It takes two to tootle

Today’s guest picture, sent by my sister Mary, shows Mr Grumpy’s London cousin trying to pass himself off as a swan or goose at the Serpentine.

We were threatened with rain today but in the end it didn’t arrive until the evening and we had a dry, cool day instead.  I had to begin the day with business relating to the photo exhibition and that took me until coffee time,

After coffee, I did a little bird watching.  The bright but sunless day made the light ideal for portraits both on the feeder…

…and in the plum tree.

A blackbird posed on the chimney pot.

Soon though, Mrs Tootlepedal, our daughter Annie and I set off for the Moorland bird hide in the hope of seeing some interesting birds and its living roof.  We saw the roof….

Tricky to get a mower up there.

….but we hardly saw any birds let alone any interesting ones.  My daughter took a picture of the bug hide….

…as she is going to build one in London.

We stopped looking for birds and explored some of the other things to see near the hide.

A slow worm

A tiny plant, possibly some sort of nettle.

And a really good show of orchids.

We decided to go along the road a bit further and see if the wild irises were out in the marshy meadow beside the Tarras Water.

There were very few irises to be seen and the ones that were there were too far into the boggy bits for us to get near.  There was plenty of other interest though, as we walked through the long grass.

There was the grass itself….

…ragged robin….

…more orchids…

…and quite a lot of hard to shoot butterflies.

I finally got a better shot of one of the butterflies just as we got back to the car.

It is a ringlet butterfly

We paused at the bird hide on the way back and were pleased to get a passing glimpse of a woodpecker.  In spite of the lack of interesting birds, the walk through the meadow and been quite good enough to make the outing a success.

We got back in time for lunch and a walk round the garden.

The Wren and Lilian Austin, one on each side of the path at the back of the front lawn, compete to see which is the most beautiful.

The bees found the Gallica Complicata more attractive than either.

For lovers of Edith Piaf’s music, there might be an echo in the thought of a bee on rose.

A fresh rose, Rosa Mundi has come to join the gang.

I like the Goldfinch because it starts out white and turns yellow giving me two roses for the price of one.

The clematis which I showed gently unfurling recently, has now completed the job.

It was worth the wait.

The afternoon drifted away with Mrs Tootlepedal cooking and me watching the tennis with Annie. I stirred myself up enough to mow the middle lawn and sieve some compost and then my flute pupil Luke came.  I had worried about his ability to count the beats well after last week’s lesson and had spoken sternly to him about the need to do something about this.  He had done something and amazingly (and very satisfactorily) came back this week with his foot tapping in rhythm and the notes played in the right place and at the right pace.  He must have practised really well.

My friend Mike, the usual Monday night cellist in our trio, had other business tonight so after tea, Annie and I packed up a couple of recorders and three trio sonatas by Boismortier, Daniel Purcell and William  Williams and went off to play with Isabel.  Annie hasn’t played for some time but we puffed away while Isabel sight read the keyboard parts and had a delightful time.  We kept the tempos steady and by and large not only started at the the same time but finished at the same time too.

The flying bird of the day is a goldfinch keeping its hands where we can see them.