It must be spring soon?

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Buds are bursting on the bushes, leaves are slowly unfurling. Each tiny leaflet a herald of coming spring. A few crocuses and snowdrops are out. Rode Halls snowdrop walk, which is an annual event round here, is advertised on Facebook. Life moves on. The water from the storms is soaking the ground, and where there are trees and gardens the water is sucked up to swell the buds. Where there is concrete and bricks it washes down and floods out from the rivers.

The weather is on a knife edge, will it get to hot again this summer? Will we have floods or drought? Will warmth spread through the land gently or will we have fires on heaths and moors and in woods and forests. Our climate is in balance no more. It is up to us to do something to help it fall back into that balance of nature that is gentlest for the world. If we try hard I hope we can.?

Memories

August at Rudyard lake, DSC_2199_optimized

Heat, sunlight, memories of warmth. Memories of the lake and the little narrow gauge (miniature?) railway that runs along side it. I think it’s 18 inch gauge.

The lake surface was very smooth apart from ripples caused by a few rowing boats. We had sandwiches and ice creams at the cafe and caught the train there and back to see how far it was (one of my Dad’s phrases).

I miss the sunlight and the warmth. It’s only two months ago and it’s literally freezing outside tonight. We had frost this morning…. Let me go back into my memories, time travel, back, to summer.

Sitting in a park

‘what is life, if full of care, we have no time to stop and stare’

W. H. Davies

Today has been lovely, we went out to see an exhibition and decided to stop and have an ice cream in the park. The sun was shining and it was just nicely warm, there was a sensory garden with large leaved plants and seed heads, the sky was dotted with fair weather clouds and the Rowan trees were full of berries. Dogs were barking off in the distance. The world was just right. I closed my eyes and suddenly I felt like I had been transported to my childhood. It was the 1960’s again before I knew about politics and anger, before I has heard of wars and revenge. I relaxed! Like a sunny Sunday afternoon in the park I played in as a child. No thought of what I have to do next. No time constraints. No I’ve got to be somewhere now. Wonderful.

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Free seeds

_20190904_163250 packets of seeds….. Free!

What a lovely surprise, a gardening magazine we sometimes get had seven free packets of seeds with it today. Most of them are worth about £3 each so that means about £20 worth of free flowers.

The other good thing is they can be planted now in late summer or early autumn to establish plants for next years display. All I have to do is dig out a load of nettles so I can plant these out!

The garden is very overgrown so I’m getting someone in to help cut it back a bit. I love it but it’s hard work having big trees and shrubs. A warning, you need to keep on top of stuff to keep it looking good. Anyway I’m hoping by tomorrow I will be feeling a bit better and can do something.

Rocks and sand

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This is a painting on my sisters wall which I did a few years ago. I’ve put it up because I want to go back. But I don’t think I will this year as the summer is rapidly running out. Maybe I can sneak off for a few days but I’ve got lots of things coming up. Is October too late for a summer holiday? We will have to wait and see what the weather is like. I don’t want to be freezing in a caravan in a storm!

The place? Bovisand Bay, in Devon. Acrylic on canvas.

Flower portraits

Just a few pictures of flowers from the garden today. This way you don’t see all the trees and shrubs that get in the way of them.

They are, red calla lily, osteospermum, lily, pink hydrangea, rose, pink convolvulus, buddlea, pelargonium, monybretia in bud, monybretia in flower (not sure of spelling), blue hydrangea, geranium.

I’m doing a few flower paintings and these could be subjects. I hope you like them.

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