Autumn leaves

Posted on October 26, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Atmosphere, Autumn, Harvest, Life, Poem, Poetry, Rhyme, Summer, verses, Weather2 Comments

Autumn leaves leave the trees, wind blows and bowls them along the gutters. They flutter madly, sadly the end of summer edges away.

Sunshine strikes through low, dark grey clouds. Holds my eye as light streams by. Sky shimmers blue, high domed hue. Birds are leaving, wings weaving across the air.

Full of delicious fruit, trees reveal their loot of apples, pears, and sweet chestnuts fair. Mists and frosts, with mushrooms and toadstools found in field and woods.

Nature’s good, it gives and takes. It feeds at harvest time, crops gathered in, the end of summer win. And all the time, those leaves spin.

Shoes

Posted on October 13, 2022 Posted in Sketching, UncategorizedTagged Art, Autumn, Drawing, flat heels, Life, Memories, Sandals, Shoes, Sketching, Summer2 Comments

Summers over and my sandals must be put away for another year. I will have to get my flat heels out again. I don’t bother to buy pairs of shoes. I bought three sorts of the same type in different colours, and never wore them! It’s strange, some women have tens or hundreds of pairs, and different ones for different occasions, I never got into that. I think it’s because I’ve never had much money. When we had a death in our family when I was a teenager, my mother gave us money to buy a dress and cardigan and shoes to wear to the funeral. I think that’s why I don’t get excited buying clothes or shoes. As long as they aren’t falling apart I keep wearing them….

Poppies in devon

Posted on September 27, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, Cliff, Colour, cove, Devon, grasses, Idea, Life, Plants, Poppies, Red, Sea, South west, SummerLeave a comment

Memory of a trip to the Southwest of England. We stopped off at a lovely sea cove, and on the cliffs above it there were bright red poppies. These were so cheering, waving in the breeze along with rough stalks of grass. I need to paint a picture of a poppy field, this might be an inspiration to work from.

Sun’s up

Posted on August 30, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Autumn, Cold, Equinox, Flowers, Garden, Leaves, Pears, Photo, Plants, Random, Spring, Summer, Trees, Warm, WinterLeave a comment

Sunlight through leaves, making patterns on the kitchen wall. It would be brighter but the wall is painted a pale apple green. When there was a partial eclipse a few years ago the light hitting the wall turned into increasing crescent moon shapes as the Moon passed in front of the Sun. This time of year, before the autumn sets in, there is a lot of shade from the trees in the garden. The pear tree is casting most of the shade on the wall, and a few pears have started to fall as the morning temperature reduces. I can almost feel a chill in the air this morning.

Soon it will be the vernal? Equinox, when the day and night time are in balance in the Northern (and also Southern) Hemispheres of the Earth. That is when both day and night are exactly 12 hours long. Soon the days here will shorten, whilst they grow longer in the south. I hope the nights are not too cold, I would like the leaves to stay on the trees as long as possible. I always feel sad when they become skeletal in the winter and the long wait till spring comes round again drags on. I miss my flowers as they wilt and fade, and I find it harder to motivate myself in the dark days of winter. But that is a while away yet, so I will enjoy what is left of the summer while I can.

Garden in sunshine

Posted on August 28, 2022August 28, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Colours, Garden, Gardening, Growth, Heat, Humid, Moist, Plants, Summer, Water, WetLeave a comment

A less blurry shot of the yard. People asked me why its not as dried out? I think we have a microclimate. The yard is enclosed by bushes and the houses. The sun comes round in the afternoon but doesn’t stay on it for too long because we are on the ‘wrong’ side of the hill so it gets shady at East an hour before sunset. I also think because there’s a wall and we cram plants together everything stays moist. I have trouble drying my washing because it gets quite humid. Also because I put one hanging basket under another when one gets watered it flows through to the bottom one. And as they are underneath they are a bit more protected from the hot sunshine. Each pot has a bowl or a saucer underneath to catch and keep the water and I make sure each pot has crocks or broken polystyrene in them so the roots don’t get swamped.

Hidden passion flower

Posted on August 13, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Back garden, Back yard, Flower, Fushias, Garden, Hidden, Passion flower, Plant, Summer, Water, Watering2 Comments

Deep in the jungle of vegetation that is our back garden are a few passion flower plants. They were coming into bud over the last few days and at last one has flowered! It’s sitting next to a fushia plant and is on the ground. Another one is trained up the downpipe to the guttering and a third is trained along the trellis fence above the wall. The only worry is the hot weather and lack of water. We have been using a hosepipe but that is likely to be banned soon. That’s part of the reason why I hang the hanging baskets one above the other.. It drops through and waters the one below too..

I want thunder and lightning!

Posted on July 20, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Clouds, heatwave, Life, Lightning, Rain, Relief, Summer, Thunder, Water, Weather, worldwide temperatureLeave a comment

I want the skies to darken, the winds to rise, I want a swirling storm, dancing leaves. Gusts and gales and the patter of heavy raindrops! I thought we were having that earlier but realised it was water pattering down on the kitchen roof from the hose! Instead of watering the plants he was watering the roof! He thought it would cool the air. Its 15°C cooler today than yesterday! We need relief for humans and the countryside. But not just here, worldwide. The trouble is its not just one country suffering.

Thunderstorms were forecast but haven’t happened yet. I’m watching www.http://blitzortung.org to see where the storms are. They seemed to be concentrated around France and Switzerland earlier on…..

Weight on the fence.

Posted on July 2, 2022July 2, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Colours, Fence, Fun, Gardening, Hanging baskets, Plant, Planting, pots, SummerLeave a comment

The trouble with attaching hanging baskets to the fence is that as they grow and get heavier with watering it starts to bend. It’s quite a strong trellis but I think it will need replacing in a couple of years.

The wall the fence is attached to is the same old bricks the house is made of with curved coping stones on the top to keep moisture out of the centre of the wall.

Each basket has many different plants crammed in them, then there are a series of smaller baskets with single species in them. There are individual pots balanced on the top of the wall and lots of them on the ground below. Planting up pots requires a balance of compost with crocks (broken pottery) in the bottom of the pots so they have drainage, but then I usually place a saucer or a bowl underneath to catch the water so that it doesn’t dry out. We have a hose pipe so we can water everything regularly.

Window

Posted on July 1, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Blackbird, Garden, Heart, Life, Photo, Poem, Poetry, Summer, Symmetry, WindowLeave a comment

I see all ways

Up, down, side to side

A window on the world

No where to hide.

Flying through space

Into the distance

Blackbird swoops

Sings and spirals

In joy and love.

Like my heart

In the summer

Like a butterfly

Fluttering.

It might rain

Posted on June 30, 2022 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Brown, Clouds, Cold, Grey, Hail, Rain, Sky, Summer, Sunset, Thunderstorms, Weather, WetLeave a comment

The skies gone a dirty grey brown colour and the forecast is for heavy rain showers or even thunderstorms. The sun won’t be setting for at least another hour, but as they say round here ‘its gone dark over Bill’s mums!’ in other words it’s going to rain soon! In fact as I write this I can hear raindrops drumming against the window. It did try and hail earlier on and there were little grains of ice on the car windscreen.

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Summer