General Chat

I've corrected it to make more sense now Mel. Don't know why it disappeared. I just got some individual colour paints to replace others I had used up and a few tubes of paint to try as well. I also got 2 chinese paintbrushes that are fat to hold paint but taper to a fine point for writing.

Your birthday card arrived today Gill so thank you! :-D

Can we see a pic of your new paints please Ann? Don't understand your last lineabout going away next month so we c re wildflower meadow??????

Vera's garden looks really great dos'nt it I like the way it grown and some of those salvias are a lovely blue with the dark stems where there have been flowers is a lovely contrast to the pklants around them.

Afternoon All,

Sunny here after a dull start. One wash is dry but there's bedding still to do. Still no rain here and I've watered the pots again and the greenhouse. The cues are growing like mad now but no colour on the toms yet. Not sure about my courgettes. The round one like last year's has had the first 3 stop growing golf ball size and go rotten and the new yellow one is only growing ones that are the shape and size of my middle fingers. :-S

That's good only 2 subs that were ok Mel. I had some yellow alpine poppies once that were about 6 inches high, but after a year or 2 no more came up........that is unless my over zealous weeder hoofed little ones out. Your OH s a cheeky devil giving you quarter of an hour off isn't he! So it's gongalong time then and nice and cool while you work in the garden. I keep meaning to ask if the tick bite was ok and has gone now?

I hadn't realised AnnG was going today! I always need a few days to decide what to pack so she is better organised and more decisive than me. I hope she has a nice time and the weather, here at least, looks good for the next few days so it should be a nice break.

What a good boy your doggie was with his toiletting Island and even checking someone had 'cleared up'.

OH has been weeding the front this morning while waiting for some records for his work to be dropped off. It's gone a bit wild out there like you were saying Vera, but it's because our neighbour with stuff growing on our fence always appears from nowhere and holds him up. Since having the little Westie he seems to have a reason to always be going for short walks and waylaying OH and others up the close as well. Their dog is normally quiet but she gets so fed up with him keep stopping to talk, you can hear her barking with impatience and always can tell when he's nattering to someone. They will be going away next month so we can have a good sort out lf the front then. We hope to go to a beautiful wildfIower meadow in Worcestershire next year. I saw it on FB. I also saw the 15 acre wildflower meadow at The Lost Gardens of Helligan on tv recently. How beautiful if the planted our roadside verges like that and just trimmed the edge near the road.

I've paid some bills so my paints are coming out now!

I wish everyone's pets were as well behaved as your little doggie Island. What a little character he was :-)

Thinking about this I remembered many moons ago calling on one of OH's work colleagues. It was one of those gardens where a weed wouldn't dare to grow and every leaf was perfectly aligned. OH remarked on the wonderful condition of their lawn and asked how on earth they managed to keep it, and the rest of the garden, looking so good when they had a child in the house, only to be told that the daughter was not allowed to play in the garden. If she wanted to play she could go to the park. She was 6! Then we went home to our house with the scuffed bit under the swing and all the bike and football marks on the grass and I knew which one I preferred.

It's still warm and dry here but the air has got very heavy. I've just done my Tesco order for Thursday and might go for a little walk now.

They are great and I'm pleased I bought another pair too.

My JR always went in the same place too. I had mum and daughter and an Alsatian. They all have their funny little ways don't they?

He was always polite with his toilet Mel. He wouldn't even 'go' in his own garden when he first moved in and always used his designated special place.

I was going to ask if the gongalongs had come out yet :-D

Gosh how lvely was that and he was telling you he had made a mess bless him.

Just going to do the lunch now. Its so very hot here I shan't be up the border this afternoon thats for sure. I do have my gongalongs on and they are lovely and cool.

Afternoon all

Dry here with sun trying to break through.
We have three tomatoes, almost the size of maltesers. How exciting is that? :-D

Vera, your mention of neat and tidy gardens has reminded me of an amusing incident with doggie.
We were visiting someone who had the most manicured garden ever. We were indoors and doggie disappeared outside. He came back in, looked at me and raced back outside - the third time he did this I followed him. He led me to a poo! The fella did the honours with the little black bag and noticed the net curtains moving - it was the dog checking that the 'evidence' was removed. So even the dog was was nervous of disturbing the 'hallowed turf' LOL

Tis really hot here now suns shining but there is a breeze.

Done the big wipe down and am just having a sit down. Did a wash and thats finished so needs to go out.

We had coffee by the pond this morning with a crumpet and watched the fish.

Mandy I have replied thank you.

Oh has just been in and saw I had finished so he said I could have the rest of the day off untill 1pm to get the lunch. :-| :-| :-| Thats about a quarter of an hour. :-| :-| :-|

The sun comes and goes but it’s quite hot here now I’ve got on well this morning. I’ve done all the ironing, prepared our meal for tonight and got some rhubarb and blueberries in the freezer. I’ve also made some phone calls and made appointments for a haircut on Friday and a session at the chiropodist next week. I haven’t been there for about a year. OH has been cutting my nails for me but they need doing properly now.

I’m just having a cuppa before deciding what to do next. There’s only a bit of tidying up to do in the garden. The rain has made everything grow so big and it’s a bit like a colourful flowering jungle out there. It looks great from above. Anyone who likes everything neat and tidy would hate it. I don’t mind it a bit natural and scruffy but we will have to take it in hand in the autumn or it will get out of control.

Morning all,

Lovely sunny morning here ,got the bedding in and I need to go to boots for our tablets .
Safe journey Anng you'll be on your way now I expect, enjoy your time with family.

Mel I have emailed you as I have yellow poppies if you want some seed ..

Morning AnngVera and all,

Looks quite bright here this morning so I am hoping its going to be a nice day.

Safe journey Anng enjoy your little break away.

Big wipe down day today and I have 2 subs, my little wholemeal loaf for a Kingsmill 800g one instead of my 400g Hovis and Asda tinned toms instead of the Napoli ones. Both acceptable.

Good morning AnnG and all

Safe journey AnnG. The roads shouldn’t be too busy on a Tuesday. Have a lovely time when you get there

We had more rain overnight but it looks quite bright out there at the moment and there’s no rain forecast for today. I haven’t got any plans for the day; I’ll just take it as it comes.

Good morning, up early, hope to leave about 0730 although the others are not up yet. Speak later I expect.

I want that yellow poppy too and took two seed heads off a plant I saw and left them in the car!!!! It grows in a wall down in the village. Round by Bradford church just up the raod those poppies grew all over the celtic cross onthe corner. All yellow and orange ones. I wonder if they still grow there? I hav'nt been there for years since I gave up ringing.

I still think it must be Angels fishing rods.

I have sword lillies in the garden. Did I say they could be Kaffir Lillies I have some of those in pale pink.

Thank you Gwyn! The plant is still a mystery then? I wonder how long the slender stems were? Thin stems like that make me think of Harebells. Some of those are a delicate pink.

Boris's update was rather unclear as usual. It's not a rule any more but we expect....... We are to think of the vulnerable, yet wear masks at our own discretion. How do we know who is vulnerable that we may be close too? It isn't always obvious is it.

Happy Birthday Ann.

I hope you enjoy using all your lovely presents.

Thank you for the recent link to the pretty tall flowers. They remind me of the magenta sword lilies that grew wild in Cyprus. The garden plant near here has a much thinner stem rather like a seed head stem on a clump of grass.

I was interested in what you said about sowing poppy seed Mel.
Recently I collected seed head from a yellow poppy plant in my daughter's garden, which I was going to keep until next year, but I might try scattering some of the seed soon.

Thank you and that will be fine Gill as I know you have a lot on your mind with all the work and difficulty finding workmen. I keep my cards up for a couple of weeks as it is cheery looking at them so yours will join the others. :-D Even slow steps will get you there eventually so just keep doing what you can. Hold ups are inevitable when you have to rely on others to do some of the work. About the ivy growing up the trees, just cut the ivy stems growing up the trees about a foot from the bottom. You can leave them for a week or two to wither and they will be easier to pull off the trunks then and will stop them growing. Then you can deal with the roots and use the bottom of the stems you cut and left to pull with when you dig the roots out.

AnnG your card had purple little studs? down one side and a pretty watering can of flowers. I could only get lenses for the bridge camera. There is a thread to screw them on top of the camera lens. I can't attach any to my pocket camera either or I would have preferred that. It has been suggested to me to try holding a magnifying glass in front but I haven't tried it yet!

That's a good idea to plant some of the poppy seeds now and save some to put in the ground next year Mel. They are a nice height to go between some of the shrubs in the borders where it is sunny. :-)

The kitchen noises were because he had removed the yorkshires to go in later as it said to do and when he went to put them in the oven he realised he hadn't taken out 2 roast potatoes that were sitting inside them that should have been with the rest of the meal!! lol. I told him to put them in the oven next to the yorkshires anyway and I would microwave them a couple of minutes at the end of the time. I did and they were fine. It's good for him to see the things us women have to think about and do to get ourselves out of problems! His neck is hurting now so he's having a lie down. :-D

I'm having a go to see what my new paints are like now.

Nice to hear from you Gill. It sounds like your getting there slowly and managing to get the garden cleared. At least you have hot water now and can relax in a bath to ease the aches and pains.

Been raining here and now the suns out and its still hot today sun in or out or raining.