500 Words...

As a child if I had been asked to write a story of no more than 500 words my thoughts would have gone to fairy tale castles...

with princesses......

and handsome princes...

So when I came to mark some of the stories submitted to BBC Radio 2's recent 500 word competition, I expected much the same. But how wrong I was!

After reading a dozen of my batch of stories I was still to come across a happy ending.. The subject matter was depressing to say the least. We had murders, family breakdown, lying in a coma, tsunamis and suicides (or, as the young writer put it, 'sewersides')....

Whilst at that age I was wrapped up in the fairy tale world,  these children were tackling subject matter which reflects the world in which they live. Is that a bad thing?

I, for one, am not sure. When you think of works by the brothers Grimm and by Hans Christian Anderson, all considered suitable bedtime reading, we were exposed to some pretty horrific subject back then, too.

I wonder then if I'm not looking back with rose-tinted spectacles.... Fairy tales just like real life have their fair share of horror.......

Reality or imagination; take your pick!

Friends...

How many "friends" do we really have? You only need to look at Facebook to see that everyone else has far more than we do....

Or do they? How many of these Facebook friends are there for us through thick and thin? With how many of these friends can we take up where we left off, even years later?

The world is full of the Facebook Friend but the true friend is a rarer breed altogether. True friendships need working at to flourish. We can't afford to take them for granted. If we do, it is our loss because a true friend enriches our life more than wealth or good fortune ever can.

Why the philosophical note?

Because I've a very special friend who is not in the best place at the moment and that thought focuses the mind somewhat.

Come on Chris; fight on!!

If you've taught me one thing, it's to value true friendship and to give it the attention it deserves.

So for all those who are thinking "it's time I got in touch with so and so....." Stop thinking and ACT today!

Help Solve a Mystery..

Can anyone help us identify a tree growing in our garden please?

Back in September, 2011, we put out a plea for help identifying a tree from in the garden. We got some feedback but no identification. 

As it is covered with catkins at the moment perhaps this will clinch it, so here goes...

Tree in leaf..

Close up of leaf..

Bark...

Bare tree..

And catkins.....

Any help identifying this tree would be much appreciated! The bees love it!

Garden Update - 19th March 2014

We went round the garden taking stock this afternoon. With the grass mowed there was time to appreciate the flowers coming into bloom...

The old shower tray is now doing good service as an alpine bed...

and it's star attraction at the moment is the aubretia, which is cascading, as it should, over onto the path..

The anemones are out and looking lovely. Who could resist their sumptuous colours?

After a few weeks of flowering, the daffodils have seen better days, though these double flowered ones still look good...

Taking their place are the tulips, the first of which are now starting to flower..

Grape Hyacinths (Muscarii) are coming up all over the place, including quite a number in the lawn, despite our efforts to move them..

The Arabis is in flower now, too

And the Goldfinch rose which George, my brother, bought for Colin and me two years ago is already full of buds...

It's going to be a picture when they all come out!

The star of the show is the Magnolia Stellata which is just starting to flower for the first time. I love it!

Hard to think we're only just in the middle of March. What a difference the spell of milder weather has made. Long may it continue, though I don't think that's what the weather men are predicting!

Hanging about...

We usually do a post about this time of year with the same theme... Mainly cos I want one and Elizabeth says definitely NO!!!

Taken on a walk very recently.

There is also one on some scaffolding on the roadside to Chatellerault...

I will keep trying and when I do I will keep it up till it drops!!!!

Mayflower

The Mayflower or Cuckoo flower or Lady's Smock (Cardamine pratensis) depending on what you know it as...

Is very aptly named ... It is generally out in May and it also coincides with the first Cuckoo...

It was out in abundance when we visited Véron last Friday afternoon but was somewhat overshadowed by the Fritillaries...

Such a shame as it is such a pretty little flower and one I have fond memories of picking for my mum as a small child.

We haven't heard a Cuckoo yet though...

A Sunday outing

This afternoon we took a ride over to the Aigronne valley to visit Tim and Pauline and look at the Fritillaries and the Purple Toothwort they had mentioned in their blog.

With detailed instructions on where to look , we couldn't fail to find them...

Here was the demarcation line dating from the Second World War..

And here was the log pile with the fallen tree....

Look close by and there they are.. Purple Toothwort...

Then back down the lane and the Fritillaries were in the dyke right by the roadside..

Our route back took us by Le Rond du Chene, and, at my request, we stopped to take a walk round one of the etangs..

I hadn't banked on having to cross the stream via a rotten tree trunk... but I managed..

The look of fear on my face was purely for effect..(!) and the scenery more than made up for the mild hesitation I felt.....

and although the shadows were beginning to lengthen it was truly glorious!

What a way to spend a Sunday afternoon!

THE Bed!

Regular readers may remember my failed attempt to grow Butternut Squash last year. One of our problems in growing anything, is that the large poplar trees surrounding the garden suck all the goodness out of the soil. We are forever digging up roots in the potager... Those trees will have to go...

In order to prove this I have created a special bed... It was going to be a raised bed, but as that meant buying timber, instead I dug a hole...

It was then lined with some strong visqueen and into this went a good layer of leaf mould covered with a layer of soil. Yes, I did put some small holes through for drainage...

This was then covered with a good layer of our home produced compost together with a little general purpose fertiliser...

Then the secret ingredient... "Chicken Sh1t"

Then more soil...

and with a top dressing and a little more general purpose fertiliser... It finally looks like this...

The chicken whisperer 'Elizabeth' has been training the chickens to do more 'secret ingredient' between the posts... Not a lot of success though!!

It will be planted with a more squash and perhaps some other test veggies... Watch this space!

Fritillaries in Véron

Last year in April we visited Véron to see a wonderful display of Fritillaries growing there. We wrote about it here.

We were looking forward to a return trip this April, until, that is, fellow blogger Susan commented that the Fritillaries are in flower a good two weeks early in the Aigronne Valley . Armed with this information we decided to take a trip up to Véron this afternoon, to see if the Fritillaries there were out early.

We were not disappointed.... Suffice it to say, the display was even better than last year! We took so many photos but we'll have to let these few give you an idea of what we saw...

 

So thank you Susan, for giving us the nod. If we'd left it much longer we would have missed the full impact of these beautiful, elegant flowers.

If you have the chance of going up to Véron over the next few days, it is well worth the visit. Get in touch if you need details.