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It’s Midsummer’s Day and my final lockdown post...For Now!

Lovely day with sun, flowers, birds. Our cherry trees are thick with fruit - not for human consumption though.

Blackbird take-away restaurant. In comes a customer to peruse the menu.

Hmm? That one looks tasty...bit tricky to pick in the wind though. The branches are swaying about.

And off he goes to scoff in private.
















Much as we have enjoyed these past few months in our garden and countryside, I am so sorry so many have had to endure the nightmare and hope everyone can get some respite for a while.

We are tentatively looking at end September to cross the Channel. Brittany Ferries are running again and hotels are open so we will take a leap of well sanitised faith. I have ordered jazzy masks and filters from Vistaprint! Le Blog will take over.

For now, I leave you with a message from The Bard. 

If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber'd here
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream,   

(Puck’s ‘s valediction, A Midsummer Night’s Dream)

If only!

Breaking rocks in the hot sun...

Singalong now!

Well yes it is hot. Adrian has gone to the sea and I am having a day to myself. First an hour tidying up my family history account - at least one section. Quite enough for one day. Then out into the blazing sun to dig up rocks from various dump sites round the garden, place them into the barrow, trundle them to the roadside and build a wall! OK an edging. I am tired of louts driving their trucks over the bank so have placed stones in their way. Some are pretty hefty and might just be sharp ones - not tellin’. I’ve weeded and put in all sorts of plants just so it looks like somebody owns it.

The weather was iffy over the weekend and we didn’t really do much except pruning and mowing. Still able to enjoy plenty of sunshine though. I thought the baby wrens in the open fronted shed had fledged but when I went to snap the empty nest, there was a tiny face at the entrance! In fact there were at least three.

The garden is heaving with birds of all ages stuffing their beaks with caterpillars, cherries, seeds. Mrs Pheasant is actually eating chaenomeles leaves and even an unripe fruit - whole! She is seriously strange that one.

Allons, enfants...

Well ‘tis an auspicious day. 80 years since Le Général broadcast his Appel. La Patrouille are joining The Red Arrows for a fly-past, M. Le Président is visiting (no quarantine for him). And Vera Lynn has died. What a curious collision of events.

The mugs are bicentenary revolution commemoration, bought in 1989 in Brittany.

A little fact about the Ile de Sein (south of Brest)




After hearing de Gaulle’s call to resistance in his Appel aux Français, every male inhabitant aged between 14 and 54 (or 60, according to the island's official website) - variously totalled as 114 to 128 - set sail in their fishing boats for Britain to join the Free French forces. For this, on 1 January 1946, the community was awarded the high honour of the Ordre de la Libération.






Weather report...pouring down and grim here today.

Rural calm

Ah, the buzz of bees, the warbling of birds, a distant mooing... Well think again! This morning we had duelling strimmers. First the chap who does the churchyard with his brush cutter. And then he was joined in a duet of raucous racket by our neighbour. The sparrows immediately upped the decibels. Cacophony!

Adrian has now had 30 ticks.

There is distant thunder heading for Cardiff.

First hollyhock.

Precious Bane

Unexpectedly today was hot. Big billowy white clouds and blue sky. The rain has messed up the roses a bit and some are drooping with heavy clusters of flowers and brown soggy petals. Albertine has stood up, best this year and looks good in all weathers. But the scent is everywhere, from the sweet peas by the kitchen door to Buff Beauty by the workshop. Delicious.

I have a tale of mistaken identity to relate. Some years ago our neighbour gave me a currant bush. I swear he said it was a blackcurrant and I lovingly tended it, even taking three cuttings to produce more. All are thriving and this year had a lot of fruit, nicely turning colour from green to red. Big too - exactly blackcurrant size. We already had a redcurrant that produces puny fruit. Then Adrian says, those redcurrants are ripe on the new bushes. Red, I scoffed...fool, they are blackcurrants! I tasted one and realised he was right. Sob. All these years hoping for a blackcurrant... I let him pick them.

Anyway, back to today. I insisted on a walk but we changed tack a bit because of potential bovine hazards and went up past Selwyn’s towards Cheldon Cross. Leaning over a gate all we could hear were larks singing their hearts out across the moor. I got the phone out to record them and they just stopped. Completely. Total silence apart from the breeze and a distant blackbird.

A bit farther down the road they started up again, so we have a before and after pair of videos.

Adrian spotted an open field gate where obviously they’d taken a hay crop and as we’d never actually walked this one we set off round its edges. It’s a lovely field that rolls down in the direction of the river and you are soon out of sight in a secret combe. It belongs to our Dutch neighbour Hans and we are sure he won’t mind. Not much flora though apart from grass. Just some yarrow and a few patches of clover and buttercup.

Nice old oak trees and a lovely wild rose hedgerow.

And then! Wonderful...two hares charged down the hill. This to me is even better than seeing a heron.

They galloped about and away but didn’t seem at bit troubled by our presence. In fact this is a known hare patch and we do see them from time to time but usually from the car. It made our day.

One other piece of wildlife news - Adrian has now had 25 ticks. He’s going for the record this year!

And now I must return to Trondheim, having abandoned my Franco Norsk family for a group of foreign students. All obsessed by sjokoladekake and horrified by the cost of everything in Norway - alt er så dyrt i Norge!

we need more peonies

I have a few. Not enough. Absolutely my all time favourite. I have a plan to fill this bed with many more, single, double, red, white, pink...

They are in the midst of the Gallicas - Tuscany Superb with its deep dark blooms, clear red Rose of Lancaster and its sport, stripey Rosa Mundi. All set about with a frill of pink and blue geraniums.








The weather is mixed. We’ve had a whole load of rain, cold and strong winds. But also sun and warmth. I walked up to the water treatment unit half way up Chawleigh hill this morning, and it was like trudging through a sauna. They have threatened thunderstorms for later.

Fields are off limits because there are Cows And Young! Some of them have eaten half my hedge, in particular the lime leaves. Grr.

Word of the day...Helseforsikring - health insurance.
Or, if you prefer...Oppholdstillatelse - residence permit

june

It’s turned a bit drear. Wet and cold. I know I know, we need the rain but it transforms the garden into a rather bedraggled state and suddenly the roses start needing dead heading. Already! Some are yet to come out - Tuscany Superb, I mean you! Get a move on.... But Félicité et Perpétue is utterly charming in front of the window and I feel like a heel because years ago I tried to remove it. It’s actually a rambler and sends out great tentacles of stems that obscure the windows. So it was either cut it back or turn into Sleeping Beauty’s briar patch. But no matter how vicious I am with the secateurs it always flowers with its clusters of pretty pink buds and small white flowers. Smells nice too.

The birds are going frantic now. Cacophony of songs from Robin, Blackbird, White Throat, Chiff Chaff, Goldfinch etc etc. Fluttering baby sparrows and marsh tits being fed. And today I witnessed Mr and Mrs Bullfinch stuffing their crops with rosemary flower seed heads.

We went for a duty walk down the road towards Chawleigh before the next shower and were accompanied by flocks of small brown butterflies. Meadow Brown. The honeysuckle is out and there are promising quantities of bramble flower buds about to burst.

And the sun’s out again with a backdrop of dramatic sky. We have no veg so I’ve had to cut our first tiny courgettes a bit earlier than intended.

Cut out the middleman

We are fed up with ordering flour from supermarkets. It never materialises. Full of hope one selects it and even welcomes any reasonable substitute so long as it isn’t self raising or wholemeal. There are limits! As delivery date nears, the desired product is often subbed for another on their list, but hope is not extinguished. Until that is the pre delivery email arrives. At the top of the list they put the products they either cannot supply or have substituted. Flour is always there out of stock, no available substitute.

So...lateral thinking ...order direct from the mill. A quick Google and there is Marriage Millers of Chelmsford doing bulk purchase online. I used to walk past this mill every day in 1968/9 when I was a student in Chelmsford. Nice to see they are still in the same place.






And so, a mere few days after ordering, the parcel appeared. Six kilos of seedy bread flour. We’d been for a walk and trip to Chawleigh for milk and there it was on our return, waiting in the post trunk. Magic!

Heroes

My nephew Ben. Works mostly at home developing online teaching materials for Raspberry Pi but is now having to multitask as a Primary teacher to his three children. Claire, his wife, is a doctor on the front line.

Raspberry Pi asked him to record a video about the challenges of home schooling.



Here is his video...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B844RnlXSFo

Too hot!

But it won’t last - cool change coming our way from the North so they say. Fluffy white vapour trails criss crossing our garden which denotes Cold Air up top.
This morning however was sticky. We decided a walk down into the coolth of the forest would be a bonne idée. But first...check Ernie. Always an anxious moment as to whether one will see image of confetti and champagne or the stark message Sorry. Yeah! today was champers - I won £50. And a quick check on the latest flowerings. Ferdinand Pichard has recovered and is in fine fettle this year.

Anyway, revenons à nos moutons. The walk. Along towards East Cheldon passing as we went the man stone-facing Winton’s gateway, white foxgloves on Winswood Cottage bank, Hans in his Landrover, the new mast behind Winswood Farm. And, yes, sheep. Some had been sheared (shorn?) and looked a bit punk-like with spikes of wool that had been missed! Beautiful wild roses in the hedgerow.

As we leaned over a gate looking north across the moor I spotted a dark shape in a far field of grass. A deer. Camera out, zoom to maximum, and it was revealed as a hind with a fawn. Apologies for fuzzy image but this was a long way away. You can tap to enlarge but it ain’t great! But lovely to see.

We gained the shade of the woods down to the ford and suddenly all was magically peaceful. Just the sound of birds in the trees. And the ping and click of Adrian’s camera!
It’s a steep descent to the ford and one has to question whether or not the return climb is worth it. Today it was.












It’s worse in the imagining than the actual doing actually. And so nice to stand on the footway over the water. Have a listen... video at the bottom.

On the way back we heard the familiar song of a yellowhammer and there he was on a wire. We used to see so many of them but now just a handful.

Back home, the postman delivered our new hose attachment for the kitchen tap so it was all systems go to fill the soaking tank with a hosepipe so we can water the veg. Even if it does rain tomorrow it probably won’t be more than deux gouttes - Jean de Florette country here at the moment.

the video...

Bloomin’ marvellous!

We feel guilty actually enjoying life. Sorry. But it’s sunny, warm, quiet and the garden is a delight. Birds, butterflies, flowers.













This morning I just sat in the sun making a base out of left over willow, accompanied by Mr Pheasant who hovered about moving from one sunny spot to another to take his ease. He’s starting to look a bit ragged, poor old chap! After which, I took up the shears and cut down the faded cow parsley on the roadside bank. Too hot! Everything is bone dry and bleached despite efforts at watering essential plants.

Today’s tally of new flowering includes two roses. Charles de Mills, Gallica (spot the aphids - they are bad this year),

and Rosa Glauca with its almost insignificant single pink flowers and glorious blue/grey foliage.

The blue iris in the ponds are coming out.

This one took three days

No sighting of kite today but we did spot it yesterday evening as we walked back up the road.

jardin potager

Maybe a bit of an exaggeration... but we do have produce of sorts.

salad leaves

tomatoes

courgettes and an unidentified item (possibly pepper)

potatoes salvaged from supermarket purchases that sprouted!

gooseberries both green and black. Or red...anyway dessert variety.
This green bush is old and prolific. The dessert one is too close to the bonfire and gets scorched rather a lot! Still it provides me with a couple of servings.

and currants of many hues. These are black. A small crop! The white and red don’t look in the best of health this year - not enough rain. And anyway we won’t get a look in on the red ones if blackbird and pheasant see them.

As we were eating our burgers what should appear but not one, but two, kites!

Beloved Bench revisited

No, we didn’t just do a Cummings and drive to Ventoux! There is another venerable bench in our lives - one given to us by my father when we first moved here. It’s had two sets of replacement slats since then and sits comfortably under the silver birch with views across the garden.

It’s where I tend to gravitate to with mug of tea in hand. Slightly hidden away. And it’s where I sit sorting willow or cutting scalloms - the ground around it often festooned with shavings. A bit like a plucking post!

But at this time of year, and increasingly so, sitting is a crime because up through the slats come the dog daisies, poking their lovely white heads against the silvered lichens. You really wouldn't want to squash them. So if I want to
slappe av at the moment, I need to draw up a chair!

While snapping this handsome goldfinch I failed to see - until too late - the Kite, again.

This is all I could get! So tricky to focus into a vivid sky at a moving target. That’s my excuse anyway.