Waiting for Buds to Open

 

                               🌿      Any day now !     🤗    🌿

A Short Break away 🦖🦕🦈

 So , here we are ! On our way home from a couple of days fossil hunting in Charmouth .

By the way , I'm not driving ! I was holding the camera up the other way around .

Not a good idea to drive with a big basket of needlework supplies , snacks , bottle of water and a coffee cup full of water and lots of scavenged plant cuttings .

Not a good idea for me to be driving at all really , because I can't !  

Charmouth Beach with the Golden Cap in the distance .

Sunday was sunny with a chilly breeze and being Sunday , there were so many people arriving on the beach that we were glad we took our walk early . Then headed off to Chesil and Cogden Beach ....which was blissful in it's emptiness .

We did a very long trudge down and along Cogden Beach and Chesil Beach  and a gruelling walk back up to the car park . Grateful for the occasional seat to get our breath back along the way .

There's the Golden Cap in the distance .

The Crambe Maritima looking amazing at this time of the year , with it's huge white flowers . 

                         Also known as Sea Kale .

           The ancient brassica of our ancestors . Isn't it gorgeous !

Every part of this perennial kale ; the leaves , the buds like broccoli and even the roots are edible .

               Potentilla anserina , also known as Silverweed . 

                                      Just so beautiful !

 

Then off to Groves Nursery for lunch .

Ricardo had  Jacket Potato , filled with Chicken , bacon and avocado .

  I had good old jacket potato cheese and beans . 

It was busy in there so I had to go and grab a table in the shade and he knows what to order for me . He knows what I like . 

Back at the hotel , I did a little more of my Pentecost embroidery listening to some beautiful music  .

  

 🌿🕊️ Harpa Dei - Music for the Healing of Nations (From Gethsemani )🕊️🌿

"Siblings in blood and spirit . Singing in various languages Aramaic , Hebrew , Greek , Latin , Chinese and various European languages ."

Monday we walked about three quarters of the way up to the Golden Cap ... I got heat stroke ..... and can't remember much more about it really . 

 The hot weather had really caught us out , we were unprepared and had not thought to bring our sun hats .  Husband can take it ...  I can't .

We went back to the Premier Inn in Seaton . I had a very uncomfortable night feeling so poorly .

 Ricardo said he would take us home that evening but I was feeling too rough to do so . 

 Felt a bit washed out next morning , but okay to do the drive home .

We usually go fossil hunting in the Winter  , so it was lovely to see our beautiful English countryside on the drive home .

We didn't find any fossils this time , I found a piece of rock with lovely crystals inside it  . Actually there was lots of it , a geode that someone had smashed open . Huge chunks ! Beautiful and sparkling !

 I was told quite firmly that I was not to try carrying it back to the car ..hmph ... so I gathered up a small chunk . I'll show you tomorrow . 

 I did find lots of stones with holes in . I seem to be drawn to them  ! lol !  

At the moment they are in every pocket of our coats , clothes and in every corner of the car , under the seats 🤗 ..... if I hadn't been feeling so bad , there would also usually be a pile of drift wood too .... sigh .....

  I slept the rest of the way home .

 Thoughts were now turning to my plants in the shed and in the greenhouse .

 I had left one side window partly open , but if it has been as hot as it has been in Charmouth , I was afraid that I might lose everything !

 So glad to see the "Coming Home Trees "on the way back .

Back home and straight up to water everything in the shed and greenhouse .

Sweetcorn and beans have all germinated and are even climbing out of the ventilation vent of the propagator !

I might sow another batch of sweetcorn . A variety called Swift and they did come up so fast !

       🌱🌱🌱  Everything is germinating and doing really well .🌱🌱🌱

Over in the greenhouse , the tomato vines are now just beginning to push their way up and through the greenhouse bench . 🌿

Soon I will top up the pot bags they are growing in with some fresh compost .

I don't give any tomato food just yet .

    🌿 I begin to feed as they start to flower .🌿

I pulled the strings forward to gently wind the tomato stems around as they grow taller . I planted the taller growing tomato plants at this end and the shorter ones further down so that I would have access to open and close the side window .

Anyway ....

      Then we went for our evening walk .  Aah ....it's so good to be home  .

               Hope the weather is being kind wherever you are .

                        ☀️and a bitterly cold breeze again here !

                                         Love and Peace 🕊️

                                  Love Debbie x

Meanwhile in the Greenhouse 🌿🌵

 

I noticed this little Rhipsalidopsis rosea is flowering .

It's a delightful little thing and I look forward to seeing it in flower every spring .

                     I will repot it when the flowers fade . 

          I'm resting up for a couple of days . Aching from weeding and carrying the watering can around . I need to pull out the garden hose .

  I still have some weeding to do , but the ground is now too hard and dry . 

I am waiting for all my seeds to germinate in the shed . Everything is coming along nicely now I think .

 I'm going to put my feet up , do my embroidery and enjoy the lovely weather .

                                 Love and Peace  🕊️

                                             Debbie 💐x

Restoring my Herb Garden - part one

 The first thing I had to do today was to lop off that palm branch that has been bashing the top of my greenhouse in this weeks gales .

                             Done !

 Then my thoughts turn to what was my lovely herb garden ...now choked with grass and weeds . 

 The herbs are still in there ....somewhere  !

I am leaving the Bluebells and the Cowslips , rescuing others if I can .

  Lemon Balm , Sweet Woodruff , Thyme , Marjoram , Rosemary , beautiful Lemon Verbena and Rosa gallica mundi versicolour (probably spelt wrong !) 🌿

 

    A few Cowslips that I will replant somewhere else ...and Sweet Woodruff. 

I love Sweet Woodruff the best , it smells so sweet as it dries....mmm heavenly !

    

 ✨   Dried Sweet Woodruff under your pillow for sweet dreams .✨

 There is one nice clump of Foxgloves , I will leave that for the bees . 🐝🐝🐝

Made a good start . I filled the wheelbarrow then just threw the weeds onto the path to collect up later .   😜

The Rose is in the foreground . 

Between the rose and the Phoenix canariensis palm , is one very out of control Artemisia vulgaris /variegated Mugwort .  This is one herb I can do without .

  

Just putting a sprig of this under your pillow will induce horrendous nightmares ! 

 Growing ten feet tall and it's roots spreading to take over the planet ...Out ! Out ! Out !   

 

 Oh ! Maybe I'll put it into a tub of it's own . You never know when I might need it for some magic spell  ✨✨✨

    

 I couldn't move the wheelbarrow it was SO heavy . So I filled up three sacks to take to the tip and will do some more weeding when I have rested and recovered .

   The ground is starting to dry out and becoming hard to dig , so I may wait until we get some rain to make it easier to dig and finish the job .

  

 I will do a quick sweep up tomorrow morning . ....honest I will !  😜               

                                         Bye fer now !    

                               Love and Peace 💛Debbie x

Pumpkin Patch 🌿

 It's a beautiful morning here and at last that cruel east wind has stopped blowing .

Yesterday evening I made a start weeding what will be my pumpkin patch in the African Keyhole Bed . What a mess !  I did cover it over the winter but took it all off too soon . I already weeded it and now they've all grown back .

I made a good start as the sun was going down but husband ordered me to stop (poor hungry man who wanted feeding ! 🦍 ) so I didn't finish it .

Just look at that Giant Echium !

 It's started to open it's flowers and it is a white one . The bees are loving it .

                                  🐝    It's still going up !   🐝🐝

I was very pleased to find a little clump of my perennial Egyptian walking onions . I thought I had lost those . I did collect a few of the bulbils last autumn and they are coming along nicely in the shed . 

It's good to have these perennial vegetables . I have lost the perennial Daubenton's Kale sadly ...but I noticed a Brussel sprout stump re growing ...it may not produce sprout buttons but the leaves are very tasty .

                  What a mess !      Aagh !                   Robin came along to help .

      Bindweed , thistles , nettles , brambles and couch grass  . Everything !

Meanwhile in the greenhouse ....

                    That cactus bud is getting fatter !

Out in the vegetable garden , the chives that I transplanted into the Lavender bed are doing really well .

 They had been grazed almost to the ground by the  naughty bunnykins , but now they are in this bed enclosed with chicken wire and are coming back nicely .   

                    🐇🐰       Well , that's all fer now !    🐰🐇

                             Peace and love  🕊️  Debbie  💐 x

                                                🌿☀️🌿 

Spuds in Tubs - update 🥔🥔🥔🌿

 

              They are doing really well !

         I earthed them up a bit more . Almost at the top of the tubs now .

                    I gave them a good drink .

                Very happy with them !

Meanwhile in the greenhouse .....

The wind has eased up today , but we have had three days and nights of a bitterly cold , roof tile rattling gale blowing in from the east . I hung this palm flower pod to stop the wind blowing in through the keyhole .

Pelargoniums are beginning to flower  and there is a nice bud coming on this little cactus . Not a very good picture , I will take a better one when it opens up .

                        Buds are coming on the Epiphyllums ! 

                           Five buds on this one !

                              All fer now ..... love Debbie x

                                            🪷🕊️💚