Today’s guest picture comes from one of my brother Andrew’s recent walks. He was rather surprised to find a woolly mammoth looking at him over a wall.
I had a day of mostly sitting down today although I did get about enough to mow the front lawn and do some deadheading.
We started off with some good sunshine and I had my camera with me when I was out in the garden. I know this will comes a surprise but I took a few pictures as I went around.
While I was out pedalling yesterday, Mrs Tootlepedal gave the hen a trim.
Although she has appeared a lot recently, Lilian Austin demanded to have her picture taken once again and who am I to deny a lady?
Nearby, a calendula was smiling back at the sun.
Crown Princess Margareta has found the weather very much to her taste and is crowding more flowers onto every stem each day.
The Goldfinch rose on the fence is doing well too…
…and I like the way that it changes from yellow to white as it grows old. You can get buds, young flowers, old flowers and dead heads in the same bunch.
Further down the fence the ginger syllabub is happy too.
We may feel the need to do some watering in this dry spell but the roses seem very content with the state of things.
There is no shortage of cheerful faces.
To avoid wind damage, Mrs Tootlepedal has gone for shorter delphiniums this year and she has got them well sheltered too. The results so far are good.
The oddest flower in the garden at the moment is this almost black pansy.
There are plenty of bees about which is good news and they like the poppies a lot. You can tell when a bee has visited one of them.
The best thing about the morning was the arrival of the phone engineers. For several weeks, the telephone wire to one of our neighbours has been lying at ground level across the garden. It couldn’t be stuck back onto the electricity pole from which it had become detached because the pole was unsafe. Finally the pole has been replaced so the wire could be retrieved and rehung today. Now I can tidy up the grass without worrying about accidentally cutting the cable.
As the telephone engineers left, so did we. We were off on our weekly visit to see Matilda in Edinburgh. Rather annoyingly, it was raining when we got there so we settled down to indoor fun instead of going to the park.
The rain had stopped when it was time for us to go home and as the train was on time in both directions today, the travel was pretty painless.
No flying birds today so a pair of flamingos from Matilda’s garden take pride of place instead.
Tootlepedal's Blog 
I know I’ll never get tired of seeing Lilian Austin. She’s a beautiful thing.
The black pansies are indeed odd. I didn’t know they had them.
I think Matilda is going to walk in her grandmother’s footsteps.
I haven’t seen them black pansies before this year. Mrs T must have bought them when I wasn’t looking.
I too am enamored of Lilian Austin. I never imagined there was such a thing as a Goldfinch Rose, and thank you for illustrating its stages. Amazing how the bees leave the poppies disheveled.
They lie on their backs and whizz round and round in the flower.
The roses and flowers are always a welcome sight. Lillian Austin is a very beautiful specimen.
Do you ever encounter wild roses along the seashore?
The smiling calendula looks very cheerful. I have used calendula petals in salads to brighten them up.
There are wild roses in the hedges along the roads and I have seen them beside the sea too but not recently.
Lovely roses of all sorts.
I particularly like the rose captions. Knowing how well kept is your garden, I think you have been very patiently accepting of the telephone wire.
There was no alternative so we bore it nobly.
🙂
The delphiniums are a lovely colour.
Yay for Matilda’s garden! Those black pansies do indeed look odd.
They have been eating mange tout peas in Edinburgh. Mrs T is impressed.
The chickens have eaten all of my pansies. It is a good year for the roses, and poppies.
We are still waiting for the poppies to come out in force.
I’ve a spectacular clump of red and pink double poppies, on the compost heap, none in the garden, not a clue how they arrived!
Birds?
Could be, I shall be collecting the seeds myself.
Good idea.
A picture is worth a thousand words…or so they say…so photos of your beautiful roses says it all! Stunning! Love the guest photo too but not so pretty!
My brother was glad that he had a wall between him and the mammoth.
Love the goldfinch rose and the before and after on the poppy. Those bees must have looked amazing carrying that dark pollen on their legs.
The bees have had full sacs lately.
I appreciate your powers of poppy observation.