower areas, ensuring that the garden looked neat and tidy. Despite the lack of rain in recent months, the garden is still full of flowering plants, with the caryopteris shrubs now covered in blue flowers and attracting the bees. The verbena, wall flowers and Japanese anemones continue to provide a wonderful display.

The highlight of the month was the Heritage Open Day on 10th September, and we are grateful to Susan for all her hard work in making this a success.  We were blessed with warm sunshine, and were delighted to welcome 49 visitors throughout the day. For many people this was the first time they had seen the garden, and they all enjoyed the beauty and peace of the space. We had left slips of paper with typed quotations from Advices and Queries around the garden for people to read to encourage a more reflective approach to visiting the garden. This also resulted in many interesting conversations about Quakers and provided an opportunity for outreach. We sold many pots of Burial Ground cuttings and other plants donated by Friends.

On Wednesday 5^th October a small group from Grow for Life helped Susan tidy the borders and take out some of the ox-eyed daisies that are starting to dominate the wildflower patch. We donated the spare daisies to our neighbours at Widcombe Crescent to plant in their community garden. The Grow for Life group were led by Neil, a professional gardener who has worked at Sissinghurst gardens in Kent.  He and the volunteers so enjoyed the peace of the Burial Ground that they have offered to come back on a more regular basis next year and develop our wildflower patch.