***WHEN THE WIND BLOWS*** (Wind Chimes)

Member Name: katestuartuk

Product:	Wind Chimes
Date:	12/10/06 (247 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: WONDERFUL SOUNDS, VERY RESTFUL AND HARMONIOUS, CHEAP

Disadvantages: NONE. JUST THAT YOU MIGHT NOT HAVE ENOUGH ROOM FOR THEM ALL....

Welcome to a World of Wind Chimes

Well, maybe not a world, though my garden is certainly a mini eco-system in itself, and when I’m sitting out there, with the trees and the sunlight and the smell of earth and damp leaves and late blooming sweet peas, it feels as though I am in a different world. A calm, peaceful, serene world full of colour and light and sound.

Sound? Well yes, in the birds and the noise of the breeze through the birch leaves, and in the tinkling song of the wind chimes, from high braches around me.

It’s October now, soon Halloween will be upon us and then we’ll speed, frost-footed towards Christmas time, and a brand new year. The nights are closing in around us, and the days are getting shorter, and everything in the garden is doing exactly what it is meant to. With the falling leaves and the turning colours as evidence, should I have needed it, that winter is well and truly on her way, I decided today that a wee tidy up of my garden was in order, and that for safety’s sake, I should pack up my wind chimes for the wintertime to save them from getting broken.

Looking round the garden, I can’t quite believe I have so many, and so I shall tell you all about them here, before I put them away, so that you can be inspired perhaps to fill your home or garden or both with the peaceful and gentle sounds they make.

On my old twisty honeysuckle, I have a crystal wind chime. It is very small and makes a high pitched tinkling sound, exactly like fairy bells. The crystal is round, and catches the light, turning rainbows out to dart over the leaves of Calendula, Birds Foot Trefoil, and Phlox.

Up above, hanging from the timbers of the pergola which the honeysuckle has enveloped, is a set of 6 little rain bells, which move gently in the breeze and sound wonderful in a shower of rain. They are bronze, and camouflaged against the wood so that you are more likely to hear them as you pass beneath than see them!

If you follow the wooded, curving path past fairies, sitting secretly in mosaic plant pots of Lavender and Sage, past wigwam canes curled round with sweet peas and jasmine, and around moss covered brick edging, home to more than one resident frog, you will come to a circle of grass, and beyond, a Buddleia tree. The flowers have faded now, and the butterflies have long gone, but though the leaves are beginning to fall, it is still adorned with lanterns, bird hideaways, wind chimes, and even an old, stained glass lampshade that the Blackbirds see to be fond of sitting in. Maybe next year they will choose this rather unusual, though decidedly beautiful metal and glass creation to build their nest in!

My favourite wind chime here is my most recent purchase. Bought at a local garden centre for a tenner, this is a beautiful ceramic set of chimes which not only looks wonderful, but sounds amazing too. It’s a gentle sound, but far reaching. Often, when I’m in bed, if I have the windows open at night I can hear it making music at the bottom of the garden as I drift off to sleep. It has long, flat chimes that hang down in a circle, and each chime has an engraving on it like “Always be Happy”, “May you be Healthy”, “Seek Wisdom”, that sort of thing. I think it’s a wonderful wind chime to meditate by and it’s definitely my favourite.
On another branch, lower down, I have a metal and stained glass dragonfly, which is also a wind chime. I saw my first real dragonfly this summer, so this is quite a special little fellow – until this summer he hung off my television aerial, so I think he has enjoyed a bit of fresh air about his gossamer wings! He has four long, thin silver coloured chimes hanging down from his silver dragony body and they tinkle very gently in the breeze.

Higher up, just in front of a winter jasmine covered fence, and below a chorus of tangled white rambling rose and clematis fronds, is a bamboo wind chime I bought in Edinburgh’s Botanical Garden about 3 years ago. It used to be round, with a little woven hat on top, but fell apart last winter. So I repaired it, strung the bamboo tubes up with thick thread onto a stout stick (a bit of apple tree pruning!), and re-hung it. The bamboo tubes are all in a row now, and somehow I think it sounds better for it!

Beneath the thick, twisted stump of my clematis, which to be honest is surely better described as more of a tree than a plant or a shrub, I have a metal wind chime that is painted all the colours of the rainbow and has a loud, frivolous sound, which is just as well, as it is hidden away beneath ivy and great heavy clouds of clematis vines, and would go un-noticed save for its cheerful sound.

High up in the apple tree, which until last week was laden with fruit, is a small white ceramic wind chime, circular like the moon, with long metal chimes making a light, tinnie song below. It is small, but had made, and has weathered many an autumn gale and unsuspected spring frost. Sometimes the sparrows will sit next to it and chatter away, pecking it occasionally to get a reply back!

I sit here, looking at them, listening to their music, and I think that my garden will feel empty, quiet, without them. Even though I want to keep them safe for another year of pleasurable, soothing sounds, I am half inclined to leave them where they are, so that on crisp, frost January mornings, when the sky is dull and heavy and full of snow, and the ground is bare and hard and there’s not a speck of colour to be had in the twisted branches and frozen borders, that there will still be that faint remembrance of summer, the sweet sounds of peacefulness, tranquillity, garden song to lift my spirits high above the steam from my morning coffee and make me smile. I wonder, what, do you think, should I do….?


Wind chimes are used in lots of religions including Chinese Philosophy of Fung Shui, as they keep the air flowing, and turn negative energy into positive. I have a set of red Chinese wind chimes, bells and ordinary wind chimes all over my house, on doors, hanging from hooks in the ceiling, and from the sides of cupboards and doorframes. I find them restful, and helpful in keeping a space calm and chilled out. Some people may find the louder ones very annoying, but I like them all, any shape, any size, any sound!

Wind chimes differ greatly in cost from one place to another, and you can pay anything from £1.00 all the way to hundreds of pounds depending on how perfectly pitched you want the sound to be. My best advice if you are looking to buy a wind chime, is to shop around, and always, always get it out of the box to listen to it before you buy it! I know this isn’t always possible if you shop online, but it’s my top tip!
Thank you very much for reading, and I hope you enjoyed my little autumn afternoon jaunt in the garden! Kate x

Summary: A LOVELY WAY TO BRING A SENSE OF PEACE TO YOUR HOME OR GARDEN