Birthday, Fox and the last two Wallabies

 A lovely day on Thursday with two cousins, a second cousin various spouses and a dog.  Lots of happy chatter and a house full of flowers and cake.  Where have all the years gone?

Such beautiful flowers, the living room has been taken over by the delicate scent of lilies.

The larger bouquet above has been split into two vases,  I'm hoping they last a while.

We'd told everyone about our fox and badger visitors and right on cue Mr Fox appeared much to everyone's delight.  He looks a bit concerned because he's not used to there being a dog in this house.

As promised in my last post here are the last two of the ten wallabies on the Where's Wallaby trail I first mentioned  here.  Not necessarily in the order we found them.

Above is Wojtek illustrated by Joanna Dawidowska in collaboration with the Leek Polish Connection.  This one is at Tittesworth Reservoir, Meerbrook.

Above is Woody on the woodland walk in Dimmingsdale near Alton.  He's painted by Jim Mcshee in collaboration with Tean Youth Club.

Next week we are having a new conservatory roof fitted.  We had booked this in before we had the problem with the main house roof which I described in an earlier post.  So more noise and dust for the next week or two.  Thankfully no scaffolding!

Is anyone else having soaring views on their posts?  I've gone from usually no more than a hundred views to more than two thousand five hundred on my last post.  I've been told it's 'AI bots.'  All a bit worrying.  What to do?  For the moment keep calm and carry on.  

See you in September.

Orchids and books

 In February we were given an Orchid as part of a thank you present.  I wrote about it at the time - here.

About three weeks ago the last of the flowers died off so we freed the plant from its wire support and let it grow as it wanted.  Soon more flower buds appeared and now we have more flowers on the first of the two stems and buds enlarging on the second.  I'm hoping we can keep it going for a while longer.

In my last post I promised recent reading and more wallabies.

I've been reading quite a few books that had been reserved at the library over the last couple of months and as often happens they were ready for collection almost at the same time.

I enjoyed reading Gill Hornby's novel The Elopement, just as much as I did her first two Miss Austen and Godmersham Park.  All three feature the Austen and Knight families and are well researched and easy to read.  The fourth novel from the Reverend Richard Coles A Death on Location is just as gently amusing and entertaining as the the first three.

The Red Shore by William Shaw introduces a new detective called Eden Driscoll.  I've read all of William Shaw's DS Alexandra Cupidi novels which are set in Dungeness.  The new setting for this novel is Teignmouth in Devon.  I have many happy childhood memories of Teignmouth as we spent a couple of weeks there each summer over a number of years.  We stayed at the same guest house and always had a beach hut belonging to them on the back beach where the ferry crosses the Teign estury to Shaldon.  The setting for the book is in the area where we had the beach hut. I hope there are more books in this new series as I really enjoyed this one.

Above me and my cousin John on one of those holidays.  I'm not sure how old we were, perhaps nine or ten.  John was just two weeks older than me.  He would have been seventy five this coming Friday.

Death in Blitz City by David Young is set in Hull and has quite a convoluted storyline with several different elements shooting off at tangents until all is revealed.  It took a while to get into but I did finish reading it.

Another book I read on e-books Cloud Library  was Death at the White Heart by Chris Chibnall.  (I forgot to take a photo of the cover.) I hope this is the start of a series as I enjoyed it. 

I have three more books reserved but I suspect they will be longer getting around to my turn.  They are The Black Wolf by Louise Penny, Deadly Remains by Kate Ellis and The Hallmarked Man by Robert Galbraith.

Two more Wallabies spotted over the last few days.

Wobbly painted by the Rachael and Phillippa Corcutt Collective in collaboration with Borderland Voices.  He's at the Manifold Valley Visitor Centre at Hulme End near Hartington.

We treated ourselves to a coffee at The Tea Junction tea rooms.

The Wallaby above is Bere painted by Nellie Shepherd and Briony Eyre from the Bullclough School of Art in collaboration with Beresford Memorial First School.  This one is outside the Peak Wildlife Park.

All for now.

In the Garden

This Summer three Great Mullein plants have taken over one of the raised beds at the top of the garden.  

 Two plants appeared in the same bed a couple of years ago, last year they disappeared but this year there are three of the them.  

According to the RHS website Verbascum thrapsus or Great Mullein is a tall grey or white woolly biennial and grows up to 2 metres in height.  Well it being a biennial explains why we didn't see one last year.  It is also known as Aaron's Rod but has many other names including Beggar's blanket, Common Mullein, Adams's flannel, and Woollens.  

Also in the garden both Philadelphus shrubs are flowering.  One at the top of the garden.

The other in a pot until we decide where to place it.  It's my favourite mock orange - Belle Etoile.

Two different poppies have appeared

 both self-seeded.

Below 

Blue Borage

Common Chamomile

Yellow Loosestrife has returned in a different part of the garden. When we first came here the garden was full of it but we have gradually thinned it out.

Sweet Peas

Hardy Geranium

I've been picking both Sweet peas and Pinks for the house.  The scent of both is lovely.  It's been cooler today and the garden has benefitted from overnight rain.

Including the pond.  The newts are happy as well.

Monday in the Garden

I went out into the garden about 8pm. yesterday evening.  It was delightful.  Quiet and peaceful, the light was wonderful, making the garden look quite different from earlier in the day.  We had taken a walk, first thing across the local nature reserve and the May or Hawthorn  blossom was certainly out although there was a really cold wind and I was glad I'd added an extra layer under my jacket.

Later that morning I went out and took photos of the plants and flowers that have made an appearance over the last few days.

The Tamarisk tree is moving towards its fluffy pink phase.  The Peony in the back garden has two flowers open already. 

 The one in the front garden is still in bud.  Geums, Aquilegia, Bistort and Astilbe are doing well.  Also the Clematis Montana and Mountain Cornflowers.  Sweet peas are beginning to climb and twist around their supports and Rhubarb, Gooseberries and Strawberries are also doing well.

The Rhubarb is ready to eat and we've already had stewed Rhubarb with a Rhubarb Yoghurt and a Rhubarb crumble with custard.  The Strawberries will be next and then the Gooseberries.

Sweet peas and strawberries

Gooseberries

The shrub above (not sure what it is) was buzzing with bees, we counted at least a dozen on there.

No rain forecast for the next few days so some watering will have to be done.  The water butts will need replenishing soon as we've used some of the water to top up the pond. 

A Saturday Walk

Yesterday we took a local walk through Hem Heath Woods which is looked after by the Staffordshire Wildlife Trust. 

Lots of trees have been taken down over the last few months due to Ash die back.

Some parts of the wood were looking quite open and bare especially until the leaves appear on the trees.  There was lots of bird song though.  With the help of Merlin we heard Robins, Nuthatch, Blue tit, Chiffchaff, Song Thrush, Wren and Crow.

We walked as far as the pond where we spotted just one solitary duck before heading back.

There's going to be plenty of Flag Iris later in the year.

The sun was shining but suddenly it disappeared and it became colder, the birds stopped tweeting.  This was about 10.30 am.  Was this change due to the partial eclipse I heard about on the news? 

By the time we reach the end of the wood where the bluebells grow it was sunny again.  There will be lots of bluebells later this year but I hadn't seen any Wood Anemone or Lesser Celandine as we walked.  The Wood Anemones in our garden are flowering at the moment so it is time for them.

It was time for coffee and we'd parked at Wedgwood so we popped into their shopping area for coffee and cake.

We sliced the two pieces of cake in half so we had a piece of each to share.

The flower displays behind the statue of Josiah Wedgwood were pretty.

Lovely colours

and containers.

All for now.  I hope you are all enjoying the weekend.