Autumn is here, it is being heralded in by the sudden appearance of the fruiting bodies of the complex hidden networks of fungi that work secretly underground the rest of the year. They have suddenly appeared in all their glory. 

My two favourite types of fungi are the mythical magical toadstools and the rarer earth stars. 

This week I came across some adorable red and white toadstools. I was so delighted in them I decided to ‘make my own’ to decorate my flat and bring a little bit of autumn indoors. I also collected conkers from my garden to put at my window to protect me from spiders, although I think this may be a myth, I still do it every year, just in case there is some truth to it.

The toadstool garland was very simple to make. All I had to do was eat a few clementines and keep the skins, paint the skins red and white. Collect sticks from the garden, cut to required sizes. Use eye hooks to attach the skins to the sticks, then tie the toadstools to twine and hang up the garland.

The Toadstool

There’s a thing that grows by the fainting flower,
And springs in the shade of the lady’s bower;
The lily shrinks, and the rose turns pale,
When they feel its breath in the summer gale,
And the tulip curls its leaves in pride,
And the blue-eyed violet starts aside;
But the lily may flaunt, and the tulip stare,
For what does the honest toadstool care?
She does not glow in a painted vest,
And she never blooms on the maiden’s breast;
But she comes, as the saintly sisters do,
In a modest suit of a Quaker hue.
And, when the stars in the evening skies
Are weeping dew from their gentle eyes,
The toad comes out from his hermit cell,
The tale of his faithful love to tell.

Oh, there is light in her lover’s glance,
That flies to her heart like a silver lance;
His breeches are made of spotted skin,
His jacket ‘is tight, and his pumps are thin;
In a cloudless night you may hear his song,
As its pensive melody floats along,
And, if you will look by the moonlight fair,
The trembling form of the toad is there.

And he twines his arms round her slender stem,
In the shade of her velvet diadem;
But she turns away in her maiden shame,
And will not breathe on the kindling flame;
He sings at her feet through the live-long night,
And creeps to his cave at the break of light;
And whenever he comes to the air above,
His throat is swelling with baffled love

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes