Friday 12 July 2013

Summer time andStrawberries

I ate my first three home grown strawberries today,They gleamed out from under the leaves and I couldn't resist the warm sun drenched fruits. They were shouting out to be eaten!

In fact I found loads of wild strawberries by the roadside this morning. Gone is the fresh greeness of spring with it's frothy verges and dappled fields. The tractors have taken over.The fields have been cut and instead of a lush green are scorched yellow in the sunshine.In place of buttercups and daisies are seagulls and crows searching for flies and worms.

The grass verges have flopped and the flowers have suddenly become untidy in their bid for sunlight. However as I roamed the village today there was a mix of cultivated and wildflowers living cheek by jowl.


At the end of the drive I am greeted by my neighbours deep crimson rose which is interplanted with lambs ears just coming into flower. The planting is perfect as the flowers complement each other although she tells me it is more by chance than design.

Stella's rose






I love this mixture of delphiniums and roses too. A real cottage garden and I'm delighted at how hardy the delphiniums have proved to be as I expected them to be devastated by the slugs which can be found everywhere in  our garden.





Seeing the roses opposite me reminds me how beautiful they are and that I should buy some more.


My own front garden needs thinning this year. The plants are competing for space and need splitting up in the autumn.


In the hedgerow the elderflowers are out ready for making elderflower lemonade. Delicious but not as much (in my opinion) as rich red elderberry wine.


This convulvulus looks like a stick of rock with its candy stripes.




Here are those wild strawberries. There were loads - but in view of their size you would need a fair few to have a strawberry tea!


And the foxgloves are here, together with honey suckle,



I've always loved the scent. That and lily of the valley are my favourites.


The blue flags (or iris) which a friend gave me a couple of years back are well established and add colour to the garden,



And when I have the time to relax and paving slabs to build it on I really fancy one of these!

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