How Outside & In started

Around 18 months ago I hadn't heard from my mother for a few days. She normally rang me daily to ask about this and that, but as I hadn't heard from her I rang her and got the answerphone. So I tried the next day, and the next, and eventually asked one of her neighbours who had a key for this eventuality, to go round and check whether she was all right. She found Mum on the floor, pinned down by a sideboard. Her friend called the ambulance first, then me, and I rushed to Margate hospital, and haven't been back to work since.
To cut a very long story short, my mother was in hospital for 2 months, during which time she became more confused and less mobile. At the end of that time she was assessed as not having 'capacity', that she needed 24-hour care, and that a residential home was the only option, as I wouldn't be able to care for her myself.
Although I didn't feel that I really had any choice, signing that consent form was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. I didn't want to be someone who put their 85-year old mother in a care home?
Anyway, all's well that ends well (please see picture below). I found her a lovely home that when I first visited it with my aunt and uncle we thought we had mistaken it for a hotel. The staff are lovely and Mum is very happy with her reclining chair, view of the garden and large TV whose sound beams directly to her hearing aids so she doesn't deafen the rest of the residents.
I go and visit her 2-3 times a week depending on family commitments (we have two teenagers) and it was on one of those visits that she mentioned that she really missed gardening and growing things. So I thought about bringing the garden into her room, and started researching 'grow-your-own' kits that she could start herself and look after on her mantelpiece. But the problem I found was that the kits were either designed for eventually transplanting to an outside garden, or they came in plastic pots with plastic markers that I thought looked a bit cheap..
So I made a herb kit up with metal pots and metal markers that I found on the Internet, and presented it to my mother for her birthday. Needless to say she loved it and points out the progress to me each time I visit.
I thought that was the end of it, until the care workers at the home saw it and asked if they could have another one for the communal sitting room so the other residents could also have their own herb garden. I obviously obliged, then got requests from some of the staff and residents for their own kit, and it was at that point that we thought this could be 'a thing'. Given that my income had gone from reasonable to zero in one phone-call, I had nothing to lose. And that's how the brand started.