The seedling Lubna gave me that grew into a hollyhock
The last time I saw Lubna we didn't realise we would never meet again.
It was the April 2023 Draw Derby gathering and she attended with her lovely niece Kinza. Lubna had been unwell for a few months and faced two lots of major surgery, so we meet with tears in our eyes that day. My dear friend worried about my eating habits and after the session treated me to a snack at Derby Museum & Art Gallery and gave me a bag of seedlings: hollyhock, ox-eye daisy, tomato and chilli.
On the 11th July I found out the dreadful news that Lubna died in the early hours of the 4th of July. I missed her (and miss her) so much but there was a small comfort in having her plants growing near me.
Last summer I saved seeds from this hollyhock, it grew way above my head and bloomed for months: yellow and one stem of purple!
Soon I'll be offering these Lubna Seeds to anyone who would like to plant and tend them and hope to spread them far and wide. I'd love to gather images of them flourishing and their locations to plot a map, a sphere of influence of Lubna's kindness.
I'll be sharing seed packets on Instagram soon!
