Balls to topiary! – Cheryl Gibbs

Yet if you look at our gardens, you wouldn’t think that. We’ve gone from having a wilderness in terms of it being totally self-sufficient trees and plants growing at ridiculous rates, to pretty much nothing.

We’ve stripped it all back and when people come round they don’t quite get it, but we’re just not that way inclined – and Matt definitely isn’t. 

Perhaps it’s because he’s a townie at heart – he grew up in Buckland and Hilsea – and while he absolutely loves living here, he hates gardening with a passion.

We tried for a good two years to keep on top of it, but after a while pulling up weeds growing in between your garden tiles becomes tiresome.

In short, we can’t be bothered. 

So we’ve opted to redesign it and we hope it will be a straightforward basic garden, with a few green plants and trees dotted throughout to add a bit of texture to it. Well, that’s the plan.

Or at least it was until I bought 15 topiary balls that I thought would look lovely along the edge of our raised garden and the wall, to kind of break up the space.

They cost £10 each so it was quite an expensive investment. I bought them because they looked easy enough to plant and they’re just plain green…lovely.

That was until my mum pointed out that in order to keep their shape I’ll have to be out there quite frequently pruning the darn things to make sure they stay in a ball and not grow out to form one giant hedge.

Honestly, people like me should have to have a permit before they go ahead and buy things for a garden because I had no idea.

Naively I thought perhaps the balls would just grow into bigger balls. So now I’ll be spending my time in what was supposed to be a fuss-free garden with a pair of scissors (sorry, secateurs) pruning 15 of the blooming things. 

It would have been cheaper if they’d just stayed married…

It’s rare for a couple to split up and remain friends. It’s even rarer when those two people are huge A-list celebs who went through a very painful public breakup.

But that’s exactly what happened in the case of Hollywood movie stars Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston.

They divorced in 2005 and Brad moved on swiftly with Angelina Jolie. Anyway, the pair have both split with their subsequent spouses and, apparently, to mark Jen’s 50th birthday Brad gifted her their old marital home which Jen was devastated to lose in their divorce.

Rumours are he bought it back from the people he’d sold it to, for a cool £42m.

I mean, seriously? The phrase ‘more money than sense’ springs to mind…

‘Goin’ to the chapel of Elvis and we’re gonna get married’

Another Jonas brother has got married and this one was in stark contrast to the last. 

Joe Jonas has tied the knot with Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner in a $600 wedding in Las Vegas presided over by an Elvis impersonator. And the rings were made of candy – I blimmin’ love it!

The couple started dating in 2016 and got engaged in 2017. Joe is 29 but Sophie’s only 23. People assumed because of her young age it wouldn’t last.

But I thought their quickie wedding was brilliant and the complete opposite to Joe’s brother Nick’s glitzy wedding to Priyanka Chopra that lasted four days.

Not a traditional Hollywood wedding, that’s why I love it.