Samantha Dolling - Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow

Samantha Dolling - Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow Medical Herbalist • Folklorist • Walking the Priestess Way

Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow Monthly Mail Subscription.

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https://gardenhearthandhedgerow.com Hello, I am Sam, a Medical Herbalist, Folklorist and a lifelong student of the old ways who is walking the Priestess Way. Through Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow I share plant and traditional folklore, herbal and plant wisdom, old practices, seasonal and slow living, garden inspiration and gentle rituals to help people reconnect with themselves and the n

atural world - one season, one story and one plant at a time. 🌳

Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow is my monthly mail subscription, created to bring the beauty, wisdom and ancient ways of the seasons into your home. Each month you will receive a thoughtfully curated collection of plant and traditional folklore, seasonal inspiration, recipes from the hearth, kitchen and medicine cabinet together with beautiful botanical artwork and gentle rituals alongside a beautiful minizine and seasonal goodies - all lovingly designed to help you slow down, reconnect with yourself, with nature and celebrate the turning of the year in simple, meaningful ways. Subscriptions are open should you wish to have a beautiful envelope of seasonal magic through your letterbox each month. I would love to have you join our beautiful community. 🌿📬

06/09/2026

Well… I finally said the word witchy. 🖤🌿

And actually, it feels rather good.

Because Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow has always been about plants, folklore, the old ways, seasonal living - and yes, a little bit of witchery too.

October’s mail is centred around Blackthorn: the fierce old hedgerow guardian of boundaries, protection and transformation.

But before anything reaches your letterbox, I work with the plant herself.

I spend time with her growing in the landscape. I journey and meditate with her. I research her folklore, history and traditional uses. And when I gather sloes, leaves or thorns to bring home and study, I leave an offering in return.

Then all of that begins finding its way onto my desk - alongside piles of cardstock, envelope samples, old books and probably several cups of tea - as I create October’s mail. 🖤

October enrolment is OPEN NOW, and I have 50 places available.

Last month’s founding members have sent me some absolutely gorgeous feedback, which I’ll be sharing over the next few days.

If plant folklore, witchy old ways and living alongside the turning seasons sounds like your sort of thing…

Comment BLACKTHORN below and I’ll DM you the details. 🌿💌

03/09/2026

Ancient folklore calls Blackthorn the guardian of the dark months. It thrives when everything else fades, holding a fierce, protective energy that helps us transition into winter.

But there is so much more to this ancient tree than meets the eye.

Inside my mail subscription this month, we are diving deep into the hidden medicine, the raw energy, and the ancient folklore of Blackthorn - bringing its magic straight to your fingertips.

🍂 October’s Mail is officially open now!

If you want to revive your spirit at the beginning of the month and carry that grounded, magical energy as you walk through October, secure your spot today. Link in bio to subscribe.

02/09/2026

Bird’s-foot Trefoil might be one of our prettiest little meadow flowers, but over the centuries it has collected an absolutely extraordinary number of local names.

Depending on where you lived, you might have known it as Eggs-and-Bacon, Butter-and-Eggs, Hen-and-Chickens, Tom Thumb, Lady’s Slipper, Devil’s Claws or, in parts of Devon, Granny’s Toenails.

And the names weren’t plucked from thin air.

As the yellow flowers age, they can take on orange and reddish tones, giving us names such as Eggs-and-Bacon. Later come the long, narrow seed pods, clustered together rather like a bird’s foot or a set of claws, hence Bird’s-foot Trefoil, Devil’s Claws and those rather unfortunate granny toenails. 😂

But one of my favourite pieces of folklore comes from southern Ireland.

Children called the flower “No Blame” and would collect it and take it to school in the belief that carrying it would protect them from the teacher’s cane.

A tiny yellow wildflower carried in a pocket against the terrifying prospect of getting into trouble at school. 🌼

And as if this little plant didn’t already have enough personality, in the Victorian language of flowers Bird’s-foot Trefoil was associated with something rather less innocent…

Revenge.

From Granny’s Toenails to schoolchildren’s charms and revenge.

Not bad for a little yellow flower growing quietly in the grass.

Did you have a name for Bird’s-foot Trefoil where you grew up? 🌿

01/09/2026

The envelopes are here. Don’t you just LOVE that colour!

The Cricut has landed. All sorts of makes are finding their way through here!

…And suddenly October’s Blackthorn edition doesn’t just exist in my head anymore…

This is the bit I love - watching a new month slowly become something I can actually hold.

Blackthorn is going to be beautiful. 🖤🌿

And if you’d like one of those blue envelopes to arrive through your letterbox, you’ve got just over three weeks to join us for October’s Blackthorn edition.

🌿 Join Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow here:

http://gardenhearthandhedgerow.com

01/09/2026

The trees are about to give us a masterclass in letting go. 🪵✨

Today is September 1st, a threshold towards autumn’s energy.

Right now, the trees aren’t panicking about losing their leaves. They don’t hold onto dead weight out of fear of the winter. They trust the cycle.
They know that shedding is the only way to protect their core and make room for next spring’s rebirth.

🌱 A Simple Ritual for Today:

1. Step outside and pick up the very first fallen leaf you see.�
2. Hold it in your hands. Breathe in the fresh September air.�
3. Identify one heavy emotion, outdated belief, or old story you are carrying.�
4. Whisper it into the leaf, thank it for the lesson, and drop it back to the earth.�
Let the soil compost your past. You do not need to carry summer’s weight into autumn’s peace.

Tell me in the comments: What are you leaving on the forest floor today? 👇

31/08/2026

Look beneath a rowan berry and you’ll find something rather magical - a tiny five-pointed star.

And this little red tree has been wrapped in magic and folklore for centuries.

Rowan was once known by names including Witchwood and Witch Wiggin, while the old Irish name fid na ndruad has been translated as “the wizard’s tree.”

Across Britain and Ireland, rowan became one of our great protective trees. Sprigs were hung above doors and stables, and rowan was carried and fashioned into charms in the belief that it could protect against harmful enchantment and unwanted spirits.

In Scotland, the tree was regarded with such reverence that in some places there was a strong taboo against cutting one down.

Even those brilliant red berries played their part. Red was itself considered a protective colour in older folk belief - and at the bottom of each berry sits that curious little five-pointed mark, later associated in folklore with the protective pentagram.

Rowan even appears in surviving records from the Scottish witch trials, where its use in charms and healing became part of the evidence recorded against accused women - a sobering glimpse of how ordinary folk practices could become entangled with accusations of witchcraft.

And now, right on the edge of September, the rowans are glowing red.

Tomorrow we enter the first of the “-ber” months - and I can’t think of a better tree to lead us in. 🍂🌿

Go and find a rowan berry.

Did you know there was a tiny star hiding underneath it? ⭐️

30/08/2026

By late summer, the moors begin to glow purple with heather.

There is something wonderfully liminal about this plant. Heather belongs to open heath and moorland - those wide, windswept places beyond the garden gate and cultivated field - and such landscapes have long gathered stories of fairies, spirits and the Otherworld.

Heather also grows amongst some of Britain’s ancient sacred landscapes. At Callanish on the Isle of Lewis, heather grows across the peatland around the standing stones, while Stanton Moor in Derbyshire is a landscape of heather moorland scattered with Bronze Age stone circles, cairns and burial monuments. There is something rather beautiful about a plant that still flowers amongst places where people gathered, remembered and performed ritual thousands of years ago.

Perhaps that is why heather feels so right at the turning of the season.

As August draws to its end, we are standing at a threshold too: summer has not quite left us, but autumn can already be felt in the cooler evenings, ripening berries and shortening days.

And out on the moor, the heather is blooming.

A purple marker that the wheel is beginning to turn. 🌿💜

30/08/2026

After just one morning in bloom, this flower will close. Many people might look at the wilted flower and think its work is done. But in plant alchemy, this is where the real transmutation begins.

The flower has accepted its sacrifice, closing its petals to seal the sun’s energy inside, starting the slow, dark transformation into a golden autumn pumpkin.

And perhaps there is something here for us, too. As we begin our own descent into the darker half of the year, we are invited to turn inward. Not all growth happens in the light. Some of our deepest transformation takes place quietly, unseen, in the dark - just as the pumpkin begins to form once the flower has closed.

29/08/2026

Blackberry gives generously - fruit, food, shelter - but she doesn’t give without boundaries.

Her thorns make you slow down. They ask you to approach carefully. Bramble has even been used historically as a physical boundary and barrier.

So perhaps blackberry is a plant to work with when you give too much of yourself. When you struggle to say no. When people take more than you’re comfortable giving. When you’ve become so used to being the healer, helper or strong one that you’ve forgotten you’re allowed to protect yourself too.

Next time you gather blackberries, make it a small ritual of intention.

As you take the fruit, notice the thorns.

Ask yourself: Where do I need a stronger boundary? What am I allowed to say no to? What part of me needs protecting as much as it needs nurturing?

Then eat the berry with that intention.

Ritual doesn’t always need candles, tools or elaborate words. Intention is an important part of ritual. Sometimes it can simply be a conscious moment between you and a plant - noticing what it embodies, what it stirs in you, and choosing what you want to carry forward.

Blackberry reminds us that sweetness and boundaries can exist on the same plant. 🌿🖤

29/08/2026

It feels so strange to be talking about October at the end of August but that’s the game when doing monthly mail clubs. We are always a month ahead!

For October, we’re stepping out to the hedgerows to meet Blackthorn - Prunus spinosa.

Dark branches. Fierce thorns. Deep purple sloes. A tree woven through centuries of British and Irish folklore, old customs and seasonal tradition.

Blackthorn feels made for October.

As the hedgerows darken and the year begins to turn inward, she’ll be at the heart of October’s Garden, Hearth & Hedgerow mail - explored through her folklore, botanical story and place within the old seasonal landscape.

And, of course, there’ll be far more tucked inside the envelope alongside her… 🍂

October’s plant has been chosen.
Welcome to the Blackthorn month. 🖤🌿

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